Is Joseph Conrad a Racist and Does His Work Portray It? Essay

Filled with an enigmatic darkness, Heart of Darkness is layered with a very detailed blend of character development involving personality changes and an obvious plethora of racist ideologies. The way in which Conrad writes allows the reader to find a rather interesting and even exciting read. The story itself is filled with rich detail to provoke imagery. Symbolism and allegory can be found everywhere in the novel, focusing largely on the inherent darkness that surrounds and possibly influence us. Heart of Darkness is a classic that we should use to teach. Of course racism makes up the novel in of itself, but the imagery and detail that Conrad is able to evoke can offset the racism. The novel can be compared to that of Sherlock Holmes – both cause the reader to yearn to unravel the mysteries within them – a great piece of literature. Conrad’s work should not be completely lost or forgotten – being taught in schools could be the perfect case for its use.

Joseph Conrad the writer of “The Heart of Darkness” (1899) describes as his own narrator of thoughts, the expedition and imperialism ideology that leads him through the Congo. Conrad has just taken a short ride up river to his company’s station. He was taken up by a Swede, who warned him about fellow men hanging themselves. The environment was new to Conrad, it’s noted as he observes the hills, rocky enclosures, and the naked African-Americans walking about. The specific texts begins, as Conrad’s curiosity of his new station, leads him up a hill. The books describes the new landscape to be close to rapids, the author, who is Conrad narrating her own thoughts, makes the noise and clustered groove to add confusion and unfamiliarity.

A famous criticism of Conrad’s novella is called An Image of Africa, which was written by an African native named Chinua Achebe. In Achebe’s criticisms of Heart of Darkness, he points out the difference between descriptions of the European woman and the African woman, who was Kurtz’s mistress. The narrator describes the European woman as being calm and mature, and the African woman as being “savage” (341 Norton). Even though many writers claim that Marlow is kind to the Africans by bringing light to their situation, the real problem does not lie in his description of their situations, but his descriptions of the people themselves (30 Heart of darkness Interpretations).

Heart of Darkness creates a prejudice way of presenting Africa, Joseph Conrad shows the African Congo through the perspective of the colonising Europeans, who describe all the natives as savages, which perpetuates the stereotype of the uncivilised African in the eyes of the European readers.

In "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness," Chinua Achebe criticizes Joseph Conrad for his racist stereotypes towards the continent and people of Africa. He claims that Conrad propagated the "dominant image of Africa in the Western imagination" rather than portraying the continent in its true form (1793). Africans were portrayed in Conrad's novel as savages with no language other than grunts and with no "other occupations besides merging into the evil forest or materializing out of it simply to plague Marlow" (1792-3). To Conrad, the Africans were not characters in his story, but merely props. Chinua Achebe responded with a

Achebe argues that the racist observed in the Heart of Darkness is expressed due to the western psychology or as Achebe states “desire,” this being to show Africa as an antithesis to Europe. He first states Conrad as “one of the great stylists of modern fiction.” [pg.1] He praises Conrad’s talents in writing but believes Conrad’s obvious racism has not been addressed. He later describes in more detail that

Chinua Achebe, a well-known writer, once gave a lecture at the University of Massachusetts about Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, entitled "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness." Throughout his essay, Achebe notes how Conrad used Africa as a background only, and how he "set Africa up as a foil to Europe,"(Achebe, p.251) while he also "projects the image of Africa as 'the other world,' the antithesis of Europe and therefore of civilization."(Achebe, p.252) By his own interpretations of the text, Achebe shows that Conrad eliminates "the African as a human factor," thereby "reducing Africa to the role of props."(Achebe, p.257)

Imagine floating up the dark waters of the Congo River in the Heart of Africa. The calmness of the water and the dense fog make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck as you wonder if the steamboats crew will eat you as you sleep. These things occur in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Although the book is undeniably racist, was the author, Joseph Conrad, racist? Conrad was racist because he uses racial slurs, the slavery and unfair treatment of the native Africans in his book.

Joseph Conrad often mocked the African peoples. In his novel, Heart of Darkness, he referred to the African people as “savages” and used strong language that looked down upon them. Conrad describes a passing native, “They passed me within six inches, without a glance, with that complete, deathlike indifference of unhappy savages.” Conrad depicts the Africans in very vivid descriptions and uses negative language with an almost disgusted tone. He sees the Africans as inhuman, feels they are not civilized, and believes himself to be far more superior than them. Conrad does not bother to try and understand their culture or language. He insults their language and believes it is merely just incomprehensible grunts. Conrad remarks that looking at an African “was as edifying as seeing a dog in a parody of breeches and a feather hat, walking on his hind legs.” The comparison he uses is very insulting to the African people and so degrading that Conrad found an African working as so surprising. He was taken away that an African could be civilized and Conrad was just mocking the natives. By using such cynical language, Conrad changes what the readers think of Africans to become negative. This view of African peoples from Conrad contrasts Achebe’s perspective of African peoples and their lives which was more influenced by his own race, culture, and beliefs just as Conrad’s novel was.

Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness has been the cause of racial arguments debating whether it should be read nowadays. The way Conrad describes African Americans troubles several critics, Achebe in particular. Achebe disagrees with Conrad’s novel so much because in it Conrad dehumanizes African and Achebe won’t let anyone lower his humanity.

looked at a map of it in a shop window, it fascinated me as a snake

Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is placed in a colonized Congo. "...despite Heart of Darkness 's (Joseph Conrad) obvious anti-colonist agenda, the novel points to the colonized population as the standard of savagery to which Europeans are contrasted" (Tyson 375). He tries to showcase the evils of these Europeans, but sacrificed showing the effects on the people most affected. The Natives. Nearly 50 years after Conrad’s death, Chinua Achebe wrote a criticism of the role of Africans in Heart of Darkness. Achebe writes most about Conrad using Africa as an antithesis to Europe, by illustrating Africa as uncivilized and primitive. Tony C. Brown speaks about Marlow’s changed view of the West through a more ‘primitive image’.

which mostly means 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 to much';, thereby condemning imperialism. He also invokes our sympathies in the 'black shadows of disease and starvation'; and his descriptions of the senseless violence which he witnesses.

Chinua Achebe is considered as the man who redefined our way of reading Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Indeed, while focusing on the description of Africa, the father of African literature criticized the novella for its racist stereotypes towards Africans and highlights the colonizer’s oppression on them. Even after thirty four years after his first delivered public lecture excoriating the book, “An image of Africa” he spoke again against it in an interview with Robert Siegel where he related that its author “was a seductive writer. He could pull his reader into the fray. And if it were not for what he said about me and my people, I would probably be thinking only of that seduction."

In the novella Heart of Darkness, Conrad uses Africa as an aesthetic construct to display the overarching theme of the novel. Conrad is not attempting to depict the African culture in a discriminatory way, in fact, it is quite the opposite.