Olaudah Equiano Olaudah Equiano, a young African slave, was forced to go through a scarring journey on a vessel through the Middle Passage. Throughout the voyage, Equiano and his people had to face misery and despair as they were forced to endure the devastating conditions. They faced horrendous situations, such as the terrible conditions on the slave ship, which caused many of the slaves to die. Many began to long for death rather than to live through the horrors, including Equiano. During his voyage, despite Equiano being forced to face traumatic situations that caused him to become mentally and physically distorted, there were also small circumstances that benefitted Equiano throughout his journey that allowed him to hold on to his life…show more content… At the beginning, the first situation that benefitted Equiano was when he “was soon reduced so low”(45) by the white men because of his “extreme youth”(45), which allowed him to stay above deck and spared him from being chained. Because he was not chained, Equiano was spared from feeling more degraded to an animal, rather than a person. It made him feel more alive that he was not shackled down, unlike most of the slaves, and it gave him the push to crave more of this freedom that he barely had. Furthermore, another situation that caused Equiano to feel hope was when the mariners “made [Equiano] one day look into through [the quadrant]”(47). For a young boy who had barely seen the world, looking through the quadrant allowed him to see a new world and his curiosity was sparked. Having curiosity to know something caused him to crave to see the world that he didn’t know about. It allowed him to feel more alive because having these thoughts proved that one part of him could not be chained by the white people. The resolve to satisfy the curiosity he had allowed his want to survive grow. Finally, another situation that affected Equiano’s hopes was when he saw that at the land that “there [were] Africans of all languages”(48). Because there were people that Equiano could feel connected to, he felt reassured and hope because his people had survived the terrors that he also went through. Seeing his people resolved Equiano’s decision to survive and try to live through the cruelty of the white people to show them that his people has not yet lost their will to become free. Through the small beneficial situations that Equiano went through, instead of choosing death during the despairing situations, it led him to determination to survive and sate his curiosity of the world he has yet
