Heart of Darkness: as following Conrad's themes
"There is a machine. It evolved itself, and behold!... it knits. It knits us in, it knits us out. It has knitted time, space, pain, death, corruption, despair, and all the illusions... and nothing matters. I'll admit however that to look at the remorseless process is something interesting." Joseph Conrad addresses the evils of this machine that has created modern society and molded its citizens in his book Heart of Darkness. In the story, Marlow, the main character travels into the Congo. He expects to enter a world where a code of moral conduct is followed, but he quickly realizes that morality is not the way of this world, or any world for that matter. Marlow finds, instead, that the world is made up of corruption, death and despair. Corruption is the main theme of Heart of Darkness, and it is reflected in many parts of the book. First of all is Kurtz. "He had collected, bartered, swindled, or stolen more ivory that all the other agents together"(pg. 43), and no doubt committed all forms of corrupted deeds to get this ivory. "It was Kurtz who had ordered the attack to be made on the steamer." (pg. 58) As the quote explains, he even attacked Marlow's ship, full of defenseless men, just so he could remain with the na
51-52) Later, as Kurtz is dying, Marlow says, "I saw on that ivory face the expression of somber pride, of ruthless power, of craven terror-of an intense and hopeless despair. Although the company despised Kurtz for his ruthless actions, it was no less corrupt. He is referred to as a "papier-mache Mephistopheles"(pg. in and out of rivers, streams of death in life, whose banks were rotting into mud, whose waters, thickened into slime, invaded the contorted mangroves, that seemed to writhe at us in the extremity of an impotent despair. Nowhere did we stop long enough to get a particularized impression, but the general sense of vague and oppressive wonder grew upon me. Later, Marlow's helmsman, who he had become quite fond of, died. " A symbol of the corruption of the empire is the brick-maker. " In addition to being witness to the death of others, Marlow came fairly close to experiencing his own death, as well. What else had been there? But I am of course aware that next day the pilgrims buried something in a muddy hole.
Common topics in this essay:
Heart Darkness,
Kurtz Marlow,
Devil Marlow,
,
Darkness Conrad,
Joseph Conrad,
heart darkness,
knits knits,
marlow experiences,
corruption despair,
despair death,
|
Acceptance Essays
