Heart of Darkness

Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad (1857-1924)

Conrad, whose original name was Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, was born near Berdichev, Poland (now in Ukraine), the son of a Polish nobleman who was also a political journalist and anarchist. From his father the boy acquired a love of literature, including romantic tales of the sea. He was orphaned at the age of 12, and when he was 16 years old he left Russian-occupied Poland and made his way to Marseille, France. For the next four years he worked on French ships, ran guns for the Carlist pretender to the Spanish throne, and became involved in a love affair that ended in his attempted suicide. He then entered the British merchant service, becoming a master mariner and a naturalized British subject in 1886; a few years later he changed his name to sound more English.

Joseph Conrad

Most famous novels:Almayer’s Folly (1889)Lord Jim (1900)Heart of Darkness (1902)Nostromo (1904)The Secret Agent (1907)Under Western Eyes (1911)

Heart of Darkness is Conrad’s most widely read novel.One reason is that it lends itself to wide range of interpretations.It can be read as…..

1. As autobiography: The account of a journey up the Congo river

that Conrad undertook in the early 1890’s.

2. As anticolonialism: An exposition of the brutality of Belgian

colonial rule.

3. As myth: An ( Arthurian) quest.

4. As classical or Norse mythology.

5. As psychology or psychoanalysis: A journey into the Self.

- and as a picture of the American involvement in the Vietnam War

Autobiography

• Conrad did, in fact, go up the Congo River in 1890

• Like Marlow in the novel, he got the job to go to the

Congo through his aunt.

• Like Marlow, he did not get along with the manager

• Like Marlow, he was sent to pick up an agent Klein !!

• Like Marlow, he fell ill and nearly died

Congo in the 1890’s

Inner Station

Anticolonialism

• “The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it

away from those who have a different complexion or lightly

flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you

look into it too much.”• ”a taint of imbecile rapacity blew through it all like the whiff

from some corpse.” • In an essay Conrad calls the colonial exploitation of

the Congo, “the vilest scramble for loot that ever dis-

figured the history of human conscience…”

Conrad about colonialism:

Myth

•In the King Arthur myths a knight in shining amour goes on a quest. Typically a quest for the holy grail.

•The quest usually involves a number of trials. Some of those are physical, but the toughest tests are usually spiritual, a test of moral fibre or personal integrity.

•The trials do not necessarily lead to wealth and fame, but equally often to insight and humility.

Mythology, classical and Norse

There are a number of references to Greek and Norse Mythologyand to the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Aeneid :

The women in the Brussels office => Fates or Nornes

The Sepuchral city => Descent into the underworld ( Odyssey and Aeneid)

The river => Styx, Lethe (Rivers in the underworld)

The dying Negroes => The lifeless shadows in the underworld

The journey itself => the journeys of Odysseus and Aeneas

The novel has repeatedly been compared to Dante’sDivine Comedy.

Dante also undertakes a journey to the underworld, to theChristian Hell.

Other parallels are:The river = snake = temptationThe dying Negroes = souls in limboThe Inner Station = the inner sanctum of Hell, Inferno

Christian Mythology

Dante (1265-1321)with his Divina Commedia

Psychology, psychoanalysis

More than 20 years before Freud published his tripartitedivision of the mind into Superego, Ego and Id, Conradseems to use similar ideas:

superego

ego

id

‘the policeman’ (p. 85)

‘your own innate strength’ (p.85)‘..he was hollow at the core’ (97)

‘powers of darkness’ (p. 85) ‘But the wilderness had found him out early… and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating’ (p. 97)

Apocalypse Now

Apocalypse Now is only loosely based on Heart of Darkness.

However, the main plot and quite a few individual lines have been lifted directly

from the novel.

• Like the novel it is an delving into the darkness of man’s heart.

• Like the novel, the film wants to penetrate all the way to the reptile brain.

• Where the novel may be called anticolonialist, the film may be seen as anti-war.

• There is the same basic conflict of a technologically advanced culture attempting

to impose its will on a less developed people.

• If the novel questions ‘the white man’s burden’, the film questions the right of

one country to impose its political system on another.

‘The horror…the horror’

Other parallels between Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness

Same basic plot: An man goes up a river in order to get another man who, in the process, takes on an ominous significance

and e.g…..•The helmsman is killed by a spear•Kurtz’ camp is in both versions a vision of hell (in the novel some of the natives wear horns- in the film we see them.)•Both Kurtzes are in opposition to their superiors.•Both Kurtzes are extremely gifted.•Kurtz’ voice plays a major role in both works. (Film: ”His voice really put the hook in me.” Novel: ”The man presented himself as a voice”.

Survey of various interpretations of Heart of Darkness

1. Realism the real journey the Congo River Brussels description of Stanleyville Marlow (Conrad) return toAutobiography expectation main office condition in the Inner Station close to dying civilisation

colony

2. Anticolonialism journey do absurd bureaucracy criticism of Europe’s so-called alienationPolitics alienation colonialism civilising influence inability to turned upside down communicate

3. Myth quest expectation delegation of task learning process culmination cleansing return, mission(Arthurian) departure temptation, trial purification accomplished

4. Mythology quest Styx, Lethe ? Nornes, Fates Hades, Hel dénouement danger of the for- homecomingClassical, Norse journey descent into Hades the underworld climax bidden, nemesis

5. Christian A Pilgrim’s Pro- Snake, tomb, descent lost souls inner Sanctum punishment forgivenessMythology gress, Everyman temptation memento mori limbo of Hell, Inferno purgatory salvation

6. Psychology analysis, method first scary learning process final step into the crisis curePsychiatry introspection revelations desperation Id

7. War movie mission ’circuit cable staff office, absurdity of the civilisation and Willard alive on mission accom-plugged into Kurtz’ bureaucracy war, ’arsehole of morality dissolved Kurtz’ terms plished, return

the world’

Snake skeleton