I, Tituba: Black Witch of Salem

Part I relates the story of Tituba from her birth to her arrival in Salem. Part II begins with the witch trials and ends with Tituba’s execution in Barbados in the 1700s. The Epilogue, narrated by Tituba’s spirit, brings the story from the century of her death to that of the present-day reader. Following the Epilogue are two sections that Condé included in the original French publication: a Historical Note on the Salem witch trials and the real-life Tituba, and a Glossary of West Indian and author-invented terms.

The narrative opens with the story of Tituba’s conception, when her mother, Abena, is raped on a slave ship. Abena’s slave owner in Barbados discovers her pregnancy and gives her to Yao, another slave. At seven, Tituba witnesses the public hanging of her mother for fighting off a rape attempt. Yao commits suicide, and Tituba is sent off the plantation.

A spiritual healer named Mama Yaya adopts Tituba and teaches her herbal healing practices and spiritual arts. After Mama Yaya dies, Tituba lives on her own. She continues to communicate with the spirits of Abena, Yao, and Mama Yaya but ignores their warnings when she falls in love with a slave named John Indian, consenting to live with him and be a servant to his owner, Susanna Endicott. Susanna sells the couple to Reverend Samuel Parris (whose historical counterpart is the fanatical Puritan who incited the Salem witch trials). The reverend takes them to the New World—first to Boston, then to Salem—where Tituba naïvely uses her healing abilities to help the reverend’s wife and daughter.

At this point, the story mirrors the recorded details of the Salem witch trials, combining real-life personages and events with the trial that lands Tituba in prison. Her testimony is a reprint of the documented testimony of the real-life Tituba. Tituba shares a cell with the fictional Hester Prynne of The Scarlet Letter, with whom she discusses modern feminism. She remains in prison until a Jewish merchant buys her. They become lovers, and she cares for his children until they are killed when the Puritans burn their home. He decides to free her and buy her passage on a ship to Barbados.

Tituba returns to Barbados, discovers she has become a legend as a witch, and becomes the lover of a rebel maroon leader named Christopher. Impregnated by Christopher, she returns to her former home and meets Iphigene, who becomes her lover and plans a slave rebellion. Betrayed by Christopher, she and Iphigene are hanged. Tituba’s spirit lives on, and in the Epilogue, she describes the ongoing bigotry of the future and the spirits who continue to inspire rebellion and the dream of liberty.