By Monica Edinger and Lesley Younge. Zest Books. March, 2023
Monica Edinger, a white woman, developed her love of Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer in Sierra Leone. She’s a 4th grade educator with over 25 years teaching experience. She has written books for children and for educators. Co-author Lesley Younge, an African American woman, is a middle school interdisciplinary educator in Washington DC. Nearer My Freedom is her YA debut; she also wrote the picture book, A-Train Allen (2023) which was the first winner of the Own Voices, Own Stories grand prize from Sleeping Bear Press.
Synopsis: As illustrated on the cover of the book, this story developed as a found poem using as its core text Olaudah Equiano’s 1789 autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. Olaudah Equiano was African man, born in the mid 1700s who was kidnapped while still a child from his home in Nigeria.The book details Equiano’s kidnapping from Nigeria, his transport to the Caribbean, his enslavement in the Americas and his work to procure and maintain freedom. The authors insert text boxes to contextualize events and provide background information to the narrative for young readers.
What works:
I don’t remember having read Equiano’s original text, so I can’t make a comparison. I don’t know how meanings were transformed when the text was edited to create the poem’s narrative. The use of first person feels like it is empowering Equiano, and it many ways, it is. But, this is no longer his story. It is an edited one that is a bit more accessible to young readers. The original text was re-published 9 times in Equiano’s lifetime, an indication as to how rare and important this work was/is. I really appreciated how Equiano’s homeland was situation in the text, that houses, food, daily work, and rituals were all described in ways that would instantly make reader aware that Nigerian people were members of vibrant communities, even back then. We’re quickly dispelled of the myth that all enslaved Africans worked on large plantations in the southern part of the United States, and that they were all illiterate. The images, charts, and maps that are added to the book help indicate how much research went into locating information that would educate and engage today’s young readers. Edinger and Younge develop Equiano as a rather willing participant in global European imperialism through his work on board ships, managing enslaved people, and participating in commercial trade. This is a dynamic that must be explored because through enslavement, which begins with the Arab Slave Trade in the 1600s, the global cultures and civilizations were impacted in ways we still don’t fully realize.
What doesn’t work:
There are so many nice white people in the story that one wonders why slavery was practiced at all. I don’t know if this is original to the text, or if editing made it so.
When I first came among the Europeans
Apprehensions and alarms had taken
Such strong possession of me.
I began now to pass to an opposite extreme.
My surprise began to diminish
as my knowledge increased.
I was so far from being afraid
Of anything new which I saw,
I remained in the ship a considerable time
And visited a variety of places.
Twice in Holland.
Leith in Scotland.
Thence to the Orkneys
(where I was surprised to see scarcely any night).
(p. 59)
Would all Europeans be cruel, hateful, mean, or racist? Probably not. I think we do have to realize that enslavement that was enacted on ships was much different than that on most plantations. The ships provided a much closer proximity between the enslaved and his owner, the ship’s captain, allowing for each to recognize the other’s humanity. This proximity allows the master to see the slave as an enslaved human; as a sentient being rather than as an object. Still, the captains were able to dominate those enslaved, and profit from the slave trade. There’s a lot of complexity to this story, some made obvious. I think it would really help to have included more nonfiction sources for young readers in the appendix rather than so many fictionalized accounts that young readers may consume as fact.
Equiano’s life didn’t seem to change much once he achieved freedom, transforming from enslaved to servant. He was able to freely choose his work, and he seemed to enjoy it. He also liked those who had been his masters, and other Europeans as much as he previously did. This one story breaks a lot of myths but, it seems to perpetuate other. That very ability to choose his work seems to be what distinguished Equiano’s servitude from his freedom, and I do wonder what freedom really meant to him.
Pass it or Grab it: I would recommend this to school libraries with hope for a discussion guide to support teaching. Hopefully, libraries will have this book right next to a copy of Olaudah Equiano’s book.
Black Cotton Reviewers 