In his essay "Othello and Venice: Discrimination and Projection" Alessandro Serpieri observes of the play's lexicon that "bondage,
bondslave and, above all, bound significantly recur in crucial passages." (47) In Juan Latino the juxtaposition of imagery of the enslavement of blacks and more abstract forms of bondage is evident; when Juan vows to adorn love's walls with a black man in chains, it is clear he is alluding to slavery because he is himself a black slave.
The most evil deceit resides in the conceit of those who pretend to be a friend and achieve their end by flattery, bribery, or coercion; those who fall victim to such evil remain forever the
bondslave of their Overseer.
"O glorious strength/Put to the labour of a Beast, debas't/Lower than
bondslave!" To Samson, the gift carries expectations/ burdens and rewards.
But, once he finds himself in the position of master to a bondslave, the colonial narrative and his own take on similar hues.
The servant/slave is attached to his master by stronger bonds than steel; his function is to validate his master, and make him whole, much in the way that Hegel later described the relationship of master and bondslave. The mutual dependency of the two lies in their complementarity in mind/body, savage/gentleman, reason/passion oppositions.
The epigraph is e.e.cummings's, but the novel's title comes from the Chinese national anthem: "Arise, ye who refuse to be
bondslaves ...
Her Saviour has taken her from among the
bondslaves of Satan, and placed her in charge of a flowering garden, not amid the dust and blood of the battle." Further, "Disdain not this humble ministry, my sisters; it is God's plan; it answers your own cravings, it is endorsed by your own tender intuitions." (12) That kind of logic (or should I say illogic?) regarding women deacons and ministers has existed in every century of Baptist life.