Describe the beauty of Imoinda.

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http://eng307womenwriters.wordpress.com/2013/03/09/the-plight-of-imoinda/comment-page-1/

Describe the beauty of Imoinda.

or, The plight of Imoinda.

One of the major themes found in Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko is the curse of beauty. Imoinda’s problems are linked directly to her physical appearance. It left me to wonder if Behn had make Imoinda less beautiful would she have suffered the same fate? There is an underlying anxiety surrounding the character of Imoinda because she possesses such great beauty. The narrator is unable to fully describe the depths of her splendor because “to describe her truly, one need only say, she was female to the noble male; the black Venus…of delicate virtues.” (Behn, 206) The idea of a “black Venus” was popularized during the European colonization of Africa. In Europe people were obsessed with the image of an over-sexualized African woman. Imoinda is described to be “[the] fair Queen of the Night.” (Behn, 207) The narrator makes a point to note that she is not only appealing to Oroonoko, but she has also captured the attention of white men who the narrator has seen “making a thousand vows at her feet, all in vain…[because she was] too great for any but a prince of her own nation to adore.” (Behn, 207) Behn plays into the obsession surrounding exotic beauty by leaving the reader longing to know more about Imoinda. The silence of the narrator towards describing Imoinda leaves room for the audience to fill in their personal expectations of foreign beauty, encapsulating the fear and fascination of the unknown.

Imoinda’s physical appearance is a curse in the story. The moral of the story seems to be that if a woman is too beautiful, she has relinquished any power that she could have had. It is because she is too lovely that the king becomes obsessed with owning her. Her beauty is seen as something to possess; she is not more than a trophy to any who have her, even Oroonoko. The narrator puts forth the idea that king cannot help but take Imoinda as his wife because she is overwhelmingly beautiful. The king sees her “as the most charming he had ever possessed in all the long race of his numerous years.” (Behn, 207) This puts the blame not on the king, but in Imoinda whom we should feel sorry for because her life is chosen for her. There is no condemnation towards the nasty old king who is obsessed with possessing Imoinda, but it is seen as perfectly normal because she is too beautiful and boys will be boys. Imoinda is given no power in the story; she is at the whim of her male counterparts and it is her appearance that makes this so.

A major topic in this course has been the discussions surrounding physical appearance and the perceptions of beauty in the texts that we have read. I think we must critically analyze this story. I do not think that it is a beautiful story about love conquering all; rather, I think it is a British woman’s fantasy of an exotic love story. Imoinda’s plight is her beauty, but it is made clear that she far exceeds any white woman in beauty because it is the mystery behind her exotic beauty that makes her so desirable. Her unfathomable loveliness is used as a plot device to draw us into a tragic foreign love story. What is not seen in this story is a confrontation with the horrors of slavery and the way in which the European colonists decimated and degraded any culture or group of people they believed to be different. This is not Romeo and Juliet; rather it is a story that further highlights the way in which European colonialists enslaved their captives by forcing their own ideals about beauty and love on anything that they viewed as alien.

Behn, Aphra. Oroonoko in The Broadview Anthology of British Literature: The Restoration and The Eighteenth Century. Toronto: Broadview Press. 2012.

Imoinda (a.k.a Clemene) Character Analysis

Imoinda is described as a “black Venus,” corresponding to Oroonoko as the “black Mars.” To the narrator, Imoinda perfectly complements Oroonoko in beauty and virtue. Her beauty often brings her unwanted attentions from men, however, even in the New World. This is a particularly big problem in Coramantien, where Imoinda catches the eye of the king. He takes her as his concubine, even though he knows she has pledged her love to Oroonoko and married him. Imoinda remains true to her husband, however, but this brings about her downfall when the king sells her into slavery. Not long after being reunited with Oroonoko in Suriname, Imoinda becomes pregnant. She then fights alongside Oroonoko to gain liberty and a better life for their unborn child. She is handy with a bow and arrow, and wounds Governor Byam during a slave uprising. Imoinda is also incredibly obedient to Oroonoko, and accepts her own death and her unborn child’s murder at his hands out of the abundance of her love for him.

Source: https://www.litcharts.com/lit/oroonoko/characters/imoinda-a-k-a-clemene