Analysis Of Joseph Conrad 's Heart Of Darkness

There is an abundance of literature in which characters become caught between colliding cultures. Often, these characters experience a period of growth from their exposure to a culture that’s dissimilar to their own. Such is the case with Marlow, Joseph Conrad’s infamous protagonist from ‘Heart of Darkness’. Marlow sets off to Africa on an ivory conquest and promptly found himself sailing into the heart of the Congo River. Along the way he is faced with disgruntled natives, cannibals, and the ominous and foreboding landscape. Marlow’s response to these tribulations is an introspective one, in which he calls into question his identity. This transcending of his former self renders the work as a whole a

The novella, Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad, is a piece that pushed the envelope of its time due to an oppositional stance on the forced imperialism of primitive and/or impoverished countries. The protagonist of this story is the self-proclaimed explorer, Marlow, who decides to leave the heart of light and purity (Europe) and take a job as a steamboat captain in the dark jungles of the Congo Free State in Africa. Upon his arrival, Marlow begins to see the impact of Belgium’s intrusion on the Congo by means of implementing slavery, commandeering ivory (a valuable resource), and presenting a negative attitude toward the primitive population. Marlow eventually becomes obsessed with an ivory

    Literature is never interpreted in exactly the same way by two different readers. A prime example of a work of literature that is very ambiguous is Joseph Conrad's, "Heart of Darkness". The Ambiguities that exist in this book are Marlow's relationship to colonialism, Marlow's changing feelings toward Kurtz, and Marlow's lie to the Intended at the end of the story.

In Heart of Darkness, the “precious trickle of ivory” from the Congo begets and corrupts everything (Conrad, 18). Kurtz, in his pursuit of ivory, becomes distorted. He changes from a “universal genius” to a barbaric figure that places the heads of decapitated natives on spikes facing him in worship and sick veneration (Conrad, 72).

Marlow is the source of our story, but he is also a character within the story we read. Marlow has always "followed the sea", as the novel puts it. His voyage up the Congo river, however, is his first experience in freshwater travel. Conrad uses Marlow as a narrator in order to enter the story himself and tell it from his own philosophical mind. When Marlow arrives at the station, he is shocked and disgusted by the sight of wasted human life and ruined supplies. The manager's senseless cruelty and foolishness overwhelm him with anger and disgust. He longs to see Kurtz, a fabulously successful ivory agent who is hated by the company manager. More and more, Marlow turns away from the white people (because of their ruthless brutality) and to the dark jungle (a symbol of reality and truth). He begins to identify more and more with Kurtz- long before he even sees him or talks to him.

Greed can push both ruthless and innocent people to hurt others. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Europeans wanted to imperialize many countries in Africa for land and resources such as gold and cash crops. They also desired economic, social, and political control along with the success of converting Africans to European politics and religion. Europeans sought to have an economic and political dominance over African Americans. The cruelty that the Africans faced is displayed in Joseph Conrad’s, Heart of Darkness. Raising questions about both racism and imperialism, the novel includes Kurtz, a character with greed for the valuable resource, ivory. Conrad comments on the horrific corruptibility of humanity through the narrator, Charles

What makes Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness more than the run of the mill adventure tale, is its moral complexity. By the end of the novel, we find a protagonist who has immense appreciation for a man who lacks honest redemption, the mysterious Mr. Kurtz. It is the literal vivaciousness and unyielding spirit of this man, his pure intentionality, which Marlow finds so entrancing and which leaves the reader with larger questions regarding the human capacity. Therefore, Heart of Darkness is profoundly different given its character complexity and ambiguous narrative technique which ultimately deliver home a message of the complex motivations and capabilities of mankind.

    Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is full of oppositions.  The most obvious is the juxtaposition of darkness and light, which are both present from the very beginning, in imagery and in metaphor.  The novella is a puzzling mixture of anti-imperialism and racism, civilization and savagery, idealism and nihilism.  How can they be reconciled?  The final scene, in which Marlow confronts Kurtz's Intended, might be expected to provide resolution.  However, it seems, instead, merely to focus the dilemmas in the book, rather than solving them.

The constant change in scenery throughout the Heart of Darkness contributes heavily to the meaning of the novel as a whole, for it allows the novel’s author, Joseph Conrad, to expand on the effects the physical journey of travelling through the Congo has on the inner mentailites of the characters- Marlow and Kurtz- in the novel. Conrad’s continuous comparisons between characters, their surroundings, and the plot, create the genuine progression of the novel, while the physical journey that is taken allows the characters to make their own discovery of humankind. As Kurtz’s destiny and the struggles he overcomes go on to deeply affect the two characters’ journey through the story’s plot, as everything in the Heart of Darkness is linked or comes back to Kurtz and all the wrongful actions he has committed in the Congo- as he was the perpetrator of all the darkness in the novel to begin with.

Ivory is connected to many of the main events and characters in the Heart of Darkness as it symbolizes imperialism and the greed of the Europeans. It drives the entire presence of the Europeans in the Congo. “The word ‘ivory’ rang in the air was whispered, was signed,” Marlow says. While amongst the Euro pilgrims, Marlow mentions, “The only real feeling was a desire to get appointed to a trading-post where ivory was to be had, so that they could earn percentages.” Greed is shown mainly through Kurtz, who has the most interaction with the ivory at the post and is sought after by Marlow and others who wish to have his position.

"The horror, the horror!" Kurtz exclaims prior to his last breath of life on earth. In those final moments, Kurtz was able to say something so true about the whole mess of human life. A life dominated by the fittest, perceived differently through each human eye, and full of judgement lacking understanding of all sides. The various ways the world is viewed causes many problems amongst its people. Whether they are about racism, wealth, or even common sense, conflicts are still subject to arouse. Why? The answer to this is not yet clear because of its complexity and endless variables. Yet what is clear is that it ties into two other aspects-prejudice and social

Evil: Morally bad or wrong; wicked. Causing ruin, injury, or pain; harmful. Characterized by or indicating future misfortune; ominous. Bad or blameworthy by report; infamous. Characterized by anger or spite; malicious. The definition of evil, a term used very cautiously in modern society, is very diverse among different people. In Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, the term evil is articulated through several ways mainly four characters: the cruelty within the people of the Belgian Congo, main mystery of Kurtz, the setting upon which the characters reside, and the atmosphere in which the Belgian Congo produces from the elements prior stated. The smarter Europeans used their intelligence and arms strength to cruelly overcome the weaker

The two major themes of Heart of Darkness are the conflict between “reality” and “darkness,” and the idea of restraint and whether or not it is necessary. Conrad’s passage describing the restraint of the hungry cannibals exemplifies both themes:  It describes how reality shapes human behavior, and contrasts the characters of Kurtz and Marlow.  “Reality,” as it is used here, is defined as “that which is civilized.”

Heart of Darkness is written by Joseph Conrad and published in 1899. It is a novella written in the early modernism literary period.

Heart of Darkness wildly reinforce imperialist and capitalist values through commodifying the Africans for their ivory , hence capitalists have the power to do so; to achieve the goals of the wealthy company. Capitalist culture exists in Heart of Darkness since sending Mr. Kurtz 'the bourgeoisie and the first class agent' of a trade company to the Congo ; to exploit its natural bounties and people to accumulate capital without regarding the proletariat who are forced to work restlessly and to subject themselves to the capitalist system without giving them their rights of payment or even enough food to eat. In its obvious practice , Kurtz's controlling value consists essentially of exploiting the natives until they die and then replacing them with other proletariats with low price to earn high profit by more working hands and hours. Marlow narrates " with that complete, deathlike indifference of unhappy savages." (Conrad 23). Also he narrates " they had given them every week three pieces of brass wire,….. unless they swallowed the wire itself, or made loops of it to snare the fishes with, I don't see what good their extravagant salary could be to them. I must say it was paid with a regularity worthy of a large and honourable trading company." (p. 67) Marlow also shows the exchange commodities in the market as every