The Novel Heart Of Darkness Essay Research

The Novel Heart Of Darkness Essay, Research Paper The novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad is a very powerful piece of writing that discusses the importance of human society and its good and bad affects on men. This novel took place in two very different places the so-called “civilized London” and the “uncivilized Africa” which had conflicting cultures. Joseph Conrad illustrates through his intense novel that although one may claim to be in a “civilized” society but when compared to a different culture they may be at the same level of civilization or as “uncivilized” as the other culture may be. There is no one clear definition of what a civilized society is but there is a clear definition on the effects that the society has on its men. Society greatly

reflects on the lives of the man because it plays a major role in leading their lives towards a specific direction. This may range from either end, towards wealth or poverty, towards life or death. It is all based on the society in which the man is constantly exposed to and affected by. Civilization lacks innocence, which strips people of their humanity. According to Joseph Conrad human society should aid the man in pursuing the right direction during the course of life which is consequently derived upon the idea that the man shapes society, but in this book it discusses the vice versa where society shapes the man. “[Marlow] was the only man of us who still ‘followed the sea.’ The worst that could be said of him is that he did not represent his class. He was a seaman, but

he was a wanderer, too, while most seamen lead, if one may express so a sedentary life. Their minds are of the stay-at-home order, and their home is always with them-the ship; and so is their country their sea”. Marlow was used in a symbolic manner to illustrate that not all men have to be a successful business man or a leader in order to have influences upon his society, he could be a wanderer and know more about society and what it can do to one. Marlow himself was the symbol of humanity when he had fallen into the trap set up by society but he was able to walk out and get back up but he was largely affected. Even though he was physically sick and needed recovery, at the very end of Marlow’s journey he claimed, “It was not my strength that wanted nursing, it was my

imagination that wanted soothing.” which occurred after Kurtz’s death. Marlow saw the inhumanity of society and what is done to its followers and rebels. Joseph Conrad makes good use of his characters to tell his story. The character that we saw the comparison of the African culture and the culture of London as illustrated through the storyteller a journeyman, a wanderer, named Marlow. Marlow was the person who spun his yarn of the clash between two cultures. The culture of the whites in London was sent to explore Africa in order to expand their trades and riches. The natives regarded these white men as god and instead of being equally treated these white men showed them their inhumanity. They enslaved these natives and made them their laborers and stripped them of their

freedom. These white men were cruel and very harsh to these people of a different culture where they regarded the natives as though they were “savages” when compared to their so-called “civilized” society. The natives were chained up and forced to go to work by these heartless whites in their own society, their home. “Six black men advanced in a file, toiling up the path. They walked erect and slow, balancing small baskets full of earth on their heads, and the clink kept time with their footsteps… [Marlow] could see every rib, the joints of their limbs were like knots in a rope; each had an iron collar on his neck, and all were connected together with a chain whose bright swung between them, rhythmically clinking… [They resembled the] deathlike indifference of