Olaudah Equiano

Olaudah Equiano (aka Gustavo Vassa ) (* 1745 in Igbo (present-day Nigeria), † March 31, 1797 in the U.S.) was a former slave, a fighter for the abolition of the slave trade and the author of a then very famous autobiography.

Biography

Equiano was captured as 11- year-old boy from slavers transported to the coast and sold to slave traders. He survived a harrowing crossing ( " middle passage " ) and landed on the West Indian island of Barbados. The boy went from hand to hand, and came to Virginia after a short time to a plantation owner, who in turn sold it to an English naval officer named Henry Pascal. As a personal servant he took from 1757 to 1762 on the Seven Years War in America part. In 1762 he was further purchases to a plantation owner and came back to the West Indies. Here he could buy himself free ( redemption ), but remained with his master, the Quaker Robert King. From 1767 to 1773 he worked on various merchant ships and made trips to the Mediterranean and the West Indies. 1773 he took part in an expedition to the Arctic. Convinced of Christian thought he was Methodist.

From 1775 to 1776 he helped his friend and former employer, Dr. Charles Irving in setting up a plantation in Central America. Here he realized that the slave-owning system could not be improved, and thus became active campaigner for a ban on trade with people, of which it was hoped to bring the system over time to disappear. 1777 back in England he found connection to the abolitionist movement to Granville Sharp. He concentrated his work on three areas:

He married an Englishwoman, had two daughters, whom he raised them even after the death of his wife, he led a bourgeois existence, leaving his daughters a considerable fortune.

The life story of Equiano, as shown in his autobiography, was examined and questioned at length by Vincent Carretta. In case of doubt, however, was merely his African origin. Vincent Carretta imputed to him ( to be born in Africa) its origin, and to have invented his survival during the crossing -free, not just to sell more books, but also to give the movement against the slave trade drive, so Vincent Carretta.

Works

• Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa the African, written by himself. 9th edition. Self Publishing, London 1794, OCLC 470,255,901th

Modern edition:

• Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative and Other Writings. Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Vincent Carretta. Penguin Books, New York 1995, ISBN 0-14-043485-2.

In German published:

• Strange life history of the slave Olaudah Equiano, published by himself in 1789. Insel Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1990, ISBN 3-458-16073-6.

Secondary literature

• Vincent Carretta: Equiano the African: Biography of a Self-Made Man. University of Georgia Press, Athens 2005, ISBN 0-8203-2571-6.