In her novel Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave, author Aphra Behn explores the life of a royal slave named Oroonoko. One of the most provocative aspects of Oroonoko’s life is his relationship with a young woman named Imoinda. Through this relationship, Oroonoko not only finds a soulmate, but he also finds himself. However, this relationship ultimately leads to Oroonoko’s self-destruction and eventual insanity. The relationship between Oroonoko and Imoinda gradually begins to take on many of the characteristics of Hegel’s model of the master-slave dialectic in which Oroonoko sees himself reflected in Imoinda.

Aphra Behn begins Oroonoko with a description of Oroonoko’s background and the early forces which shaped his life. Oroonoko was raised in a society which valued truth, honor and honesty above everything else. According to the narrator of Oroonoko: "They have a native justice which knows no fraud, and they understand no vice or cunning, but when they are taught by the white men" (Behn 2172). From a very early age, Oroonoko was seen as a shining light in a society facing discord and corruption. The coming of the English settlers brought a rise in dishonesty and general societal decay. Oroonoko’s birth was viewed as a sign that the corrupt society of the English would soon be replaced with their traditional native values.

From the time he was born, Oroonoko was regarded as a unique and special man. He was the sole surviving grandson of the King of Coramantien and by the time he was seventeen he was "one of the most expert captains and bravest soldiers that ever saw the field of Mars" (2173-74). Oroonoko’s extraordinary attributes were not limited to skill in battle. He was also intelligent, well-educated and physically beautiful. Behn describes Oroonoko’s attributes and their effect on society in the following passage from the novel:

Nor did the perfections of his mind come short of those of his person, for his discourse was admirable upon almost any subject; and whoever had heard him speak would have been convinced of their errors, that all fine wit is confined to the white men, especially those of Christendom, and would have confessed that Oroonoko was as capable even of reigning well, and of governing wisely, had as great soul, as politic maxims, and was as sensible of power, as any prince civilized in the most refined schools of humanity and learning, or the most illustrious courts. (2175)

Although Oroonoko is a man who is loved and admired by many people because of his noble and desirable attributes, he only begins to take on a personal identity and purpose when he falls in love. The woman he falls in love with is Imoinda, the daughter of the general who trained him in warfare. He first meets her after her father’s death when he comes to bring her the spoils of her father’s final victories. However, he soon becomes enchanted by her grace and beauty and as a result discovers feelings he didn’t know he had. As Behn describes, this initial attraction soon turns into an all-consuming passion for both Oroonoko and Imoinda:
"I have often heard him say that he admired by what strange inspiration he came to talk things so soft and so passionate, who never knew love, nor was used to the conversation of women; but (to use his own words) he said, most happily some new and til then unknown power instructed his heart and tongue in the language of love, and at the same time, in favor of him, inspired Imoinda with a sense of his passion. "(2176)

At this point, the relationship between Oroonoko and Imoinda begins to follow the development of Hegel’s concept of the Master-Slave Dialectic. Imoinda’s recognition and acknowledgment of Oroonoko’s feelings for her is a direct reflection of Hegel’s notion of the recognition of Self-Consciousness. Hegel defines the recognition of self-consciousness in the following section of his work Phenomenology of Spirit:
"Self-consciousness is faced by another self- consciousness; it has come out of itself. This has a two-fold significance: first, it has lost itself, for it finds itself as an other being; secondly, in doing so it has superseded the other, for it does not see the other as an essential being, but in the other sees its own self." (Hegel 111)

Just as Oroonoko finds his true identity in his relationship with Imoinda, Imoinda also begins to find her own personal identity with Oroonoko. The bond they form is immediate and intense and soon they make plans for their wedding. However, as soon as they decide to get married Oroonoko’s grandfather, the King, decides that he wants Imoinda for himself. Because of the King’s standing in society, Imoinda is compelled to follow him back to his palace, but once she is there she still affirms her relationship with Oroonoko.
"[But] Imoinda, all in tears, threw herself on the marble, on the brink of the bath, and besought him to hear her. She told him, as she was a maid, how proud of the divine glory she should have been, of having it in her power to oblige her king; but as by the laws he could not, and from his royal goodness would not, take from any man his wedded wife, so she believed she should be the occasion of making him commit a great sin, if she did not reveal her state and condition, and tell him she was another’s, and could not be so happy to be his. " (Behn 2177-78)

Imoinda’s affirmation of her relationship with Oroonoko cements her role in the Hegelian Master-Slave Dialectic because at this point "They recognize themselves as mutually recognizing one another" (Hegel 112). Although the lovers are faced with the possibility of being separated due to the King’s attraction to Imoinda, the bond between them still remains. Hegel describes this aspect of the Master-Slave dialectic in the following passage from his work:
"[For first,] through the suppression, it receives back its own self, because, by superseding its otherness, it again becomes equal to itself; but secondly, the other self-consciousness equally gives it back again to itself, for it saw itself in the other, but supersedes this being of itself in the other and thus lets the other go free again." (111)

Eventually, Imoinda is forced into marriage with the King, but that doesn’t prevent Imoinda and Oroonoko from meeting secretly to affirm their love for each other. The time they spend together is precious to them even though they are aware that it is very ephemeral. Even though Imoinda is now married to the King, he is jealous of her continued bond with Oroonoko and watches her closely. In addition, because Oroonoko is a skilled soldier there is the constant danger that he will be sent to fight in battle at a moment’s notice.

Imoinda and Oroonoko continue to meet in secret until they captured and enslaved by European colonizers. At this point, their relationship contains an unusual paradox because they are both physically enslaved by the settlers and emotionally enslaved by the Master-Slave dialectic. Oroonoko and Imoinda are now free to be together but because they are now slaves, they never be able to truly savor that freedom.

Their situation is further complicated by the fact that Imoinda is now pregnant and is in danger of being attacked or killed. Oroonoko doesn’t want to leave Imoinda and their child to face the unknown terrors of their situation and he decides to take a drastic step which will forever alter their lives. Oroonoko decides that he would rather kill Imoinda himself rather than leave her and their unborn child in danger. Imoinda willingly allows Oroonoko to kill her; however, as Behn describes, Oroonoko ultimately feels as if he is killing a part of himself.
"He (grieved to death) yet pleased at her noble resolution, took her up, and embracing her with all the passion and languishment of a dying lover, drew his knife to kill this treasure of his soul, this pleasure of his eyes." (2212)

While Oroonoko believes that he is acting with the best of intentions when he kills Imoinda, the critic Margaret W. Ferguson disagrees. "...Oroonoko has resolved to kill his pregnant wife for reasons that show him to be no less obsessed than Othello by a sexual jealousy intricately bound up with the ideologies of property possession" (Ferguson Internet). However, Oroonoko’s motives in this action go beyond mere possession. Oroonoko’s killing of Imoinda is instead the enactment of one of the final stages of the Master-Slave dialectic, the life-and-death struggle. Hegel describes this stage in the following section from his work:
"This presentation is a two-fold action: action on the part of the other, and action on its own part. In so far as it is the action of the other, each seeks the death of the other...Thus the relation of the two self-conscious individuals is such that they prove themselves and each other through a life-and-death struggle. "(Hegel 113-14)

This life-and-death struggle has devastating consequences for Oroonoko as he realizes that in killing Imoinda he has also killed off a part of himself. The killing is both physical because Oroonoko also killed their unborn child and it is also emotional because Oroonoko only gained an identity through his relationship with Imoinda. Consumed by terror and grief over the loss of his love and his identity, Oroonoko tries to take his own life as well.
"A thousand times he turned the fatal knife that did the deed towards his own heart, with a resolution to go immediately after her; but dire revenge, which now was a thousand times more fierce in his soul than before, prevents him." (Behn 2212)

Because Oroonoko has killed off a part of himself he has resolved to take his own life in order to join together with the woman who gave him his identity. According to Charlotte Sussman, the pattern of injuries Oroonoko inflicts on himself is symbolic of his desire to reclaim that part of himself he lost.
"The marks Oroonoko makes on his body, however, mirror the injuries he has recently inflicted on Imoinda. First he cuts a piece of flesh from his own neck, just as he slit Imoinda’s throat. Then, in an action that points to the underlying significance of Imoinda’s murder, Oroonoko, rather than cutting off his own head, 'rip’d up his own Belly, and took his Bowels and pull’d ‘em out, with what strength he could'" (p.75) (Sussman 220)

The relationship between Oroonoko and Imoinda is a significant one for Oroonoko on a number of levels. Through this relationship, he not only finds the love of his life, but he also discovers his real identity. Oroonoko’s discovery and Imoinda’s affirmation of their relationship leads them into a relationship modeled after Hegel’s Master-Slave dialectic. This relationship is ultimately damaging for Oroonoko because his realization of his place in the dialectic leads him down a path of self-destruction.

Behn, Aphra. "Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave." The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Seventh Edition. ed. M.H. Abrams and Stephen Greenblatt. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. 2170-2215.

Ferguson, Margaret W. "Juggling the Categories of Race, Class, and Gender: Aphra Behn’s ‘Oroonoko’." Women’s Studies. 19.2 (159). Online. InfoTrac. Expanded Academic ASAP. A16010088. 30 March 2000.

Hegel, G.W.F. Phenomenology of Spirit. Trans. A. V. Miller. New York: Oxford University Press. 1977.

Sussman, Charlotte. "The Other Problem with Women: Reproduction and Slave Culture in Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko." Reading Aphra Behn: History, Theory, and Criticism. ed. Heidi Hunter. Charlottesville and London: University Press of Virginia, 1993. 212-233.