O'Donnell Melville Blog

In the deposition of Benito Cereno in Herman Melville's book of the same name, the slaves aboard the San Dominick are described as ruthless and calculating. This is not incorrect, of course, but in this story slavery does not only destroy the Africans aboard this ship, but their superiors as well. Melville makes the reader view slavery in another light because of the turning of tables that happens on the ship.

Babo and Atufal were formerly important, dominant people in Africa, but then they were sold into slavery--which is most likely a position they never thought they would see themselves in. Don Benito Cereno and the deceased Don Alexandro Aranda experience something very similar to this. Cereno becomes the subordinate after the revolt, and begins to realize that much that he has been taught about these slaves is incorrect. This is made clear at the beginning of the deposition when the court did not even believe all of Cereno's story, hence not really believing that the slaves could be as cunning and powerful as they really were.

"The tribunal inclined to the opinion that the deponent, not undisturbed in his mind by the recent events, raved of some things which could never have happened" (62), wrote Melville.

I believe this quote is a clue as to what really happened in the demise of Cereno. After the reader realizes (and even a bit before) that the slaves are really in charge of the ship, Cereno's life is turned upside down. Obviously his life is seriously in danger, but his view of the balance of things good and evil most likely has changed. In the end, when "three months after being dismissed by the court, Benito Cereno, borne on the bier, did, indeed follow his leader" (76). Perhaps, his realization that the slaves he was transporting were real humans, not subhumans, left him unable to cope.