Masters of the Game

Because the white man found the black man and was able to take him and his family from their land and use them as laborers, it was widely believed that the blacks were not only meant to be slaves to “civilized” westerners, but that they accepted this role. Captain Delano in “Benito Cereno,” illustrates this prevailing belief with his condescending descriptions of the slaves aboard the ship and his reluctance to see the intelligence and power that they were capable of. His notion that the slaves were obedient, docile creatures nearly cost him his life, but on a larger scale it shows that the white American and European’s conviction that they were superior to blacks in every way was extremely dangerous and eventually led to the successful uprising of the slaves. Had the whites not so fervently underestimated the slaves and their capabilities, they may have known better than to treat them like animals. In “Benito Cereno,” by Herman Melville, the slaves, Babo in particular, use their white masters’ naiveté to their advantage and are able to exact revenge. By merely pretending to be submissive, Babo and the other slaves show that they held that power over the whites. In most cases the slaves obeying their white masters was out of self-preservation and the interest of staying alive, but it nonetheless demonstrations that their “playing the part” of subservience says more about their intelligence and strength than it does of the white’s.

Delano is so sure that the slaves on the ship are friendly and compliant that he never considers the possibility that they could resent the men who have taken them from their homes and mistreated them; “Captain Delano could not but bethink him of the beauty of that relationship which could present such a spectacle of fidelity on the one hand and confidence of the other”(Melville 176). His observations throughout the story are so erroneous that they show how blind he was to the slave’s unhappiness. His insinuations of the slaves being loyal like animals also show that he believed them to be incapable of thinking for themselves and having higher aspirations than serving others. After describing how cheerful they are as a whole, he goes on to say, “… to this is added the docility arising from the unaspiring contentment of a limited mind, and that susceptibility of bland attachment sometimes inhering in indisputable inferiors…” (212). Everything in this description goes to show that Delano’s preconceived notions of blacks kept him from seeing what was truly going on.

Babo and the other slaves continued to act like willing and cheerful servants because to do otherwise would have meant that their plans for revenge and freedom were ruined. In order to not give themselves away once Delano entered the ship, they had to pretend to be following Benito Cereno’s orders. The fact that they did so when they were actually the ones in control shows how they used their situation to their advantage, knowing that Delano and the other white men would be so convinced of their nature that they would never suspect anything to the contrary. It is often said in competition that one should never underestimate their opponent; the problem was that the whites did not see the blacks as opponents because that would have meant that they saw them as equals. By being the underdogs, the slaves had the upper hand.