OROONOKO OR THE ROYAL SLAVE: With Introduction and Notes

Oroonoko tells the story of an enslaved African Prince passion for the virtuous Imoinda arouses the jealousy of his grandfather, the lovers are cast into slavery and transported from Africa to the colony of Surinam. Oroonoko's noble bearing soon wins the respect of his English captors, but his struggle for freedom brings about his destruction. Inspired by Aphra Behn's visit to Surinam, Oroonoko reflects the author's romantic views of native peoples as being in "the first state of innocence, before man knew how to sin." The novel also reveals Behn's ambiguous attitude toward slavery: while she favored it as a means to strengthen England's power, her powerful and moving work conveys its injustice and brutality. Its engagement with the themes of slavery, race, and gender, as well as its influence on the development of the English novel, helped to make it, by the turn of the 21st century, her best-known work.

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