Introduction Aphra Behn's Oroonoko is presented as an amalgamation of three narrative forms: memoir, biography and travel narrative, narrated by an English woman visiting the colony in Surinam.(1) In this essay I will examine the ways in which power groups are presented within the text and in particular the ways in which the narrator and the hero are able to transcend them. I will argue that Oroonoko's contradictory status as both a prince and a …showed first 75 words of 2652 total…

…showed last 75 words of 2652 total…the characters involved (including her 'self' as narrator) are remembered, and to make the tragic names of Oroonoko and Imoinda live on. Thus died this great man, worthy of a better fate, and a more sublime wit than mine to write his praise. Yet, I hope, the reputation of my pen is considerable enough to make his glorious name to survive to all ages, with that of the brave, the beautiful, and the constant Imoinda.