The Brutality Of Racism In Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness
The Brutality of Racism in the Heart of Darkness
In the Heart of Darkness British Voyagers travel the Congo River in Africa on the ‘Nellie’ giving an insight of the ruthless actions of man. Joseph Conrad is able to portray this travel through his own alter ego Marlow. The travel itself is dark to begin with only to come that the people within the travel were darker. Throughout the Heart of Darkness readers can get an insight on the brutality of racism with the setting, imagery and symbolism used in the novel.
To begin, with Conrad’s setting is in a menacing domain. Clarence B. Lindsay states, “such scenes create an atmosphere of bizarre futility and, for Marlow and for the reader, a sense of human helplessness, the failure of human expectations” …show more content…
The aunt talks about how she wants Marlow to go into missionary when she addresses him within this quote, “there had been a lot of such rot let loose in print and talk just about that time, and the excellent woman [Marlow's aunt], living right in the rush of all that humbug, got carried off her feet. She talked about "weaning those ignorant millions from their horrid ways," till, upon my word, she made me quite uncomfortable" (Conrad 27) because it made Marlow feel uncomfortable it symbolizes how he does not care about the wellbeing of the Africans and that he is not going for them, but for the adventure. Coming back to when Conrad states, "near the same tree two more (bundles) of acute angles sat with their legs drawn up. One, with his chin propped on his knees, stared at nothing, in an intolerable and appalling manner, his brother (phantom) rested its forehead, as if overcome with a great weariness; and all about others were scattered in every pose of contorted collapse, as in some picture of a massacre of a pestilence. While I stood horror-struck, one of these (creatures) rose to his hands and knees” (40-41) he calls the Africans bundles, phantoms and creatures showing how even Marlow himself does not see them as
In the Heart of Darkness British Voyagers travel the Congo River in Africa on the ‘Nellie’ giving an insight of the ruthless actions of man. Joseph Conrad is able to portray this travel through his own alter ego Marlow. The travel itself is dark to begin with only to come that the people within the travel were darker. Throughout the Heart of Darkness readers can get an insight on the brutality of racism with the setting, imagery and symbolism used in the novel.
To begin, with Conrad’s setting is in a menacing domain. Clarence B. Lindsay states, “such scenes create an atmosphere of bizarre futility and, for Marlow and for the reader, a sense of human helplessness, the failure of human expectations” …show more content…
The aunt talks about how she wants Marlow to go into missionary when she addresses him within this quote, “there had been a lot of such rot let loose in print and talk just about that time, and the excellent woman [Marlow's aunt], living right in the rush of all that humbug, got carried off her feet. She talked about "weaning those ignorant millions from their horrid ways," till, upon my word, she made me quite uncomfortable" (Conrad 27) because it made Marlow feel uncomfortable it symbolizes how he does not care about the wellbeing of the Africans and that he is not going for them, but for the adventure. Coming back to when Conrad states, "near the same tree two more (bundles) of acute angles sat with their legs drawn up. One, with his chin propped on his knees, stared at nothing, in an intolerable and appalling manner, his brother (phantom) rested its forehead, as if overcome with a great weariness; and all about others were scattered in every pose of contorted collapse, as in some picture of a massacre of a pestilence. While I stood horror-struck, one of these (creatures) rose to his hands and knees” (40-41) he calls the Africans bundles, phantoms and creatures showing how even Marlow himself does not see them as