The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Written by Himself

Olaudah Equiano’s 1789 narrative tells the remarkable story of his childhood in Africa, his kidnapping and subsequent years as a slave and seaman, and his eventual road to freedom in the Caribbean and in England. The text reprinted here is that of the 1789 first edition. It is accompanied by explanatory annotations, textual notes, and a map of Equiano’s travels.
“Contexts” provides essential public writings on the work by James Tobin, Gustavus Vassa (Olaudah Equiano), and Samuel Jackson Pratt; general and historical background by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Eva Beatrice Dykes, Wylie Sypher, Charles H. Nichols, Nathan I. Huggins, and David Dabydeen; related travel and scientific literature by Anthony Benezet, John Matthews, and John Mitchell; eighteenth-century works by African authors James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, John Marrant, and Quobna Ottabah Cugoano; and English debates about the slave trade by Thomas Clarkson, John Wesley, and William Wilberforce, as well as antislavery verse by Thomas Day and John Bicknell.
“Criticism” includes six contemporary reviews of The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. Nine modern essays are contributed by Paul Edwards, Charles T. Davis, Houston A. Baker, Jr., Angelo Costanzo, Catherine Obianju Acholonu, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Geraldine Murphy, Adam Potkay, and Robert J. Allison.
A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are included.