Throughout American literature, slavery has been written about time after time. Two well known works about this topic are The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano by Olaudah Equiano and “On Being Brought from Africa to America” by Phillis Wheatley. While these works deal with the same topic of slavery, they differ in genre and time period. Equiano wrote a narrative in the Early American Fiction time period while Wheatley wrote a poem during the Revolutionary period. They both tell the tale of slave in first person perspective, but they tell two different stories. Equiano’s narrative was written in the 1750s at the end of the Early American Fiction period of American Literature. The religious theme that was common during this …show more content…
Equiano wrote a narrative, while Wheatley wrote a poem. Equiano wrote descriptive paragraphs about his experience in slave trade. He wrote about all the cruel and horrifying things he saw in detail. Wheatley, however, wrote a poem where she praises her experience as a slave for converting her to Christianity. She expresses that she feels redeemed after converting .Unlike a narrative, the poem does not explain why she feels this way or about her experience her as a slave. The most she writes about her experience is“‘Twas mercy that brought me from my Pagan land…” (Wheatley). Wheatley chooses to express her feelings while Equiano decides to share his experience. “This wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains...the shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable” (Equiano). Equiano paints a pictures that makes the reader feel as if they were right next to him, helping the reader understand what he was feeling as opposed to just telling the reader like Equiano. The difference in genre gives the reader a completely different understanding of the topic and how the writer feels about the