The title of this video commentary on Oroonoko is A Fate Worse than Death, which caught my sympathy. The animated version of the summary well explains the harsh lives and fates of characters had to go throughout the story.
Oroonoko is a mixture of horrors of slavery, tragedy, romantic and moving story. According to Wilber L. Cross, it is even considered as the first humanitarian novel in English. Behn implied several significant themes throughout the story that are European or Native Superiority, Anti-colonialism, Slavery and Trust between people.
First of all, Behn depicts and compares the natives with colonists. I believe her usage of natives and colonists are somewhat mixed in the text. She definitely contains the innate superiority of European and rather describes natives as savages. On the other hand, Oroonoko is described as beautiful which might have been achieved from his non-native life and education when he was a prince prior to becoming a slave.
In terms of slavery, Oroonoko is known to be the earliest cause of abolitionism of slavery however; I suppose Behn’s writing seemed to be remaining passive against the slavery problem in a way. This story ultimately tells you the tragedy and horrors of the slavery but not directly criticizing the colonists using the slaves.
Last of all, the fact that trusts between people was so weak and not regarded as a significant value for living back in time seriously moved me much. It seemed like Oroonoko was the only one having trust and loyalty as the important values. He encountered the first betrayal from the King, and next the Commander’s. After several betrayals and lost of trust, Oroonoko once was a prince but eventually became a slave.
Oroonoko’s anger about the commander’s dishonesty is truly shown within his words. “Come, my fellow-slaves, let us descend and see if we can meet with more honour and honesty in the next world we shall touch upon” (Behn 41).