Reading Notes W2: Oroonoko, Part B

Aphra Behn, “Oroonoko; or, The Royal Slave” (225-246)

Plot:

This reading covers the life of one African Prince: Oroonoko (or Caesar) and the story of what he goes through. In these specific pages (225-246), we learn about the struggles Caesar goes through in living the rest of his life as a slave. As if by fate, he comes across Imoinda (now Clemene) and is happy to see her. In fact, they even conceive a child of their own. However, it is the end of the story that really gets me. This twist in the story happens to be when Caesar kills his wife and unborn child in the reason that he felt there was no way they could reach freedom. He had a whole plan that involved killing her and others: “he told her his Design first of Killing her, and then his Enemies, and next himself, and the impossibility of Escaping, and therefore he told her the necessity of dying” (242). She was even willing to obey him and die by his hands.

This twist in the story sent the rest of the events down a dark path.

After killing her, there was no return and you could get the sense of hopelessness in his life as a slave due to the narrator’s sympathy. It makes the reader sympathize with the Prince, even if he did kill his wife. He just felt it was the only way out.

He is killed after this and dies in a horrible way: “the Executioner came, and first cut off his Members and threw them in the Fire; after that, with an Ill-favoured Knife, they cut his Ears, and his Nose, and burn’d them; he still Smoak’d on, as if nothing had touch’d him…” (246).

This twist in the plot is important because:

1)      The pipe represented his honor and how he would accept death as if by example. It was emphasizing how important it was that he was a great man and of high importance. It was as if he was a martyr: believing in freedom.

2)      This plot twist emphasizes how bad slavery actually was and that freedom was hard to find. It seems that she was pointing out that slavery was not humane and that slavery could put a man down this path.

3)      Caesar stuck by his beliefs till the end: aiming for revenge and freedom if he could.

In personal opinion, the twist needed to be there as a shock factor so people could understand how grave slavery was, no matter how intense and sad the ending is.