SOURCE: Little, Roger. “Oroonoko and Tamango: A Parallel Episode.” French Studies 46, no. 1 (January 1992): 26-32.

In the following essay, Little finds connections between “Tamango” and Aphra Behn's novel Oroonoko.

In both Mrs Aphra Behn's most celebrated novel, Oroonoko; or The Royal Slave (1688), and Prosper Mérimée's short story ‘Tamango’ (1829), there occur similar episodes of ‘the biter bit’. The eponymous black hero of each tale is an outstanding African with potential qualities of leadership (ironically undercut at every turn in Tamango's case) and a nice sideline in selling his fellow Africans as slaves. Each in turn is offered abundant wine and lured on to a European slaving vessel, betrayed by the captain who has made prior arrangements with his crew, and unceremoniously shackled in the hold for transportation across the Atlantic. Thereafter the narratives diverge.

After being translated Oroonoko was widely influential among French writers.¹ Just as dramatic versions...