He, however, died on the passage thither, and her childhood and youth were passed there. She became
acquainted with the celebrated slave Oronoko, afterwards the hero of one of her novels. Returning to
England in 1658 she married Behn, a Dutch merchant, but was a widow at the age of 26. She then
became attached to the Court, and was employed as a political spy at Antwerp. Leaving that city she
cultivated the friendship of various play-wrights, and produced many plays and novels, also poems and
pamphlets. The former are extremely gross, and are now happily little known. She was the first English
professional authoress. Among her plays are The Forced Marriage, Abdelazer, The Rover, The Debauchee,
etc., and her novels include Oronoko and The Nun. The former of these was the first book to bring
home to the country a sense of the horrors of slavery, for which let her have credit.
