Ross Appleton

Abstract:

Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko is often cited as a pre-eminent anti-colonial text, in part because of the daring representations of non-European peoples, not as savage and subordinate but as civilised and above all human.  These views went against the dominant literary representations of the period which sought to justify colonialisms progress. This piece measures whether in Oroonoko, one can see the emergence of an anti-colonial voice. Appleton locates Behn’s novella in the wider anti-colonial movement in literature and art and by this process assesses the radicalism of Oroonoko. In placing the text amongst Michel de Montaigne’s Of Cannibals, William Shakespeare’s The Tempest and John White’s illustrations, Appleton highlights Oroonoko’s value as an anti-colonial text. Appleton argues that from its formal content to the context of its publication the novella contains an essential radicalism. Oroonoko is a story recounted by a woman and written by a woman, Appleton states that this unquestionable authority over the narrative transgresses the rigid gendered boundaries of the early modern literary landscape. Behn equates the enslavement of Africans with the oppression of women, Appleton argues that it is this unique blend of feminism and colonial critique that give Oroonoko a unique, radical stance on colonialism.

Description:

This critical piece locates Aphra Behn’s novella Oroonoko in the wider anti-colonial movement in literature and painting and looks at whether the text can be read as possessing an emergent anti-colonial voice. Oroonoko is situated amongst Montaigne’s Of Cannibals, parts of Shakespeare’s The Tempest and John White’s paintings. Through this process Appleton measures the radical anti-colonial voice in Oroonoko which dared to challenge dominant representations of other cultures in the early modern period as uncivilised.

 

Oroonoko: An emergent anti-colonial voice?

Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko is a radical text for a variety of reasons, both in its formal content and the context of its publication and reception, the novella defies dominant ideas of gender and presents an alternative image of the new world. The authority of this narrative is unquestionable, in a story recounted by a woman and written by a woman Behn transgresses the gendered boundaries of the early modern literary landscape.  Perhaps most radical, are the depictions of non-European peoples which serve to dispel the myths of indigenous Americans as savage and slaves as un-civilised, peddled for decades by colonising Europeans, and seeks to question the dehumanising effects of slavery and colonisation; which were all ignored in the process of empirical economic gain. This is not a perfect text, for a modern reader its anti-colonial voice is limited by certain terminology and particular comparisons of race. But these issues hold less weight when Behn’s representation of indigenous peoples are compared to other literature and painting of the period, which serve as a stark reminder of dominant opinion of the period; that native meant uncivilised. However, whilst these views and representations were dominant that does not mean there were not deviations and more valid and fair depictions. Textually, we see the probing and questioning of colonialism emerging in Michel de Montaigne’s 1580 essay Of Cannibals and William Shakespeare’s The Tempest thought to have been written between 1610 and 1611. John White’s illustrations from 1585 of indigenous Americans, are not necessarily anti-colonial but they provide an objectivity lost previously in other art works. In setting Oroonoko in the wider anti-colonial movement and against popular, mass circulated representations of native people one can chart the emergence of Behn’s radical stance on colonial projects and in turn, slavery.

In publication alone Behn is a radical figure. Being a woman writer and having autonomy in her art is in itself radical but this has led to a simplification of Behn’s work by early feminist writers. Vita Sackville-West’s observation that ‘Behn’s having written at all is “much more important than the quality of what she wrote”’(Plasa, 1994, p.4) can serve to undermine the attention given to Behn’s output. As this book shows Behn transcends genre and formal limitation to challenge society about gender, race and countless other issues. Assessing the extent to which Oroonoko charts the emergence of an anti-colonial voice is done best by way of through locating the book contextually in relation to the dominant representations of early colonial projects in the Americas, some current at the time of Behn’s writing, critiques of colonialisms and objective representations of indigenous people.

The novella presents two groups of non-European people, firstly the reader is shown the indigenous people of Suriname and secondly African slaves are introduced to work the colonised land. The early descriptions of ‘perfect tranquillity’ (Behn, 1997, p.10) in Suriname are respectful, written with a tone of wonder and amazement, our narrator refers to flora and fauna of ‘amazing forms and colours.’ (Behn, 1997, p.9) We are told of the ‘amity’(Behn, 1997, p.8) with which the colonisers interact with the indigenous population, ‘without daring to command ‘em’(Behn, 1997, p.8) the colonisers rely on trading ‘for their fish, venison’ and ‘buffalo.’ (Behn, 1997, p.8)These people are described as the ‘absolute idea’(Behn, 1997, p.10) of ‘the first state of innocence’(Behn, 1997, p.10) , Behn goes on to push this idea noting similarities between the natives code of dress and ‘Adam and Eve’(Behn, 1997, p.10) which produce a pre-lapsarian image in the readers mind. The setting is key to arc of the text, the slaves brought to Suriname are not ‘natives of the place.’ (Behn, 1997, p.8)

In engaging the reader with a peaceful, serene image of the new world, Behn is able to show the chaos that comes with colonisation; this in and of itself is a radical proposition. The idea of the civilising hand of European culture was dominant and acted as a justification of colonialism. To many today the idea that other cultures level of development needed to be measured by European standard is ludicrous but this remained unquestioned by many in the period. Whilst these views were dominant, Behn is not the only one we see deviating from this view; in the arts John White’s illustrations serve as an interesting comparison. Drawn between ‘1584 and 1590’ (Pratt, 2009), White is perhaps the first ‘English artist taken abroad specifically for the role of making a visual record’ (Pratt, 2009), in the first British settlements in America. They are seen by many as ‘objective records immune from any process of mediation’(Pratt, 2009),  and whilst they were conceived on a colonial expedition, the objectivity and respect for other cultures marks them out as fairer in their representation of indigenous Americans.  Stephanie Pratt, of the British Museum, wrote in 2007 that upon seeing White’s work for the first time that ‘Virginian and North Carolinian Indian representatives’(Pratt, 2009),  praised the drawings and were able to recognize ‘our brothers and sisters’(Pratt, 2009),  and saw their ‘traditional practices well represented.’ (Pratt, 2009),  The detail with which White records indigenous Americans also breaks down the homogenisation in representations of them as all looking similar and believing similar things. With White we see not necessarily an anti-colonial perspective but a fair representation and one endorsed by descendants of those illustrated; in Behn’s initial representation this air of respect is solidified.

In asserting a strong female narrative voice Behn is allowed to withhold information and release it. Behn utilises this tool to aid an objective, non-othering representation of Imoinda.  Halfway through the narrative Behn reveals to the reader that Imoinda’s entire body is carved in tattoos, ‘carved in fine Flowers and Birds all over her Body.’ (Behn, 1997, p.40) The emittance of this vital visual description ‘I had forgot to tell you’(Behn, 1997, p.40) demonstrates a radical female voice that can manipulate her readers, by withholding information that could distance them from sympathising with certain characters because of cultural differences. Playing on these preconceptions about slaves Behn goes to compare them to ‘Cæsar’(Behn, 1997, p.40)  who was also tattooed. Imoinda’s tattoos, Behn writes, resembled ‘our antient Picts that are figur’d in the Chronicles’(Behn, 1997, p.40), measuring beauty by European standards can be problematic as it can lead to certain expressions of appearance or cultural practice in other cultures being permitted, only if there is a European parallel.  Behn goes beyond this problem in commenting, ‘but these Carvings are more delicate’ (Behn, 1997, p.40) and in doing so inverts the hierarchy by placing African cultural tattoos above Roman ideas of beauty. Behn takes an idea which is problematic and radicalises it, taking it beyond her readerships preconceptions about other cultures built up from the dominant accounts of colonial exploits elevating the value of other cultural expression. Behn compares the indigenous people of Suriname to Adam and Eve which has been argued as belittling of non-European cultures making them seem primitive or un-civilised. However, I think this comparison could be in fact high praise that aligns the indigenous people with a prelapsarian world, free from sin and corruption making Europe a corrupt post fall world that has lost something. This is a radical view that inverts the dominant representation of colonisation as positive and natives as savage.

One limit to Behn’s radicalism is the problem, of what Anne Fogarty calls; ‘representativity’(Plasa, 1994, p.3)  in literature. From the outset Oroonoko claims to be a True History, a history in which the people Behn is representing have no say and the perspective remains that of a privileged white woman, who is part of a colonial party. In its infancy the novel became ‘a form dealing with adventures in far off lands’(Azim, 1993, p.21)  Oroonoko and Robinson Crusoe are both texts that could claim the title of the first novel both of which are centred around colonial experience; making the very form of the western novel complicit with colonialism.

Michel de Montaigne’s 1580 essay Of Cannibals is one of the first anti-colonial texts, Montaigne is foundational in highlighting the strange binary view that Europeans had taken with regard to other cultures. Through inversion, Montaigne shifts the idea of native as savage, writing ‘everyone gives the title of barbarism to everything that is not in use in their own country’(Montaigne, 2006), questioning the long held idea of difference as demonstrably negative and uncivilised and pointing out that ‘they are savages at the same rate we say fruits are wild.’(Montaigne, 2006) Montaigne writes this piece over a hundred years before Oroonoko, his writing contains views and opinions that informed Europeans society of the problems of seeing European colonial projects as civilising. Montaigne reverses this idea of Western superiority and places a great emphasis on the differences as positive; namely the closeness with nature and the ability to live harmoniously within it. Shakespeare’s The Tempest, written between 1610-11 draws on Montaigne’s ideas. It contains complex ideas about new world colonialism and the subjugation of indigenous peoples. Gonzalo’s utopian speech in act 2 scene 1 of a commonwealth containing ‘no kinde of Trafficke’ (Go, 2012) free from any ‘Magistrate’ a place where ‘Riches’ and ‘pouerty’ (Go, 2012) would be outlawed. This utopia emphasises a greater closeness with nature that the indigenous people of Suriname in Oroonoko have retained and Europeans have lost. Gonzalo’s vision laments the violence of European civilisation in his rejection of the need for any ‘Sword, Pike, Knife’ or ‘Gun’ (Go, 2012), Gonzalo instead focuses on the provisions available for the people saying there would be ‘all abundance, To feed my innocent people.’(Go, 2012) Shakespeare gives the most poignant and beautiful speech to Caliban, the native of the island who is rewarded at the end of the play by re-owning his land. Behn I think is aware of this story, but has a greater understanding of the hopeless-ness of colonialism; as we see no such return of land and status to natives or slaves in Oroonoko.

 

It is useful to understand the dominant representations of the New World from the period. Works like Theodor Galle’s America (1587–89) or Arnoldus Montanus’s New and Unknown World (1671) serve as interesting markers of colonial representation with which one can compare Behn’s emergent radical view of these processes. Arnoldus Montanus never actually visited America which reinforces the idea of the European myth created to prove colonial projects as right and just. This binary of male and female is prevalent in early accounts which could be the reason critics have sought the idea that Behn was aligning female oppression with the slave trade; broadening her point out into universal human rights. Both of these engravings show the effect of intensive othering and exploiting difference, they encapsulate the dominant reaction to colonialism which reinforce the idea of natives as savage and uncivilised. Personifying America or the new world as female serves to justify colonial rule and enslavement through male domination. In some ways what Behn does with her account of Suriname, is part of a process of writing back to these simplified accounts which misrepresent America and the complexity of encountering other cultures.

Oroonoko is arguably an account of the new world written in a travel narrative style; popular at the time. The problem with many accounts of the period is the representativity issue that Fogarty flags up, so whilst there are limits to what Behn can represent because of her privilege, her role in literary representation as a woman is radical. This is because of the ‘European dream’(Elliot, 2008, p.25) painted by other travel accounts by ‘soldiers, clerics, merchants, and officials trained in the law’ whose ‘limits’(Elliot, 2008, p.25) are arguably wider because of their investment in perpetuating this ‘myth of America’(Elliot, 2008, p.25); which existed wholly outside of ‘accumulated European experience.’ (Elliot, 2008, p.25)  Another part of their bias could be their masculinity, in Oroonoko the assertion of female narrative authority counters this masculinity which is reproduced in the engravings mentioned that seek to represent the new world as feminine and in need of masculine, or European control. This is one of the key ideas in Oroonoko that link feminism with the anti-colonial movement, Fogarty writes that some believe ‘slavery functions as a means of tracing a parallelism between the subjugation of other races and the oppression of women’(Plasa, 1994, p.1) in the novella. Equalising the position of our female narrator with the royal slave is however problematic as our narrator is still in Suriname with a colonial party, but this perceived levelling of their roles does also discredit racial difference as status defining.

 

Behn details the royal slave’s appearance and intellectuality ‘his nose was rising and Roman, instead of African and flat’ (Behn, 1997, p.13), he can speak ‘French and English’ (Behn, 1997, p.13),  and holds ‘the best Grace in the world.’ (Behn, 1997, p.13), On the surface by measuring Oroonoko by European values and standards Behn is as Colonial as any other writer attempting to represent these exchanges. However I think by drawing attention to these measures perhaps Behn is expressing firstly a genuine appreciation of his intellect, that her readership may only be able to comprehend through comparison to European standards, but also in highlighting his ability to converse in these languages and show his intellectual capability she is suggesting a higher knowledge in him; one that is un-attainable to Europeans. The narrative has it limits in its anti-colonial voice by proposing a hierarchy of blackness which serves to recognise Oroonoko as better than other Africans which undermines the radical tone Behn seems to start with. It is ‘his mouth, the finest shap’d that cou’d be seen; far from those great turn’d lips, which are so natural to the rest of the negroes’(Behn, 1997, p.14),  that captivates our narrator into suggesting such a hierarchy. This idea is perhaps furthered by that fact that arguably our narrator’s sympathies go not with a slave, but a noble slave; whose title precedes him despite his incarceration.

Aphra Behn is an unmistakably radical writer and Oroonoko is a testament to this point. In her crafted representations of the indigenous people of Suriname and the beauty and high intellect of African slaves Behn is over-turning the long held idea of any culture that is non-European as less civilised and developed. Her anti-colonial voice does have its limits for a modern reader with the imposition of a hierarchy within blackness and the nobility of Oroonoko, but overall Behn pushes the standards, set by Europe, that define intellect, beauty and civilisation and deftly proposes that these other cultures are superior by their closeness with the natural world making them prelapsarian; an idea which parallels colonialism and Europe with corruption of innocence and a fall from grace. In setting Oroonoko within the context of various engravings, illustrations and texts of and before 1688 when the novella was published, one is able to see that Behn’s power of representing other cultures as different and that difference as positive is fundamentally radical. Behn establishes a female anti-colonial viewpoint and through the equation of the enslavement of Africans with the oppression of women, Behn is able to provide a unique stance on colonialism; a radicalism which has not abated.

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography

 

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