Captivity, Desire, Trade

Abstract

This chapter continues the discussion of Equiano/Vassa's autobiography, focusing on its role in the literary tradition as the most important eighteenth-century slave narrative in order for Barrett to set up the long tradition of the fugitive slave narrative in its pre-classic (prior to 1800), classic (1830–1865), and postbellum (1865 and later) versions. It then turns to a number of fugitive slave narratives and related abolitionist texts from the classic period: William Grimes's Narrative of the Life of William Grimes, the Runaway Slave (1855); James Bradley's 1835 journalistic account of his own enslavement; David Walker's Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World, but in Particular, and Very Expressly to Those of the United States of America (1829); Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself (1845) and My Bondage and My Freedom (1855).