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Here's a cluster of questions for you to consider in preparation for class. Feel free to address any one of them in your response (just make it clear which you're responding to).
1. Have you had to read this novella before? In what context? What did you take away from it?
2. At what points in the narrative does Behn reveal her political leanings? What hints do you get about her political beliefs?
3. What interesting points of comparison do you find between this text and the other novels/novellas/fictions that we've read? (i.e., Fantomina, Gulliver's Travels, The Story of the Stone)
4. What interesting points of comparison do you find between this text and the other travel narratives we've read in the past few weeks?
Deadline: Wednesday (4/13), start of class.
10 comments:
4. Behn's descriptions of the natives on page 302 resemble Montagu's depiction of the Turks' simple lifestyle. Both accounts cast the people as innocent, their customs beyond the reproach of the European observers. The differences between them and their observers set them up to be viewed through a kind of anthropological lens, one that takes into account histories familiar to Europeans in order to cast light on the foreignness encountered. Montagu compares the bucolic scenes of the Turks to the Greeks, recalling a positive cultural example to frame an exotic culture with a degree of familiarity. In a similar way, Behn compares the natives to Adam and Eve before the fall, referencing the well-known story and its particular connotations to effectively convey her perception of the newly-encountered culture.
With such allusions, both authors ascribe a rich set of characteristics to the cultures they observe. By Behn tying the natives to Adam and Eve, her account sympathizes with them in their innocence, while also undermining their intelligence.
In viewing their culture, she describes a “tranquility they possess by ignorance,” explaining their lack of sin not to any higher moral order achieved on their part, but rather a lack of knowing how to do so. Thus she frames them simply, but in a positive light that does not seem to purposed to undermine them. I just find it interesting that whenever Europeans encounter a civilization freer of malevolence than their own, they unfailingly attribute that innocence to ignorance.
As for her political leanings, they certainly present themselves on page 302, when the native replies to the governor, "Governor, you are a liar, and guilty of that infamy." The "infamy" being that associated with being a liar.
This is the sort of response we would more likely hear from a bleeding-heart historian of our times rather than in the past. They would look at European colonialism (as well as American domination of the American Indians) with disdain, and call it a shameful moral double-standard. It's clear that Behn subscribes to this sort of philosophy, and her character points out that the colonial powers kept changing the rules on the natives, which in their own society (either the natives' or the Europeans', take your pick) they would deem inappropriate and wrong.
However, my reaction in this manner may simply be my own perception of history. Most textbooks often make a point of emphasizing how terrible the White People were to everyone else, and do not include mention of the counter-culture movements that did exist at the time. That I find Behn's perspective somewhat out of place for the time period may be my own fault, but I do think it's safe to say that she wasn't alone in her beliefs.
On pages 302 and 303 I find the most evidence of Behn's political leanings since it is on these pages that she speaks of the governor, the natives that they are at peace with and where they get their slaves from. I think her sympathy for Oroonoko also shows her political leanings, at least as far as her understanding of the foreign court allows her to have political leanings about the events there. Her leaning toward Oroonoko is more in the tone of the piece than on any particular page, however. I think that in part her description of both Oroonoko, being like Mars and the King being a Jealous old lover also betray where Behn’s political sympathies lie and show that the character that is meant to be supported is the prince in this story because if it were the king he would be described in a much more favorable light.
In the initial description of Oroonoko, Behn reveals some of her political views through her allusion to the English Civil Wars. She portrays Oroonoko as an Anglophile who "has heard of the late Civil Wars in England, and the deplorable death of our great monarch [Charles I]" (304). Even in a passage that focuses on Oroonoko's "greatness of courage and mind," (304) Behn reveals her favorable view of the Stuart monarchy.
I think Behn's attitudes toward the Stuart monarchy also offer insight about the views she expresses regarding religion. When describing the natives of Surinam, Behn claims that "religion would here but destroy that tranquility they possess by ignorance"(302). During Behn's era, one of the most significant issues regarding the Stuart monarchs was their association with Catholicism. Behn might be responding to the religious concerns of her time by suggesting that religion is a source of social instability and that criticism of the Stuart's religious views is merely a symptom of its harmful social implications. She contrasts religion to "simple Nature," which is a "harmless, inoffensive, and virtuous mistress" (302). Conversely, religion is characterized as disruptive. Given the contentious religious issues that threatened the monarchy that Behn supported, it is reasonable to expect that she would portray religion as a destabilizing influence.
When Behn talks abou the natives' way of having multiple women, it reminded me of Diderot's travel narrative about the chaplain who visited Bouganville. Behn says, "...and where the only crime and sin with woman is to turn her off, to abandon her to want, shame and misery. Such ill morals are only practiced in Christian countries, where they prefer the bare name of religion; and without virtue or morality, think that's sufficient" (306). She seems to approve of the natives' way of marrying or loving.
WIth Diderot's story, Orou presented his daughters and wife to the chaplain, which they complied to happily. When the chaplain refused at first, they grew sad and fearful and did not want to be rejected. Similarly, Behn talks about the negativity of women who are rejected or abandoned, and that it is right to for men to take on multiple women so as to prevent the women from feeling such a way.
Behn also says that the "ill practices" of abandoning women to their miseries only happens in Christian lands. In Diderot's story, religion is what hinders the chaplain from accepting Orou's women. But it wasn't like he was turning down the offer because of his own morals, but because of the "bare name of religion" that Behn stresses in Oroonoko.
I find it interesting that Behn, a woman, approves of polygamy. Even though the King in the story has multiple wives and mistresses, it does not mean that all his wives are loved. Onahal is described to be a jealous wife because she is aged and not as beautiful as the other young wives or mistresses. Is Behn trying to use the King and Onahal as an example to show how women can be forgotten and unloved by their husbands?
I read Oroonoko twice before this. Both were in 300 level Literature courses that focused on either black British writers or focused on the interesting narrative style that Aphra Behn employs in the work.
I also found it extremely interesting that as views on slavery changed over the centuries since this was published it changed from being read more widely as a romantic tragedy to a novella that was read as ant-slavery propaganda.
To that measure, too, it's strange to fully believe Behn was 100% writing the story as anti-slavery as she was a loyalist and had connections to the throne. Yet she does show plenty of respect for those who are royalty - like Oroonoko.
This travel narrative reminds me of Lady Mary's Turkish letters. Behn seems to take a very scientific approach when describing the natives and the situation in Surinam. She observes that they go without clothing but are used to it and do not behave improperly just as Lady Mary describes the Turkish baths. However, the rest of the story is very different from Lady Mary's letters because it is a story rather than letters. Lady Mary focuses on small events in her own life, whereas Oroonoko tells the tale of a specific man and his journey. In that way, it is much more similar to the novels we've read than the travel narratives.
On page 302, it seems that Aphra Behn begins to express her political leanings because she talks about the natives and the concept that they are comfortable with the slaves they have and where they are getting them from and the governor. Behn states, “ they once made mourning and fasting for the death of the English governor, who had given his hand to come on such a day to them, and neither came, nor sent; believing, when once a man’s word was past, nothing but death could or should prevent his keeping” (p. 302). In addition to, Behn stating her political leanings about: “those who want slaves make a bargain with a master, or captain of a ship, and contract to pay so much a piece, a matter of twenty pound a head for as many as he agrees for, and for them when they shall be delivered on such a plantation” (p. 303).
I believe that Behn has a lot of sorrow and shows sympathy for Oroonoko by her political leanings, according to what she understands from the foreign court and how it allows her to have political leanings based on what occurs there. However, Behn’s perspective toward the Staurt monarchy also shows reasons for her regarding religion as well. When she describes the natives of Surinam, Behn states that “religion would here but destroy tranquility they posses by ignorance, and laws would but teach them to know offense, of which now they have no motion” (p.302).
I feel this story relates quite a bit to other stories we've read in the the past. There always seems to be some sort of a love connection. Whether it is small, the main idea, or random, there is always some kind of passion between a man and a woman. Also, the description of a people from the west also seems to be a common topic. In this story you might wonder if it was first hand observations or a bunch of ideas and stories put together second-handedly into one description.
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