Slavery: when abuser meets victim

OneWorld UK

By Daniel Nelson

Question: What happened when Olaudah Equiano, one of the most famous slaves in history, met John Newton, British slave trader and writer of the hymn Amazing Grace?

Answer: Nothing - because they didnt meet. African Snow imagines the confrontation, and shows us what might have occurred.

Its a strong idea and author Murray Watts has some rich material from which to draw, because both Equiano and Newton wrote books about their lives. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano or Gustavus Vassa, the African was a best-seller in late 18th century England.

Equiano was born into a family of standing in what is now eastern Nigeria, was captured as a child by slavers, was bought and trained by a naval officer, learned to read and write, fought in several battles during the Seven Years War, was baptised, cheated of his earnings, sold to a Quaker slaver-owner in Montserrat, bought his freedom for £40, became a hairdresser in England and joined a voyage of exploration to find a northwest passage to India across the North Pole, before becoming an author and lecturer and campaigner for abolition.

Newton went to sea at around the same age as Equiano, under different circumstances, as the son of a commander of a merchant ship. Forced into service in the navy he deserted to get away from the appalling conditions, was recaptured and publicly flogged. He was demoted, later moved to a slave ship, and experienced a dramatic conversion at sea. Thanks to his fathers contacts he finally became captain of his own slaver, and a church minister and abolitionist only late in life.

They are extraordinary lives, though Newtons tribulations cannot compare with the loss of freedom and brutality experienced by a slave, or even with the discrimination experienced by a liberated slave as a result of racism. (One of Watts previous projects involved a cast of black and white actors in Soweto in apartheid South Africa another historic example of how oppression distorts and damages, in different ways, both perpetrators and victims.)

The play was commissioned and supported by the Church Missionary Society, founded by abolitionists in 1799, and though it rises beyond its didactic roots it cannot conjure up the sheer drama of the two lives. It would be hard to be unmoved by the horror of the iron mask worn by the cook to stop her eating the slave owners food or by the image of Equiano hanging upside down that ends the first act, but generally the staging presents few surprises.

Perhaps because there is so much information to pack in, the evening is more like a story told dramatically than a drama arising from the confrontation of two men. If you know the mens stories, the storytelling may not grip sufficiently; for those who dont know the stories sadly, the vast majority of the population the play could, as the Missionary Society must have hoped, be thought-provoking, even eye-opening.

The title? Snow is a two-masted ship, often used in the slave trade. The African was the first slave ship that Newton captained. And the snow seen and felt by Equiano on his voyage of exploration is shown as a spiritual and liberating moment.

* African Snow is at the Trafalgar Studios, 14 Whitehall, London SW1 until 5 May, then goes to Clwyd Theatre Cymru 22-23 May; Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham 24-25 May; Hackney Empire 29 May-2 June; New Theatre, Hull 4-9 June; Redgrave Theatre, Bristol 12-16 June; Corn Exchange at Brighton Dome 19-23 June; and Tameside Hippodrome, Ashton Under Lyne 26-30 June

* For more events in London related to the 200th anniversary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, check OneWorlds Events listing.