race in heart of darkness
The representation of race in fiction is never as simple as it looksFor Joseph Conrad to write Heart Of Darkness in the late nineteenth century should have been controversial. It voiced an opinion of slavery and Imperialism not welcome in civilized Europe. Conrad's writing is fictional, and therefore attracted less attention than it might have. It's dream-like storytelling is courtesy of a frame narrator, who is in turn relaying the story of the African journey undertaken by Marlow, Conrad's main character. Fiction though it may be, Marlow was strategically placed in this new world to witness greedy colonial power in action, and present it to the people who are ignorant of it or choose to suppress knowledge of it. Therefore the text acts almost like a conscience for the society. Through dialogue spoken to Marlow and his personal contemplation - Marlow discovers a distaste for the white 'Company' values towards the Africans they so readily abuse. He pities the natives greatly, but this is problematic as he too uses them, to philosophize on their existential struggle and contemplate subconsciously why white is indeed dominant. Thus Marlow himself reinforces the social values of his time which he dislikes. This dehumanization is
Marlow has obvious disgust at the white treatment of Africans and feels very real pity for them. Thus by using the nineteenth century European values of Imperialism and Social Darwinism, this character and other white male characters in Heart Of Darkness can justify their abuse of the natives of Africa. Marlow also says of the natives, 'I don't think a single one of them had any clear idea of time, as we at the end of countless ages have. When a native is beaten for a supposed wrongdoing, he remarks, " What a row the brute makes!", likening him to an animal or less evolved being. ' Marlow also says that here they were called 'criminals', but only because the 'outraged law, like the bursting shells, had come to them, an insoluble mystery from over the sea. ' This implies the natives are timeless; they have not progressed. It shows how social Darwinist ideology was used in the time period to construct imperialism as imperative for the civilization of less evolved races. Transgression - punishment - bang! Pitiless, pitiless. As his journey continues, Marlow grows more and more critical of imperialism. Marlow is critical of the European characters he meets, and pities the natives they abuse, but still does not view Africans as equal to himself. Most white male characters in Heart Of Darkness do not speak directly to Marlow about the mistreatment of the natives. The character of the Central Station Manager indicates how imperialism can be used to gain power in Africa and social Darwinist ideology can be used to justify mistreatment of the Africans.
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