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Heart of Darkness

Joseph Conrad
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Conrad#/media/File:Joseph_Conrad.PNG

England

First Published 1899 in Blackwood's Magazine; 1902 with three other stories in Youth

General Questions | Group Questions | Criticism | Pictures | Links

Terms to know

colonialism    The establishment by more developed countries of formal political authority over areas of Asia, Africa, Australasia, and Latin America. It is distinct from spheres of influence, indirect forms of control, semi-colonialism , and neo-colonialism .

Colonialism was practised by Spain, Portugal, Britain, France, and the Netherlands in the Americas from the fifteenth century onwards, and extended to virtually all of Asia and Africa during the 19th century. It was usually (but not necessarily) accompanied by the settling of White populations in these territories, the exploitation of local economic resources for metropolitan use, and sometimes both together. The term is often used as a synonym for imperialism although the latter covers other informal mechanisms of control.

In addition to debates about the causes, benefits, and impact of imperialism, discussion of colonialism has covered a wide range of issues including: the different mechanisms of colonial control and the contrast between the assimilationist policies of France and Portugal and the more segregated policies of Britain; the social and economic impact on colonized countries, resulting from the destruction of old social, economic, and political systems and the development of new ones; the 19th-century discourse of domination around the idea of the ‘civilizing mission' and the related rise of racism; the issue of why colonialism ended in the post-1945 period, involving a consideration of the relative weights of international pressure from both the United States and USSR, the rise of nationalist movements demanding independence in colonies, and the exhaustion of the European colonial powers after the Second World War.

"colonialism."  A Dictionary of Sociology, Oxford Reference Online, edited by John Scott and Gordon Marshall, Oxford University Press 2009, 6 December 2009.

Imperialism Domination of one people or state by another. Imperialism can be economic, cultural, political or religious. From the 16th century, trading empires were set up by major European powers such as the British, Spanish, French, Portuguese and Dutch. They penetrated Africa, Asia and N America, their colonies serving as a source of raw materials and a market for manufactured goods. Imperialism often imposed alien cultures on native societies. See also colonialism

"imperialism."  World Encyclopedia, Oxford Reference Online, Philip's, 2008,  accessed 6 December 2009.

Orientalism
Traditionally, any form of scholarship or indeed fascination with the Orient, meaning the countries generally referred to today as the Middle East (but also encompassing the whole of North Africa, Turkey, Pakistan, and the northern tip of India). Edward Said’s book Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient (1978) transformed the term from a relatively neutral, though obviously biased, name for a venerable field of study dating back several hundred years, into an indictment of bigotry and racism. Said’s work emptied Orientalism of its previously positive associations and connotations and put in their place a long list of charges. Indeed, there are few critical reversals of the meaning of terms as complete as Said’s demolition of Orientalism. His basic charge is that the Orient as conceived by the Orientalists (primarily, but not exclusively, English, French, and German) is a fiction of their own imagining bearing no resemblance to the actual Orient, which, as Said points out, is a vastly complicated region. He notes, too, that many of the most famous Orientalist scholars never even visited the Orient, relying instead on second-hand accounts of it, as though the actuality of the Orient did not really interest them. This fictional Orient conjured up by Orientalists is, Said shows (using the work of Michel Foucault as his inspiration), a discursive production, a fantastic place that is the product of hundreds of years of mystification, exoticization, and outright deception made possible by the discrepant power relations between West and East. The problem, he argues, is that the West’s ongoing fantasy of the Orient has real effects: insofar as the West understands the Orient as backward, unenlightened, irrational, sexually deviant, unhealthy, uninviting, and so on, it forms its politics accordingly (one has only to recall Donald Rumsfeld’s callous disregard for the looting of Iraq’s national museum following the fall of Baghdad in 2003 to see the consequences of this). In the 30 years since its publication, Orientalism, has become a cornerstone of Postcolonial Studies.

Introduction

In his poem "The Hollow Men" (1925), T.S. Eliot, the Noble prize winning American writer, uses as an epigraph the odd line "Mistah Kurtz – he dead," a sentence lifted directly from "The Heart of Darkness." Eliot and other modernist writers took Conrad's story as their anthem because to them it suggested the emptiness of life and reflected the jaundiced air they assumed after the rack and ruin of WWI. Though written in 1899, its themes, including the emptiness of materialism, the dangers of succumbing to instincts, and the hypocrisy of benevolent capitalism and colonialism, resonate throughout the century, cropping up in books such as Lord of the Flies and movies such as Apocalypse Now.

The Times
Politics

Map of Congo Free State 1890

The story is based in part on Conrad's own journey to what was then called The Republic of Congo where he gained, as he reported in an essay on explorers, "the distasteful knowledge of the vilest scramble for loot that ever disfigured the history of human conscience and geographical exploration" ("Stanley Falls" 187). The background of this "scramble for loot" involves a rapacious king, secret deals by super-powers, and the crass manipulation and almost willful blindness of the period's benevolent and evangelical desires societies.

To understand the quite real and specific historical context of the story, it's necessary to understand the way Europe divided up the natural wealth of Africa into easily digestible pieces. Throughout the ages, Europe, and later the Americas, had exploited the coastal areas for the slave trade, but as the nineteenth-century drew to a close, the slave trade was legislated out of existence by most Western countries. But as the slave trade dwindled, the burgeoning industrial and commercial interests of these countries increased the demand for more material goods, such as ivory, lumber and rubber.

King Leopold of Belgium, hungry for some land pie, formed the International Association of the Congo, a supposedly philanthropic organization whose goal was, as Leopold stated in 1876, "to open to civilization the only part of our globe where Christianity has not penetrated and to pierce the darkness which envelops the entire population" (qtd. in Hennessy 80). This, of course, was the religious pabulum he mouthed to cover his true ambition: to get rich. The International Association of the Congo, renamed the Company in "Heart of Darkness," was nothing but a pious front for an organization dedicated to the systematic plunder of a foreign land; and King Leopold was nothing but a robber-baron cloaking his imperialistic ambitions in borrowed and ill-fitting ecclesiastical robes.

Throughout the nineteenth-century, as the English, Dutch, French, German, and Portuguese interests descended on the "dark" continent to plunder its natural resources, they quickly began butting up against each other. To avoid conflict, Germany called them together in a conference in1884 to divvy up the remaining land and respect each other's territorial claims. Amazingly, given the historical animosity of these countries towards each other, an agreement was signed, and Leopold, for his part, received the Congo. The ready acceptance of the covenants from this conference by these antagonistic countries – as well as their hubris in asserting their will over other countries – attests to their imperialistic desires. Apparently, the lure of lucre is powerful enough to overcome even the forces of nationalistic enmity.

Photograph of African prisoners/workers/slaves from the period of the novel. Note chains around neck and waist.
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/1e/9d/0b/1e9d0bbf933acff48adea52214548251--congo-free-state-king-leopold.jpg

Reports of atrocities came early from Africa, but the lure of money proved too powerful to sway governments to take any steps which might endanger the flow of goods. In particular, Leopold came under fire for his practice of enforced slavery, but the various benevolent and missionary societies, blinded by their desire to spread their "holy light" among the "dark people," felt that a few million lost were worth the cost of a Christianized continent. As Conrad sarcastically noted in an 1890 letter,

One way to read the story is as an indictment of the pretensions of economic, moral, and religious leaders in Europe towards Africa and its people. Conrad, with bitter irony, calls those who travel to the continent in search of riches "pilgrims;" however, unlike true religious travelers, their god is mammon. In the story, the rapacious capitalism of King Leopold and his minions is embodied by the customs officials of the Company. Conrad took a dim view of any attempts by one nation to impose their will (or in other words colonize) on another. He knew all to well that the "kind" in mankind does not stand for the way we treat each other.

The greed exhibited by King Leopold and his ilk stems, in part, from Europe's desire for conquest, its imperialistic urges that led to the establishment of outposts of Western civilization all over the globe, and, to be frank, the oppression and exploitation of foreign lands and indigenous peoples. Since I mentioned imperialism, a definition is in order here. Simply put, imperialism is the usurpation of one nation by another. Typically, a more powerful (militaristically of course) nation will impose its political and economic system on a weaker one to exploit its people as labor or its land for raw material. The focus here is on Africa, but as the example of India, the Carribean, and the Philippines show,  it has been practiced around the world.  To be frank, it is usually whites taking advantage of people of color – all colors. As the main character, Marlow, says "The conquest of the earth, which mostly meant the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much" (4). I open my discussion on the story with imperialism because it seems, at the basic level, to be a critique of this form of intervention.

The Arts
Okay, now before you run away in terror at what may sound like a boring historical novel on the evils of colonialism, realize that I've only given the historical context of the tale: its scope and vision are by no means limited to a screed against imperialism. As a work of art, Conrad's evocative, searching language, shares affinities with artists of the impressionist movement, interested, as they were,

not in precise, photographic renderings of subjects, but in the subtle shades that are often closer to reality. At its core, this story, as my heading suggests, is about evil: both on the grand, national scale, but more revealingly, on the personal and private level. The story of two men – Marlow, who narrates the tale, and Kurtz, who gradually assumes importance – it encompasses moral questions of the nature of evil, psychological probings of man at his most elemental, and a quest for ultimate knowledge of . . . . you'll have to read to find out.

The Life
In 1890 Conrad sought a commission to captain a vessel up the Congo River from the Societe Anonyme Belge pour le Commerce du Haut-Congo (the "Company" in "Heart of Darkness"). He received, in part through the efforts of an Aunt Marguerite, his command, but discovered it had sunk (hmmm) when he arrived. So instead of piloting a vessel, he shipped as a mate aboard the Roi de Belges.

Photo of Conrad’s Boat
http://abergo1.e-monsite.com/medias/album/eic0026.jpg

Conrad proceeded all the way to the Inner Station at Stanley Falls, but there was no Kurtz waiting for him (there was, however, a sick agent named Klein). Such are the concrete details that Conrad apparently borrowed from his own life. 

More important, I think, than all of these was what he learned about men and himself on the voyage. Like Marlow he was profoundly moved by the experience, and, seeing man at their lowest and most revolting (of his time there, he wrote to his Aunt Marguerite "Everything here is repellent to me . . . Men and things, but above all men" [qtd. in Murfin 12]), he gained a moral vision which he proceeded to elucidate in fiction. On a more practical basis, he realized that he preferred writing to seafaring, and after this final trip, devoted himself to a life of literature.

Manuscript page of Heart of Darkness showing "The Horror!"

  

Conrad, Joseph. "Stanley Falls, Early September 1890." The Heart of Darkness, edited by Robert

    Kimbrough, Norton, 1988, pp.186-187.

Franklin, John Hope. "Williams Ignored." The Heart of Darkness. edited by Robert

    Kimbrough, Norton, 1988, pp. 120-125.

Hennessy, Maurice. "The Congo Free State: A Brief History, 1876 to 1908." edited by Robert

    Kimbrough, Norton, 1988, pp. 79-81.

Murfin, Ross. Introduction and Editor. Heart of Darkness: A Case Study in Contemporary Criticism.

    St. Martin's Press, 1989, pp. 3-16.

Questions to mull over as you interpret the story

• Note that Marlow isn't telling the story directly – it's mediated through another person. What effect does this "story in a story" create? 
• Marlow says that meeting Kurtz was "the farthest point of navigation and the culminating point of my experience" (5). What do these two things have in common? Why did Marlow have to go to the "farthest point" to "culminate"?
• Who's the protagonist of this novel? Kurtz or Marlow?
• Who's the antagonist?
• What’s the climax of this story?
• What could all the broken machinery in Africa  symbolize?
•     What is Marlow's attitude toward the natives?
•     What is Kurtz's attitude toward the natives?
•     How is Conrad's attitude toward the natives racist? How isn't it?
•     Why does the station manager believe Kurtz is evil? Why does Marlow believe he is a "genius"?
•     To what extent does Marlow himself acknowledge his own "heart of darkness"?
•     How are the Intended and the Russian similar? How are they different?
•     What do you make of Marlow's dismissal of women throughout the text?
•     Consider the implications behind the following statements by Marlow and others concerning Kurtz: "All Europe contributed to the making of Kurtz" (45); "he had the faith. He could get himself to believe anything" (67) What does it seem Conrad wants Kurtz to represent/symbolize?
•     What is the "dumb thing" on page 23? Why embody it?
•     What's the difference b/t the "restraint" exhibited by the cannibals and the "restraint" exhibited by the pilgrims? (see 38) Consider, as well, who is more "civilized" and which more humane
•     Important point: What are the "little things [that] make all the difference"? (45) And what difference is Marlow/Conrad suggesting?
•     What's the purpose of the French warship "shelling the bush"? What does it demonstrate?
•     Marlow reports that Kurtz "presented himself as a voice" (43). Why? What points about language, both written and oral, is Conrad bringing up. Consider, in particular, the comments on Kurtz's pamphlet for the International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs: "This was unbounded power of eloquence – of words – of burning noble words. There were no practical hints to interrupt the magic . . ." Then, the one, shocking bit of advice "Exterminate all the brutes!" (46) (Note, by the way, that Marlow removes this when he gives it to the officials from the company [66].) See War speech from W. Bush.
•     How is the manager's claim that "Kurtz has done more harm than good to the Company" (57) ironic? – and is it related to Marlow's "choice of nightmares"? (57) What is the manager really upset about?
•     What is "the horror!" (65)
•     Who or what is evil in this story?
• Why so few names? – Kurtz, Marlow . . . that’s about it.  Why are so many characters nameless (the station manager, doctor at the Corporation office)? (bring up the deconstructionist idea of absence – how an absence has meaning.
• Said’s Orientalism: Discuss the idea of the cult of orientalism in the period – Whistler and other artists⦁    Often deals in seeming paradoxes: How can something be “not very clear,” yet “throw a kind of light”? (5); how could a person spread “the pulsating stream of light or the deceitful flow from the heart of an impenetrable darkness” (43)?
• What “devil” is he talking about (13 – particularly the “flabby devil”)
• 43 – what’s the missing word?
• Why have Kurtz unhealthy?
• What “nightmares” can he choose from? – and why use the word “nightmares”?  Why not horrors, or negative views of the world . . .
• The novel makes many references to time, particularly prehistoric and the long reach of time: 3,26,30,31,36 – why?
• Why so many words dealing with uncertainty and shadow?  Consider, for example, passages on pages 10, 11, 18, 24, 30, 54, 58, 59, 60, 66, 69, 70.
• In his essay “The Politics of the English Language,” Orwell discusses how euphemism is used by the powerful to hide their true motives.  Here, we find the language of the imperial powers, Belgium as a stand in for others, use the language of _____ to hide ______: page 4,22,29,63.  And how can we tell the people don’t believe in words?  How does Conrad expose this language as propaganda (words v. deeds 17 “to make money of course”,46)?
• Psychology – the Id, Ego, and Superego: 24,44,63
• A retired student who took this course found the novel reminded him of office politics.  cf 18-22.
• Note connection b/t Kurtz and Marlow; Conrad suggests how can we ever really know a person (does this through the intended as well) (22)
• What references and symbols of death are there in pages 7-8?  Why?
• In what ways is what Marlow finds at Kurtz's camp "traveling back to the earliest beginnings of the world"? (30)
• Why refer to the men who come to make money in Africa as pilgrims
• What's the function of the Russian in Kurtz's camp?
• What do you make of the water imagery in the story?  The color imagery (consider, especially, the play of light and darkness, shade and shadow)
• Contrast the final paragraph with the first
• What's the purpose of the Russian?
• What is the native girl function in the novel? (cf. 56 and 71)
• What is the novel saying about the power of language?  (cf. 46, and consider the story itself, particularly how it is told)
• Why has the river Thames "also. . . been one of dark places of the earth" (3)

Group Questions

Questions day 1 "Heart of Darkness"

1. Why does the novel open with a comparison to the “Romans” (3)?  Another way of looking at this question is by looking for a parallel in the novel: what is suggested by this comparison b/t the Romans and the early English (“Gauls” [3])?
2. Consider the implications behind the following statements by Marlow and others concerning Kurtz: "All Europe contributed to the making of Kurtz" (45); What does it seem Conrad wants Kurtz to represent/symbolize?
3. What is the "dumb thing" in the middle of page 23?  Why embody it?
4. What's the difference b/t the "restraint" exhibited by the cannibals and the "restraint" exhibited by the pilgrims? (see 38) Consider, as well, which is more "civilized" and which more humane
5. Important point: What are the "little things [that] make all the great difference"? (45)  And what difference is Marlow/Conrad suggesting?
6. What earlier novel we’ve read connects with the following quote: “I like what is in the work, the chance to find yourself”? (25).  Explain, in detail, the connection b/t the two novels (see also 30, 34)
7. What connections do you see between "Shooting an Elephant" and HOD

Questions day 2 "Heart of Darkness"

1. Why does Kurtz "present himself as a voice"? (43) What points about language, both written and oral, is Conrad bringing up.  Consider, in particular, the comments on Kurtz's pamphlet for the International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs: "This was unbounded power of eloquence -- of words -- of burning noble words.  There were no practical hints to interrupt the magic . . ."  Then, the one, shocking bit of advice "Exterminate all the brutes!" (46) (Note, by the way, that Marlow removes this when he gives it to the officials from the company [66].)
2. How is the manager's claim that "Kurtz has done more harm than good to the Company" (57) ironic? -- and is it related to Marlow's "choice of nightmares"? (57)  What is the manager really upset about?
3. In his essay “The Politics of the English Language,” Orwell discusses how euphemism is used by the powerful to hide their true motives.  Here, we find the language of the imperial powers, Belgium as a stand in for others, use the language of _____ to hide ______: page 4,22,29,63.  And how can we tell the people don’t believe in words?  How does Conrad expose this language as propaganda (words v. deeds 17 “to make money of course”,46)?
4. What’s the purpose of the native woman and “the Intended”?  What does the native woman represent?  What does “the Intended” represent? What light do they shed on cultural ideas of women?  What’s the purpose of the French warship "shelling the bush"?  Why include this passage (look, in particular, at the way Conrad uses specific words to convey an effect)?
5. What is "the horror"?
6. How many different Hearts of Darkness can you name?

What the author/critics say

In "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness'," the best known criticism of Conrad's depiction of Africa, the African novelist Chinua Achebe accuses Conrad of racism. His main argument is two-fold: he feels that Conrad positions Africa as the Other and that the story exhibits a condescending liberalism towards Africans which he believed "sidestepp[ed] the ultimate question of equality between white people and black people" (256).

He adds that the "book [. . .] parades in the most vulgar fashion prejudices and insults from which a section of mankind has suffered untold agonies and atrocities in the past and continues to do so in many ways and many places today. I am talking about a story in which the very humanity of black people is called into question" (178)

Pictures

See above for relevant pictures

The river Thames according to Turner.
http://i47.tinypic.com/hun4bb.jpg

For an American view on this issue, see essay by the African-American scholar W.E.B Dubois on WWI and African Americans: May 1915 Atlantic Monthly.

 For another English view on a later manifestation of colonialism, see George Orwell's "Shooting an Elephant."

© 2018 David Bordelon