The Book of Negroes

“I have my life to tell, my own private ghost story, and what purpose would there be to this life I have lived, if I could not take this opportunity to relate it? My hand cramps after a while, and sometimes my back or neck aches when I have sat for too long at the table, but this writing business demands little. After the life I have lived, it goes down as easy as sausages and gravy.” 

This passage, from the novel’s opening pages, introduces one of the book’s central themes: storytelling. The act of telling one’s story—and writing it down—requires both strength and bravery, yet not quite as much as Aminata’s life of suffering has required. The mention of “sausages and gravy” nods to the comforts of her life now, as an old woman living in London. Food and shelter are no longer her primary pursuits. Instead, her primary pursuit and goal in life is writing her story. The passage also contains a hint of menace with the use of the word “ghost,” for the life Aminata has led has turned many people she has known into ghosts, and they are with her, even as she sits alone, writing.

“We had no more clothing than goats, and nakedness marked us as captives wherever we went. But our captors were also marked by what they lacked: light in their eyes. Never have I met a person doing terrible things who would meet my own eyes peacefully. To gaze into another person’s face is to do two things: to recognize their humanity, and to assert your own.” 

This passage expresses the dehumanizing act of enslaving fellow human beings. The young Aminata, newly captured, does not yet understand the processes by which one human being robs another of humanity, but she knows that something terrible is going on, and her own nakedness torments her. Even as a young girl of eleven, she knows to look for “light” in a person’s eyes—its absence signifies a lack of humanity, one that can never be put back, even if that person is clothed.