Whether this is a positive or a negative is up to the reader to decide.
As a portrait of a life, The Interesting Narrative offers up one of the most unbiased, matter-of-fact autobiographies that I have ever read. His decision to publish the narrative under the name of Gustavus Vassa is interesting in and of itself, and is indicative of a man whose existence seems to be fraught by some vague internal contradiction. These discrepancies are never reconciled, and we are left with a portrait of a man who, despite being fervently opposed to the trade, never quite finds the means to embrace his African identity. Though a slave himself, not all of Equiano’s actions opposed the trade, and his proposed solution isn’t exactly compelling by retrospective standards. Equiano’s initial account of his enslavement may be the most compelling part of this book, but that doesn’t make his subsequent indictment of it any the less biting.Įquiano lived quite a complicated life, truth be told, and the book doesn’t make any attempt to reconcile some of the more contradictory aspects of it to his entreaty against slavery.
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