Techno-Prosthetic Romantic FuturismBlack HackOlaudah Equiano is many things: slave narrativist, spiritual autobiographer, abolitionist, ethnographer, economist, spinner of yarns, teller of tales. He's a hacker too. As Vincent Carretta makes clear in his meticulous notes to The Interesting Narrative, if most readers read, Equiano hacks and slashes. He stitches his book together from the remains of other books--a Frankentext that haunts material discourse like the monster it anticipates. This in no way compromises Equiano's authority. To my mind it enhances it. [2] The Black Hack carves up old authors to create something new. Olaudah Equiano. Notes1. See Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative and Other Writings, ed. Vincent Carretta (New York: Penguin, 1995). 2. See Paul Youngquist, "The Afro-Futurism of DJ Vassa," European Romantic Review 16 (2005): 181-92. Navigation |