The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano:

Slavery was an issue for centuries in America. There were always those against it and those for it. Thomas Jefferson attempted to confront the issue in his draft of the Declaration of Independence. His part was written in The Autobiography. However, Congress removed the section because of their unwillingness to take a stand against the travesty. They did not wish to cause a problem between states even before the country was even created. On the other hand, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano gives a detailed firsthand account of the feelings and thoughts of a newly enslaved person. It is a life full of uncertainty, fear, and misery. This connects to the reader and is more effective of an argument for freedom than The Autobiography because in that piece Jefferson is just writing as an angered politician compared to an enslaved man in Equiano’s work. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano is a more effective argument for freedom as to The Autobiography because of its firsthand account, its ability to connect to the reader, and the ineffectiveness of The Autobiography.
The firsthand account provided by Olaudah Equiano was very useful for creating an argument for freedom. It showed the hardships that the slaves had to go through. For example, Equiano says, “I was soon put down under the decks, and there I received such a salutation in my nostrils as I had never experience in my life: so that with the loathsomeness of the stench and the crying together, I became so sick and low that I was able to eat nor had I the least desire to taste anything” (Appleman et al. 85). He says this when he is first put on the ship and is describing the horrid smell of the holding area of the passengers below the deck of the ship. The stench made Equiano so sick that he couldn’t eat and he was flogged because of it. The conditions were so bad that they had Equiano wishing for death. He said, “I now wished for my last friend, death, to relieve me”...