Introduction
Think of a novel as a world waiting to be discovered. Your job isn’t just to read it—it’s to explore its landscape, meet its people, and understand what makes it tick. This is exactly that with Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave (1688).
Aphra Behn’s powerful novella sits at a fascinating crossroads in literary history. Published during England’s Restoration period, it mixes romance with brutal realism, adventure with tragedy. More importantly, it dares to criticize something most English people at the time took for granted: colonialism and the slave trade. This makes Oroonoko one of the earliest English works to question slavery’s morality, centuries before abolition became a popular cause.
What makes this work revolutionary? Behn blends the eyewitness detail of a travel narrative with the emotional power of a tragic love story. The result is something that feels surprisingly modern, that doesn’t just tell you what happened but makes you feel it.
About the Author
Aphra Behn (c. 1640–1689) lived an extraordinary life. She was England’s first professional female writer—meaning she actually earned her living by writing, something almost unheard of for women in the 1600s.
We don’t know much about her early years. She may have been born in Kent or Canterbury, and she possibly traveled to Surinam (in South America) as a young person. These early experiences likely shaped Oroonoko. During the Dutch Wars, Behn worked as a spy for King Charles II, using the code name “Astrea.” When she returned to England, broke and struggling, she turned to writing.
Behn became famous for her plays—witty, bold Restoration comedies like The Rover (1677) that featured intelligent women and weren’t afraid of sexual themes. She also wrote poetry and translated works from French and Latin. Oroonoko marked her move into prose fiction.
Her contemporaries and later critics often attacked her work as “indecent” or improper for a woman. But Behn refused to apologize. She famously wrote, “I am not content to write for a few and for the present age only.” She saw herself as writing for future generations, too—and she was right. Her work challenged the assumption that women couldn’t be serious writers or thinkers, and later abolitionists and novelists would draw inspiration from her bold storytelling.
Understanding the Title
The title Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave, immediately presents us with a contradiction. How can someone be both royal and enslaved? This paradox drives the entire story. Behn wants us to question the assumptions that allow such an injustice to exist.
Themes: What the Story Is Really About
Themes are the big ideas beneath the surface, the questions and insights that give a story depth. To find them, look for patterns: What situations keep coming up? What are the characters arguing about? What images and symbols appear again?
Central Theme: The Corruption of Slavery
At its heart, Oroonoko argues that slavery and colonialism corrupt everything they touch. Behn presents us with a world turned upside down: an African prince who embodies honor and nobility is enslaved by English colonists who claim to be civilized but act with cruelty and deceit.
Oroonoko represents natural virtue. Despite being called a “savage” by European standards, he demonstrates more genuine nobility than any of the English characters. Meanwhile, his captors—men who consider themselves Christians and gentlemen—lie, betray, and brutalize him. The real savagery, Behn suggests, belongs to the oppressors, not the oppressed.
This was a radical argument in 1688. England was deeply invested in the slave trade, and most people justified it by claiming Africans were inferior. Behn challenges this by showing that slavery destroys the moral order itself. It turns supposedly civilized people into monsters while revealing the humanity and dignity of those they enslave.
Secondary Themes
The Power of Love
Oroonoko and Imoinda’s relationship transcends their circumstances. Even when slavery tries to reduce them to property, their love remains unbreakable. This shows that some human connections can’t be commodified or destroyed, no matter how brutal the system.
The Myth of Racial Superiority
Behn does something complicated here. She describes Africans in ways that seem racist to modern readers—she emphasizes how Oroonoko’s features are “like Europeans” as if that makes him more worthy. Yet her overall point undermines racial hierarchy: she’s showing that Africans possess refinement and nobility that shame their English captors. While her methods are problematic, her intent is to challenge, not reinforce, racism.
Betrayal and Broken Promises
Nearly every character betrays Oroonoko. The pattern begins in Africa when his own grandfather, the King, steals his beloved. It continues with the English captain who tricks him into slavery, and reaches its peak with the colonial governor who pretends to be his friend. These betrayals mirror the political intrigues of Restoration England, where loyalty was rare and deception common.
Individual Honor vs. Corrupt Society
Oroonoko lives by a personal code of honor. He believes in keeping promises, treating people with dignity, and maintaining courage in the face of death. But colonial society has no honor—only greed and self-interest. The clash between these two worldviews drives the tragedy.
How the Themes Develop
Through Plot
The story’s events trace an arc of increasing violence. Oroonoko moves from betrayal in Africa to enslavement in Surinam to rebellion and finally to his own death. Each stage shows how colonial brutality escalates, until the only dignified response left is Oroonoko’s tragic resistance.
Through Character
Oroonoko embodies honor even as the world around him degrades. Characters like the treacherous English captain and the scheming Governor Byam represent European duplicity. The contrast couldn’t be clearer: who is truly civilized?
Through Symbolism
Watch for recurring images. The “royal veil” that the King sends to claim Imoinda symbolizes how even love can be turned into submission and ownership. Oroonoko’s scarred body becomes a map of his suffering—physical evidence of betrayal written on his flesh. The lush Surinam landscape represents paradise corrupted by invasion, a Garden of Eden poisoned by greed.
Through Direct Statement
The narrator doesn’t hide her opinions. She openly praises Oroonoko’s “European” features and manners, calling him worthy of being “called Caesar.” She directly states that he surpasses the “base” Englishmen who enslave him. These explicit judgments guide readers toward her anti-slavery message.
Plot Summary
Oroonoko unfolds in two major parts: Oroonoko’s life in Africa and his enslavement in Surinam. The narrator presents the story as true history she witnessed firsthand, blending romantic storytelling with documentary detail.
Setting
Time
The story takes place in the mid-17th century, around the 1660s, during England’s occupation of Surinam. The narrative spans several months but emphasizes emotional truth over precise chronology. This isn’t history textbook time—it’s tragic time, where every moment counts toward the inevitable catastrophe.
Place
We begin in Coramantien (modern-day Ghana), a wealthy West African kingdom. The story then shifts to Surinam (now Suriname, in South America), an English colony filled with rivers, forests, and plantations. The main plantation is called Parham House.
Social Context
This is the era of Restoration England’s aggressive colonial expansion and the height of the transatlantic slave trade. Surinam represents a frontier society where normal rules don’t quite apply—a place where fortunes can be made through exploitation. The colony has three populations: English colonists, enslaved Africans, and Indigenous peoples.
The setting isn’t just background—it’s an active force. The contrast between the Indigenous people’s peaceful lifestyle and the brutal plantation system highlights colonial violence. The beautiful landscape becomes a kind of prison. The very paradise of Surinam corrupts Oroonoko’s nobility and provokes his revolt.
The Beginning: A Prince in Love
In Coramantien, Prince Oroonoko enjoys a privileged life. He’s young, brave, educated, and destined to rule. He falls deeply in love with Imoinda, a beautiful young woman at court.
Then disaster strikes: Oroonoko’s grandfather, the King, sees Imoinda and wants her for himself. Despite being elderly and knowing about his grandson’s love, the King sends Imoinda the “royal veil”—a command that she must become one of his wives. This act of selfish betrayal sets everything in motion.
When Oroonoko and Imoinda attempt to continue their relationship in secret, they’re discovered. The furious King sells Imoinda into slavery, telling Oroonoko she’s been executed. Shortly after, Oroonoko himself is tricked onto a slave ship by an English captain who pretends to invite him to dinner. This is the inciting incident—the moment Oroonoko’s world shatters, and the real story begins.
Rising Action: From Prince to Slave
Enslaved and shipped across the Atlantic, Oroonoko arrives in Surinam, where he’s renamed “Caesar”—a final insult that strips away his identity while ironically acknowledging his natural nobility.
Then comes an unexpected twist: Oroonoko discovers that Imoinda is alive and enslaved on the same plantation. She’s been renamed “Clemene.” Their reunion brings joy, but they’re still trapped.
Oroonoko befriends the narrator (who represents Behn herself) and some sympathetic colonists. He tries to negotiate his freedom, but the English keep lying to him. They promise to release him “soon,” but those promises are empty.
Tensions escalate when Imoinda becomes pregnant. Oroonoko cannot bear the thought of his child being born into slavery. He leads a slave rebellion, trying to fight his way to freedom. The uprising fails. Oroonoko is captured, brutally whipped, and humiliated.
The colonists try to calm him with a feast, but it’s another trick—another betrayal. They plan to execute him. Oroonoko realizes there’s no escape and no hope.
The Climax: A Tragic Choice
Cornered and desperate, Oroonoko makes a heartbreaking decision. He cannot save Imoinda or their unborn child from slavery, but he can save them from continuing to suffer. In an act of mercy that’s simultaneously loving and horrifying, he kills the pregnant Imoinda with her consent.
This is the story’s turning point—the moment when tragedy becomes inevitable. Oroonoko waits beside her body for days, overcome with grief, until his enemies find him. His fate is sealed.
The Ending: Dignity in Death
The colonists capture Oroonoko and subject him to brutal torture—they dismember him piece by piece while he’s still alive. But Oroonoko refuses to give them the satisfaction of seeing him break. He smokes his pipe calmly, showing no fear, maintaining his dignity to the very end.
His death avenges Imoinda in the only way possible—by proving that no amount of torture can destroy his nobility. But there’s no happy ending, no justice. The colonists face no punishment. The system continues.
Behn leaves the story open-ended in one sense: she doesn’t pretend everything works out or that good triumphs. This makes the tragedy more powerful. We’re forced to sit with the injustice, to feel its weight. This is not a comedy ending in marriage and reconciliation. It’s pure tragedy—death and downfall, with no redemption for the oppressors.
The Story in Brief
Noble African prince Oroonoko is betrayed and sold into slavery. In Surinam, he reunites with his beloved Imoinda, also enslaved. They endure colonial horrors together. Oroonoko leads a failed rebellion, then kills Imoinda to spare her from further suffering before being brutally executed himself. The story is an indictment of European savagery disguised as civilization.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
Oroonoko doesn’t have numbered chapters, but it divides into clear narrative sections:
Opening: The Colony of Surinam
The narrator describes the colony’s natural beauty, its Indigenous inhabitants, and her purpose in telling this story. She introduces Oroonoko’s arrival as someone special among the enslaved.
Part One: Africa and Betrayal
We learn about Oroonoko‘s background—his education, his military skill, and his passionate romance with Imoinda. The King’s jealous betrayal destroys their happiness and leads to both being sold to slave traders.
The Middle Passage
During the ocean voyage, Oroonoko’s natural nobility earns respect from some of the crew, but they still betray him upon reaching Surinam. He’s renamed Caesar and assigned to plantation labor.
Plantation Life
Oroonoko tries to adapt while secretly planning escape. He’s repeatedly whipped for defiance. He marries Imoinda in secret. She becomes pregnant. The couple also has positive encounters with Indigenous peoples, who treat them with more humanity than the English do.
The Rebellion
Oroonoko rallies other enslaved people to rise up against their captors, especially against the cruel Governor Byam. The rebellion fails. The fake peace feast leads to Oroonoko’s recapture. In desperation, he kills Imoinda.
Execution and Aftermath
Oroonoko faces his death with stoic courage. The narrator laments his fate while acknowledging that colonial evil remains unchecked.
Characters: The Heart of the Story
Characters drive our emotional connection to literature. They’re not real people—they’re artistic creations designed to serve the story. But the best characters feel real. Behn’s characters blend heroic ideals from romance literature with realistic details from travel writing, creating figures who are both larger-than-life and painfully human.
Oroonoko (Caesar): The Tragic Hero
Character Type: Oroonoko is both dynamic and static—a fascinating contradiction. He changes from naive lover to hardened rebel, yet his core honor never wavers. He’s designed to be sympathetic: noble, brave, intelligent, and loving.
Behn describes him as having “perfect ebony” skin and features that are “European” in structure—which reveals her own racial biases. She’s trying to make him acceptable to her white audience by describing him as not “too” African. This is problematic, but her larger point remains: Oroonoko’s nobility shames the English who enslave him.
He’s educated in European languages and customs, which makes him an unusual protagonist for the era. He embodies Stoic philosophy—facing suffering with dignity and refusing to show weakness. Ultimately, he’s a tragic hero in the classical sense: a great person brought down by circumstances beyond his control and by his own unwillingness to compromise his principles.
Colonel Byam: The Face of Colonial Evil
Character Type: Byam is the antagonist, though the real enemy is the system of slavery itself. He’s the deputy governor of Surinam, and he represents colonial power in its most treacherous form.
Byam embodies deception. He pretends to befriend Oroonoko while plotting against him. He promises freedom but never intends to grant it. He’s a coward who hides behind authority, using others to do his dirty work.
Beyond Byam, the broader antagonistic forces include the slave trade as a system and Oroonoko’s own internal conflict between his love for Imoinda and his desire for revenge against his captors.
Imoinda (Clemene): Love and Sacrifice
Character Type: Imoinda is a supporting character, but a crucial one. She symbolizes pure, chaste love and victimhood.
Before enslavement, she’s portrayed as beautiful, modest, and devoted to Oroonoko. After being sold into slavery and renamed Clemene, she remains loyal. Her pregnancy adds urgency to the story—it’s not just about two adults trapped in slavery but about their unborn child’s fate.
When Oroonoko offers to kill her rather than let her remain enslaved, she accepts without hesitation. This reveals profound loyalty but also raises uncomfortable questions about agency and choice. Is her death a heroic sacrifice or a tragic defeat?
The Narrator: An Eyewitness and Advocate
Character Type: The narrator represents Behn herself (or a fictionalized version). She claims to have witnessed these events firsthand in Surinam.
She serves as Oroonoko’s confidante and advocate, providing an eyewitness perspective that makes the story feel authentic. She openly admires Oroonoko and sympathizes with his plight. However, her narration also reveals the racial prejudices of her time—she sees Oroonoko as exceptional partly because he seems “European” in manner.
The narrator’s presence raises important questions: How reliable is she? How much does she really understand about Oroonoko’s experience? Her perspective is both a strength (it humanizes Oroonoko) and a limitation (it filters his story through a white, European lens).
Supporting Characters
The Cornish Captain: He tricks Oroonoko onto the slave ship. He represents English duplicity and greed. His betrayal mirrors the larger betrayals of colonialism.
Trefry: A plantation overseer who shows some sympathy for Oroonoko but ultimately does nothing to help him. He represents complicity—good intentions that don’t translate to action.
The King (Oroonoko’s Grandfather): His selfish betrayal in Africa sets the whole tragedy in motion. He represents authority corrupted by lust and power.
Indigenous Peoples: The narrator describes various Indigenous groups sympathetically, presenting them as living in natural harmony. They serve as a contrast to European corruption, though Behn’s descriptions are also problematically romanticized.
How Characters Are Revealed
Direct Characterization: Behn tells us explicitly what characters are like. She describes Oroonoko’s beauty, intelligence, and nobility in glowing terms. She directly labels Byam as treacherous and cowardly.
Indirect Characterization: We also learn about characters through:
- Speech: Oroonoko’s eloquent language shows his education and nobility
- Thoughts: The narrator shares Oroonoko’s inner reflections on honor and suffering
- Effect on Others: Other enslaved people revere Oroonoko; he inspires loyalty and awe
- Actions: Oroonoko’s refusal to cry out during whipping reveals his strength; his killing of Imoinda shows his desperation
- Looks: Physical descriptions emphasize Oroonoko’s exceptional appearance and Imoinda’s beauty
Style: How Behn Tells the Story
Style is how an author uses language—the texture and feel of the writing. Behn’s Restoration style combines vivid travel writing with dramatic, heroic language. She’s creating something new: a realistic yet romantic prose fiction that will evolve into a novel form.
Point of View: Who’s Telling This Story?
Behn uses a mix of third-person narration and first-person eyewitness accounts. The narrator inserts herself into the story, saying, “I was there, I saw this happen.” This creates intimacy while claiming authenticity.
Why this choice? In the 1680s, novels weren’t considered respectable literature. By framing her story as “true history” rather than fiction, Behn tried to give it more weight and credibility. The eyewitness perspective makes the abolitionist message harder to dismiss—she’s claiming these horrors really happened.
But this perspective also has problems. The narrator is “unreliable” in the sense that she’s biased by her own background and assumptions. She filters Oroonoko’s story through her European worldview, sometimes missing or distorting what his experience might have truly been like.
Word Choice: Elegant and Concrete
Behn’s vocabulary mixes formal, elevated language with vivid sensory details.
She uses Latinate words (“noble,” “virtue,” “magnanimous”) to give the story dignity and seriousness. These formal words elevate Oroonoko to heroic status—he’s not just a man but a figure of classical nobility.
At the same time, she provides concrete descriptions: the “glorious” wounds on Oroonoko’s body, the “delicious” fruits of Surinam, the “perfect ebony” of his skin. These physical details make the exotic world of colonial Surinam feel real to English readers who’ve never been there.
Occasionally, she adds colloquial asides and witty observations typical of Restoration writing, lightening the tone before plunging back into tragedy.
Sentence Structure: Flowing and Varied
Behn’s sentences vary in length and complexity. Long, flowing compound sentences mirror the sweep of adventure and the complexity of emotions. These create a rolling, epic feel.
But she also uses short, stark, exclamatory sentences during violent or emotional moments: “He was taken!” “She died!” This creates dramatic emphasis and quickens the pace.
The rhythm alternates between romance and horror, between beautiful descriptions and brutal violence. This keeps readers engaged while underscoring the tragedy.
Figurative Language: Creating Emotional Impact
Similes: Behn frequently compares Oroonoko to precious materials—he’s “black as jet” but “shining like ebony polished.” These comparisons make him seem exotic and valuable, though they also objectify him.
Personification: Nature comes alive in the story. Rivers “whisper,” forests “embrace.” This creates a sense of Surinam as an Eden, a paradise lost to colonial greed.
Symbolism: The royal veil symbolizes stolen agency—it transforms a love relationship into ownership. Oroonoko’s mutilated body becomes a symbol of colonial violence written on human flesh.
Imagery: Behn appeals to all the senses. We see the lush landscapes, smell the exotic flowers, feel the brutal heat and the sting of the whip. This sensory richness makes the story immersive.
Tone: The Author’s Attitude
Behn’s tone is solemn and satirical at once. She admires Oroonoko with genuine reverence, treating his story as tragic and important. But she’s also ironic when describing the English colonists—she calls them “Christians” in a way that highlights their hypocrisy. How can they claim moral superiority while acting so cruelly?
Mood: The Feeling Created
The mood shifts from exotic wonder to visceral horror. Early descriptions of Surinam create a sense of lush, tropical paradise. The love story creates romance and hope. But as the plot progresses, the mood darkens into tragedy and despair.
By the end, we feel a heavy, haunting sadness—a sense that something beautiful and noble has been destroyed by greed and cruelty. This emotional journey from awe to devastation is precisely what makes the story so powerful.
Personal Response: What This Story Means
This is where your unique voice matters. Literary analysis isn’t complete without personal, thoughtful response. Here’s mine as a reader and scholar who’s spent years with this text.
Emotional Impact
I feel profound pity when Oroonoko kills Imoinda. It’s a moment of terrible love—he’s granting her mercy because there’s no other escape. This creates what Aristotle calls “catharsis”: emotional purging through pity and fear. We pity them; we fear we might face such impossible choices in their position.
I feel anger at Governor Byam’s banquet betrayal. The fake friendship, the lies, the cruelty disguised as hospitality—it mirrors the political treacheries of Restoration England (like the Popish Plot hysteria). Behn makes us see how power corrupts.
There’s brief joy when Oroonoko and Imoinda reunite in Surinam. For a moment, love conquers circumstances. But overall, the story creates a haunting dread. We know tragedy is inevitable. We’re watching noble people destroyed by an evil system, and that helplessness is devastating.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths:
Behn brilliantly blends romance and realism. The plot is coherent and builds tension masterfully—each betrayal leads naturally to the next, creating narrative momentum toward the tragic climax.
The characters, especially Oroonoko, feel psychologically real even while serving as heroic ideals. We believe in him as both a symbol and a person.
The pacing varies effectively. Slow, descriptive passages give us time to absorb the setting, while action sequences create urgency and excitement.
Weaknesses:
Sometimes the pacing drags during ethnographic digressions—when Behn describes Indigenous customs or Surinam’s natural features in lengthy detail. While interesting, these passages can slow the emotional momentum.
The ending, while powerful, romanticizes Oroonoko’s suicide and stoic death. It makes his suffering seem almost noble and beautiful, which softens the abolitionist critique. Real suffering isn’t beautiful; it’s just suffering. By aestheticizing his death, Behn risks making slavery seem tragic-but-tolerable rather than purely evil.
An Outstanding Achievement
The most breathtaking element is Behn’s narrative technique—her eyewitness narration. By positioning herself as a witness who knew Oroonoko personally, she creates empathy in a way few writers had attempted before.
This pioneering approach would influence the development of the English novel. Later writers like Daniel Defoe and Samuel Richardson would use similar first-person, “this-really-happened” techniques. Behn showed that prose fiction could create an empathetic gaze, making readers care about marginalized people by presenting their stories as real and immediate.
A Notable Failure
The narrator’s racial essentialism creates troubling distance from the story’s anti-slavery message. By praising Oroonoko specifically for his “non-African” traits—his “European” features, his refined manners, his education—Behn implies that most Africans don’t deserve such sympathy.
She’s essentially arguing: “Slavery is wrong when it enslaves someone as noble as Oroonoko.” But what about everyone else? The logical extension should be: “Slavery is wrong, period.” By making Oroonoko exceptional, she undermines her own abolitionist intent.
This reveals the Eurocentrism of Behn’s era. She couldn’t fully escape her cultural conditioning. While her heart was in the right place, her execution perpetuates some of the same prejudices she claims to challenge.
Why This Story Still Matters
Oroonoko is deeply relevant to our current moment. Its critique of systemic racism and its exploration of the “noble savage” myth illuminate contemporary movements like Black Lives Matter and ongoing decolonization efforts worldwide.
The story forces us to confront how systems of oppression dehumanize everyone involved—not just the oppressed but also the oppressors, who lose their humanity by inflicting cruelty.
However, we must read critically. Behn’s exoticism and racial essentialism perpetuate stereotypes that still harm people today. We can honor her abolitionist courage while also interrogating her biases. This dual reading—appreciating the work’s progressive elements while critiquing its limitations—is exactly what literary study should do.
Oroonoko gives us a lens for examining modern hypocrisies: global inequality, human trafficking, refugee crises, and ongoing racial injustice. The same patterns Behn identified—powerful people exploiting vulnerable ones, then justifying it through ideology—remain relevant. Her call to recognize the humanity of the marginalized echoes across centuries.
Conclusion
Oroonoko endures as a Restoration masterpiece. Its tragic nobility serves as a powerful indictment of the empire’s shadows. By exploring its themes of betrayal and honor, analyzing its colonial setting, understanding its complex characters, and appreciating Behn’s bold prose, we engage not just with a literary pioneer but with questions of justice that remain urgent today.
This guide is an invitation, not a conclusion. What will you discover when you read Oroonoko for yourself? What territories in Behn’s miniature world will speak to your own experience? Great literature opens conversations that never end—join this one.
Sources
- Britannica. “Aphra Behn | Biography, Books, & Facts.” Accessed December 9, 2025.
- LitCharts. “Oroonoko Themes” and related study guides. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Study.com. “Oroonoko by Aphra Behn | Summary, Analysis & Themes.” Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Course Hero. “Oroonoko | Plot Summary & Analysis.” Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Clark University. “Aphra Behn, Oroonoko, and Racism.” Accessed December 9, 2025.
- GradeSaver, SuperSummary, and BookRags study guides for Oroonoko. Accessed December 9, 2025.
- Various academic sources, including Howard Community College Pressbooks and Studocu materials on Restoration literature.