Olaudah Equaino and Benjamin Franklin

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While Olaudah Equiano (1745 - 1797) and Benjamin Franklin (1706 - 1790) both pen an autobiography of sorts, they differ greatly in the style or the theme of their writings.  To begin with, Benjamin Franklin is extremely proud and self-centered in The Autobiography.  He exceeds the normal limits of pride and “painting oneself as good,” and he shows himself as a wily, independent man who made himself up from nothing.  For example, when Franklin first arrived in Philadelphia, he recorded an almost inconceivable good deed, writing,

“Then I turned and went down Chestnut Street and part of Walnut Street, eating my roll all the way, and, coming round, found myself again at Market Street wharf, near the boat I came in, to which I went for a draught of river water; and, being filled with one of my rolls, gave the other two to a woman and her child that came down the river in the boat with us, and were waiting to go farther” (Perkins 293).

Another notable and independent act was Benjamin Franklin’s listing of good qualities that he wished to attain (Perkins 307-09).  Perhaps this would have been not so self-sufficient, if not for Franklin’s lack of Divine assistance in the section and throughout his autobiography.  He begins this with,

“It was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection.  I wished to live without committing any fault any time; I would conquer all that either natural inclination, custom, or company might lead me into” (307).

To compare, Olaudah Equiano bears a more historic style, listing happens just as they were instead of pairing events with his philosophy or wisdom.  He does not have an independent or prideful air about him, as with Franklin, in his book of The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano.  One example of his writing is,

“One day they had taken a number of fishes, and when they had killed and satisfied themselves with as many as they though fit, to our astonishment who were on deck, rather than give any of them to use to eat, as we excepted, they tossed the remaining fish into the sea again, although we begged and prayed for some as well as we could, but in vain; and some of my countrymen, being pressed by hunger took an opportunity when they thought no one saw them of trying to get a little privately; but they were discovered, and the attempt procured them some very severe floggings” (Perkins 395).

However, near the end of his passages, Olaudah Equiano revels in what would be his highest quality; he worships God for his freedom and compares himself to a Biblical character, both which connect his writing deeper to the reader.  He writes,

“As I was leaving the house I called to mind the words of the Psalmist, in the 126th Psalm, and like him, “I glorified God in my heart, in whom I trusted” … All within my breast was tumult, wildness, and delirium!  My feet scarcely touched the ground, for they were winged with joy; and, like Elijah, as he rose to Heaven, they “were with lightening sped as I went on.”  Everyone I met I told of my happiness, and blazed about the virtue of my amiable master and captain” (Perkins 400).

Cite:

Perkins, George B., and Barbara Perkins. The American Tradition in Literature. 12th ed. Vol. 1. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.