Comparing Jealousy In Othello And Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

In both Shakespeare’s Othello, and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, they pertain to racism and jealousy. Racism goes about when someone believes that they’re the superiority of a particular race. It’s treating people differently whether it’s positively or negatively just based on the color of their skin. As for jealousy, it’s more like an insecurity in which you feel or show envy of someone’s achievements and advantages or simply even just the person themself. In Othello, Jealousy is a major theme throughout the play, seen as early as the very beginning of the play and begins to deepen. Racism also plays a role in the play because it was written between 1600 and 1605 which was a time where ethnic minorities were so unimportant they were nearly ignored. A black man rises and obtains a position as a general in Venice, trusted and very much respected by his fellow
Marlow also compared him to a child by saying he’s “not much heavier than a child” (3.29) Kurtz on the other hand is a “star agent” of the company and works in true ivory country located deep in Africa; he’s an ambitious man whom has to act like god or a leader of some sort to lead “primitive people” to civilization or “proverbial light.” Due to being a person with such success and advantages, jealousy applies. Kurtz’s manager is a basically mediocre Company Employee which gives him a reason to be envious. He both lives and works at Central Station. He is jealous of Kurtz’s success and speaks irrelevantly and also has a creepy smile described as “seal applied on words to make the meaning of commonest phrase appear absolutely inscrutable” (1.52) In other words, his irrelevant words or meaningless talk ends up seeming profound due to his smile. Because