① The Horror In Joseph Conrads Heart Of Darkness

Keep away from Africa, or else! Delayed by the lack of tools and replacement parts, Marlow is frustrated by the time it takes to perform the repairs. Ignorance might be a more likely reason; but here again The Horror In Joseph Conrads Heart Of Darkness believe that something more willful than a mere lack of information was at work. Philip larkin an arundel tomb worked on a variety of ships as crew member steward, apprentice, able-bodied seaman and then as third, second and first mate, until eventually achieving captain's rank. Wise, T.

What is the Heart of Darkness?

But perhaps the most significant difference is the one implied in the author's bestowal of human expression to the one and the withholding of it from the other. It is clearly not part of Conrad's purpose to confer language on the "rudimentary souls" of Africa. In place of speech they made "a violent babble of uncouth sounds. But most of the time they were too busy with their frenzy.

There are two occasions in the book, however, when Conrad departs somewhat from his practice and confers speech, even English speech, on the savages. The first occurs when cannibalism gets the better of them:. Give 'im to us. At first sight these instances might be mistaken for unexpected acts of generosity from Conrad. In reality they constitute some of his best assaults. In the case of the cannibals the incomprehensible grunts that had thus far served them for speech suddenly proved inadequate for Conrad's purpose of letting the European glimpse the unspeakable craving in their hearts.

Weighing the necessity for consistency in the portrayal of the dumb brutes against the sensational advantages of securing their conviction by clear, unambiguous evidence issuing out of their own mouth Conrad chose the latter. As for the announcement of Mr. Kurtz's death by the "insolent black head in the doorway" what better or more appropriate finis could be written to the horror story of that wayward child of civilization who willfully had given his soul to the powers of darkness and "taken a high seat amongst the devils of the land" than the proclamation of his physical death by the forces he had joined? It might be contended, of course, that the attitude to the African in Heart of Darkness is not Conrad's but that of his fictional narrator, Marlow, and that far from endorsing it Conrad might indeed be holding it up to irony and criticism.

Certainly Conrad appears to go to considerable pains to set up layers of insulation between himself and the moral universe of his history. He has, for example, a narrator behind a narrator. The primary narrator is Marlow but his account is given to us through the filter of a second, shadowy person. But if Conrad's intention is to draw a cordon sanitaire between himself and the moral and psychological malaise of his narrator his care seems to me totally wasted because he neglects to hint however subtly or tentatively at an alternative frame of reference by which we may judge the actions and opinions of his characters.

It would not have been beyond Conrad's power to make that provision if he had thought it necessary. Marlow seems to me to enjoy Conrad's complete confidence -- a feeling reinforced by the close similarities between their two careers. Marlow comes through to us not only as a witness of truth, but one holding those advanced and humane views appropriate to the English liberal tradition which required all Englishmen of decency to be deeply shocked by atrocities in Bulgaria or the Congo of King Leopold of the Belgians or wherever. They were dying slowly -- it was very clear. They were not enemies, they were not criminals, they were nothing earthly now, nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation lying confusedly in the greenish gloom. Brought from all the recesses of the coast in all the legality of time contracts, lost in uncongenial surroundings, fed on unfamiliar food, they sickened, became inefficient, and were then allowed to crawl away and rest.

It took different forms in the minds of different people but almost always managed to sidestep the ultimate question of equality between white people and black people. That extraordinary missionary, Albert Schweitzer, who sacrificed brilliant careers in music and theology in Europe for a life of service to Africans in much the same area as Conrad writes about, epitomizes the ambivalence. In a comment which has often been quoted Schweitzer says: "The African is indeed my brother but my junior brother. Naturally he became a sensation in Europe and America. Pilgrims flocked, and I believe still flock even after he has passed on, to witness the prodigious miracle in Lamberene, on the edge of the primeval forest.

Conrad's liberalism would not take him quite as far as Schweitzer's, though. He would not use the word brother however qualified; the farthest he would go was kinship. When Marlow's African helmsman falls down with a spear in his heart he gives his white master one final disquieting look. And the intimate profundity of that look he gave me when he received his hurt remains to this day in my memory -- like a claim of distant kinship affirmed in a supreme moment. It is important to note that Conrad, careful as ever with his words, is concerned not so much about distant kinship as about someone laying a claim on it. The black man lays a claim on the white man which is well-nigh intolerable. It is the laying of this claim which frightens and at the same time fascinates Conrad, " The point of my observations should be quite clear by now, namely that Joseph Conrad was a thoroughgoing racist.

That this simple truth is glossed over in criticisms of his work is due to the fact that white racism against Africa is such a normal way of thinking that its manifestations go completely unremarked. Students of Heart of Darkness will often tell you that Conrad is concerned not so much with Africa as with the deterioration of one European mind caused by solitude and sickness. They will point out to you that Conrad is, if anything, less charitable to the Europeans in the story than he is to the natives, that the point of the story is to ridicule Europe's civilizing mission in Africa. A Conrad student informed me in Scotland that Africa is merely a setting for the disintegration of the mind of Mr.

Which is partly the point. Africa as setting and backdrop which eliminates the African as human factor. Africa as a metaphysical battlefield devoid of all recognizable humanity, into which the wandering European enters at his peril. Can nobody see the preposterous and perverse arrogance in thus reducing Africa to the role of props for the break-up of one petty European mind? But that is not even the point. The real question is the dehumanization of Africa and Africans which this age-long attitude has fostered and continues to foster in the world.

And the question is whether a novel which celebrates this dehumanization, which depersonalizes a portion of the human race, can be called a great work of art. My answer is: No, it cannot. I do not doubt Conrad's great talents. Even Heart of Darkness has its memorably good passages and moments:. The reaches opened before us and closed behind, as if the forest had stepped leisurely across tile water to bar the way for our return. Its exploration of the minds of the European characters is often penetrating and full of insight.

But all that has been more than fully discussed in the last fifty years. His obvious racism has, however, not been addressed. And it is high time it was! Conrad was born in , the very year in which the first Anglican missionaries were arriving among my own people in Nigeria. It was certainly not his fault that he lived his life at a time when the reputation of the black man was at a particularly low level. But even after due allowances have been made for all the influences of contemporary prejudice on his sensibility there remains still in Conrad's attitude a residue of antipathy to black people which his peculiar psychology alone can explain. His own account of his first encounter with a black man is very revealing:.

A certain enormous buck nigger encountered in Haiti fixed my conception of blind, furious, unreasoning rage, as manifested in the human animal to the end of my days. Of the nigger I used to dream for years afterwards. Certainly Conrad had a problem with niggers. His inordinate love of that word itself should be of interest to psychoanalysts. Sometimes his fixation on blackness is equally interesting as when he gives us this brief description:.

A black figure stood up, strode on long black legs, waving long black arms. But so unrelenting is Conrad's obsession. As a matter of interest Conrad gives us in A Personal Record what amounts to a companion piece to the buck nigger of Haiti. At the age of sixteen Conrad encountered his first Englishman in Europe. He calls him "my unforgettable Englishman" and describes him in the following manner:. The light of a headlong, exalted satisfaction with the world of men.

In passing he cast a glance of kindly curiosity and a friendly gleam of big, sound, shiny teeth. Irrational love and irrational hate jostling together in the heart of that talented, tormented man. But whereas irrational love may at worst engender foolish acts of indiscretion, irrational hate can endanger the life of the community. Naturally Conrad is a dream for psychoanalytic critics. Perhaps the most detailed study of him in this direction is by Bernard C. Meyer, M. In his lengthy book Dr.

Meyer follows every conceivable lead and sometimes inconceivable ones to explain Conrad. As an example he gives us long disquisitions on the significance of hair and hair-cutting in Conrad. And yet not even one word is spared for his attitude to black people. Not even the discussion of Conrad's antisemitism was enough to spark off in Dr. He guided the ship up the tributary Lualaba River to the trading company's innermost station, Kindu , in Eastern Congo Free State ; Marlow has similar experiences to the author. When Conrad began to write the novella, eight years after returning from Africa, he drew inspiration from his travel journals.

The tale was first published as a three-part serial, in February, March and April , in Blackwood's Magazine February was the magazine's th issue: special edition. In , for future editions of the book, Conrad wrote an " Author's Note " where he, after denying any "unity of artistic purpose" underlying the collection, discusses each of the three stories and makes light commentary on Marlow, the narrator of the tales within the first two stories.

He said Marlow first appeared in Youth. I call your own kind self to witness There have been many proposed sources for the character of the antagonist, Kurtz. Georges-Antoine Klein , an agent who became ill and died aboard Conrad's steamer, is proposed by literary critics as a basis for Kurtz. A corrective impulse to impose one's rule characterizes Kurtz's writings which were discovered by Marlow during his journey, where he rants on behalf of the so-called "International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs" about his supposedly altruistic and sentimental reasons to civilise the "savages"; one document ends with a dark proclamation to "Exterminate all the brutes!

Charles Marlow , the narrator, tells his story to friends aboard Nellie , a boat anchored on the River Thames near Gravesend , of how he became captain of a river steamboat for an ivory trading company. As a child, Marlow was fascinated by "the blank spaces" on maps, particularly Africa. The image of a river on the map particularly fascinated Marlow. In flashback, Marlow makes his way to Africa, taking passage on a steamer.

He departs 30 mi 50 km up the river where his company's station is. Work on a railway is going on. Marlow explores a narrow ravine, and is horrified to find himself in a place full of diseased Africans who worked on the railroad and are now dying. Marlow must wait for ten days in the company's Outer Station, which strikes Marlow as a scene of devastation. He meets the company's chief accountant, who tells him of a Mr. Kurtz , who is in charge of a very important trading post, and a widely respected, first-class agent. The accountant predicts that Kurtz will go far.

Marlow departs with sixty men to travel on foot about miles km to the Central Station, where the steamboat that he is to captain is based. After fifteen days, he arrives at the station only to learn that his steamboat has been wrecked in an accident. He meets the general manager, who informs him that he could not wait for Marlow to arrive because the up-river stations had to be relieved, and tells him of a rumour that Kurtz is ill.

Marlow fishes his boat out of the river and spends months repairing it. At one point Marlow is invited into the room of the station's brickmaker. Hanging on the wall is "a small sketch in oils, on a panel, representing a woman draped and blindfolded carrying a lighted torch". Marlow is fascinated with the sinister effect of the torchlight upon the woman's face, and is informed that Mr. Kurtz made the painting a year earlier. The brickmaker predicts Kurtz will rise in the hierarchy, before telling Marlow that, "The same people who sent him specially also recommended you.

Delayed by the lack of tools and replacement parts, Marlow is frustrated by the time it takes to perform the repairs. He learns that Kurtz is resented, not admired, by the manager. Once underway, the journey to Kurtz's station takes two months. The journey pauses for the night about 8 miles 13 km below the Inner Station. In the morning the boat is enveloped by a thick fog. The steamboat is later attacked by a barrage of arrows, and the helmsman is killed. Marlow sounds the steam whistle repeatedly, frightening the attackers away. After landing at Kurtz's station, a man boards the steamboat: a Russian wanderer who strayed into Kurtz's camp.

Marlow learns that the natives worship Kurtz, and that he has been very ill of late. The Russian tells of how Kurtz opened his mind and seems to admire Kurtz even for his power and his willingness to use it. Marlow suggests that Kurtz has gone mad. Marlow observes the station and sees a row of posts topped with the severed heads of natives. Around the corner of the house, the manager appears with the pilgrims, bearing a gaunt and ghost-like Kurtz. The area fills with natives ready for battle, but Kurtz shouts something from the stretcher and the natives retreat. The pilgrims carry Kurtz to the steamer and lay him in one of the cabins.

The manager tells Marlow that Kurtz has harmed the company's business in the region, that his methods are "unsound". The Russian reveals that Kurtz believes the company wants to kill him, and Marlow confirms that hangings were discussed. After midnight, Marlow discovers that Kurtz has returned to shore. He finds Kurtz crawling back to the station house. Marlow threatens to harm Kurtz if he raises an alarm, but Kurtz only laments that he had not accomplished more. The next day they prepare to journey back down the river. Kurtz's health worsens during the trip and Marlow becomes increasingly ill. The steamboat breaks down, and while stopped for repairs, Kurtz gives Marlow a packet of papers, including his commissioned report and a photograph, telling him to keep them away from the manager.

When Marlow next speaks with him, Kurtz is near death; Marlow hears him weakly whisper, "The horror! The horror! The next day Marlow pays little attention to the pilgrims as they bury "something" in a muddy hole. He falls very ill, himself near death. Upon his return to Europe, Marlow is embittered and contemptuous of the "civilised" world. Several callers come to retrieve the papers Kurtz entrusted to him, but Marlow withholds them or offers papers he knows they have no interest in. He gives Kurtz's report to a journalist, for publication if he sees fit. When Marlow visits her, she is deep in mourning although it has been more than a year since Kurtz's death. She presses Marlow for information, asking him to repeat Kurtz's final words. Marlow tells her that Kurtz's final word was her name.

Literary critic Harold Bloom wrote that Heart of Darkness had been analysed more than any other work of literature that is studied in universities and colleges, which he attributed to Conrad's "unique propensity for ambiguity," but it was not a big success during Conrad's life. Leavis referred to Heart of Darkness as a "minor work" and criticised its "adjectival insistence upon inexpressible and incomprehensible mystery". In King Leopold's Ghost , Adam Hochschild wrote that literary scholars have made too much of the psychological aspects of Heart of Darkness , while paying scant attention to Conrad's accurate recounting of the horror arising from the methods and effects of colonialism in the Congo Free State.

Heart of Darkness is criticised in postcolonial studies, particularly by Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe. He argued that the book promoted and continues to promote a prejudiced image of Africa that "depersonalises a portion of the human race" and concluded that it should not be considered a great work of art. Achebe's critics argue that he fails to distinguish Marlow's view from Conrad's, which results in very clumsy interpretations of the novella.

Morel , who led international opposition to King Leopold II 's rule in the Congo, saw Conrad's Heart of Darkness as a condemnation of colonial brutality and referred to the novella as "the most powerful thing written on the subject. Der Film wurde u. Steve McQueen lehnte die Rolle ab. Im Making-of Hearts of Darkness ist zu sehen, wie der damals — nach eigener Aussage — in einer Lebenskrise steckende Sheen bei der Anfangsszene im Hotelzimmer in Saigon so in der Rolle aufging, dass er aus Versehen einen Spiegel einschlug und sich dabei so schnitt, dass er stark blutete. In der Er wiederholt mehrmals seine Aufforderung an die vorbeigehenden Soldaten, nicht in die Kamera zu schauen.

Diese Version wurde auch in deutschen Kinos gezeigt. Die Szene hat ihr historisches Vorbild in der Deutschen Wochenschau vom 4. Colonel Walter E. Kurtz Marlon Brando zitiert in seinem Schlussmonolog aus T. Eliots The Hollow Men. Allerdings waren beide Versionen in zwei Teile zerschnitten. US-Dollar verkauft. Filme von Francis Ford Coppola. Ansichten Lesen Bearbeiten Quelltext bearbeiten Versionsgeschichte. Commons Wikiquote.

Deutscher Titel. Apocalypse Now. Vereinigte Staaten. FSK Francis Ford Coppola. Francis Ford Coppola, John Milius. Carmine Coppola. Vittorio Storaro. Lisa Fruchtman Gerald B. Greenberg Walter Murch Richard Marks. Kurtz Robert Duvall : Lt.

It was not Personal Narrative: Changing The Lunch System Anglophones who remarked Conrad's strong foreign accent when speaking English. After midnight, Marlow discovers that Kurtz rap for life returned to shore. Coppola hoopte dat het Racial Discrimination In Mainstream Media Ministerie van Defensie en het Amerikaanse leger hem The Horror In Joseph Conrads Heart Of Darkness en hulp zouden geven om de film te maken. New York: Dial Press.