======================================================================
= Heart_of_Darkness =
======================================================================
Introduction
======================================================================
'Heart of Darkness' is an 1899 novella by Polish-British novelist
Joseph Conrad in which the sailor Charles Marlow tells his listeners
the story of his assignment as steamer captain for a Belgian company
in the African interior. The novel is widely regarded as a critique of
European colonial rule in Africa, whilst also examining the themes of
power dynamics and morality. Although Conrad does not name the river
on which most of the narrative takes place, at the time of writing,
the Congo Free State--the location of the large and economically
important Congo River--was a private colony of Belgium's King Leopold
II. Marlow is given an assignment to find Kurtz, an ivory trader
working on a trading station far up the river, who has "gone native"
and is the object of Marlow's expedition.
Central to Conrad's work is the idea that there is little difference
between "civilised people" and "savages". 'Heart of Darkness'
implicitly comments on imperialism and racism. The novella's setting
provides the frame for Marlow's story of his fascination for the
prolific ivory trader Kurtz. Conrad draws parallels between London
("the greatest town on earth") and Africa as places of darkness.
Originally issued as a three-part serial story in 'Blackwood's
Magazine' to celebrate the 1000th edition of the magazine, 'Heart of
Darkness' has been widely republished and translated in many
languages. It provided the inspiration for Francis Ford Coppola's 1979
film 'Apocalypse Now'. In 1998, the Modern Library ranked 'Heart of
Darkness' 67th on their list of the 100 best novels in English of the
20th century.
Composition and publication
======================================================================
In 1890, at the age of 32, Conrad was appointed by a Belgian trading
company to serve on one of its steamers. While sailing up the Congo
River from one station to another, the captain became ill and Conrad
assumed command. He guided the ship up the tributary Lualaba River to
the trading company's innermost station, Kindu, in Eastern Congo Free
State; Marlow has similar experiences to the author.
When Conrad began to write the novella, eight years after returning
from Africa, he drew inspiration from his travel journals. He
described 'Heart of Darkness' as "a wild story" of a journalist who
becomes manager of a station in the (African) interior and makes
himself worshipped by a tribe of natives. The tale was first published
as a three-part serial, in February, March, and April 1899, in
'Blackwood's Magazine' (February 1899 was the magazine's 1000th issue:
special edition). 'Heart of Darkness' was later included in the book
'Youth: a Narrative, and Two Other Stories', published on 13 November
1902 by William Blackwood.
The volume consisted of 'Youth: a Narrative', 'Heart of Darkness' and
'The End of the Tether' in that order. In 1917, for future editions of
the book, Conrad wrote an "Author's Note" where he, after denying any
"unity of artistic purpose" underlying the collection, discusses each
of the three stories and makes light commentary on Marlow, the
narrator of the tales within the first two stories. He said Marlow
first appeared in 'Youth'.
On 31 May 1902, in a letter to William Blackwood, Conrad remarked,
I call your own kind self to witness ... the last pages of 'Heart of
Darkness' where the interview of the man and the girl locks in--as it
were--the whole 30000 words of narrative description into one
suggestive view of a whole phase of life and makes of that story
something quite on another plane than an anecdote of a man who went
mad in the Centre of Africa.
There have been many proposed sources for the character of the
antagonist, Kurtz. Georges-Antoine Klein, an agent who became ill and
died aboard Conrad's steamer, is proposed by literary critics as a
basis for Kurtz. The principal figures involved in the disastrous
"rear column" of the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition have also been
identified as likely sources, including column leader Edmund Musgrave
Barttelot, his Scottish colleague, James Sligo Jameson, slave trader
Tippu Tip and the expedition leader, Welsh explorer Henry Morton
Stanley. Conrad's biographer Norman Sherry judged that Arthur Hodister
(1847-1892), a Belgian solitary but successful trader, who spoke three
Congolese languages and was venerated by Congolese to the point of
deification, served as the main model, while later scholars have
refuted this hypothesis. Adam Hochschild, in 'King Leopold's Ghost',
believes that the Belgian soldier Léon Rom influenced the character.
Peter Firchow mentions the possibility that Kurtz is a composite,
modelled on various figures present in the Congo Free State at the
time as well as on Conrad's imagining of what they might have had in
common.
A corrective impulse to impose one's rule characterises Kurtz's
writings which were discovered by Marlow during his journey, where he
rants on behalf of the so-called "International Society for the
Suppression of Savage Customs" about his supposedly altruistic and
sentimental reasons to civilise the "savages"; one document ends with
a dark proclamation to "Exterminate all the brutes!". The
"International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs" is
interpreted as a sarcastic reference to one of the participants at the
Berlin Conference, the International Association of the Congo (also
called "International Congo Society"). The predecessor to this
organisation was the "International Association for the Exploration
and Civilization of Central Africa".
Synopsis
======================================================================
The novella opens on "the sea-reach of the Thames" where Charles
Marlow tells his friends that "when the Romans first came here,
nineteen hundred years ago" they would have sensed "the savagery, the
utter savagery" surrounding them. Marlow then relates how he became
captain of a river steamboat for an ivory trading company. He tells of
his fascination as a child for "the blank spaces" on maps,
particularly in Africa. The image of a river on the map particularly
drew his attention.
In a flashback, Marlow makes his way to Africa by taking passage on a
steamer. He travels 30 mi up the river to where his company's station
is. Work on a railway is taking place. Marlow explores a narrow
ravine, and is horrified to find himself in a place full of critically
ill Africans who worked on the railroad and are now dying. Marlow must
wait for ten days in the company's devastated Outer Station. Marlow
meets the company's chief accountant, who tells him of a Mr. Kurtz,
who is in charge of a very important trading post, and is described as
a respected first-class agent. The accountant predicts that Kurtz will
go far.
Marlow departs with 60 men to travel to the Central Station, where the
steamboat that he will command is based. At the station, he learns
that his steamboat has been wrecked in an accident. The general
manager informs Marlow that he could not wait for Marlow to arrive,
and tells him of a rumour that Kurtz is ill. Marlow fishes his boat
out of the river and spends months repairing it. Delayed by the lack
of tools and replacement parts, Marlow is frustrated by the time it
takes to perform the repairs. He learns that Kurtz is resented, not
admired, by the manager. Once underway, the journey to Kurtz's station
takes two months.
The journey pauses for the night about 8 mi below the Inner Station.
In the morning the boat is enveloped by a thick fog. The steamboat is
later attacked by a barrage of arrows, and the helmsman is killed.
Marlow sounds the steam whistle repeatedly, frightening the attackers
away.
After landing at Kurtz's station, a man boards the steamboat: a
Russian wanderer who strayed into Kurtz's camp. Marlow learns that the
natives worship Kurtz and that he has been very ill. The Russian tells
of how Kurtz opened his mind and admires Kurtz even for his power and
his willingness to use it. Marlow suspects that Kurtz has gone mad.
Marlow observes the station and sees a row of posts topped with the
severed heads of natives. Around the corner of the house, Kurtz
appears with supporters who carry him as a ghost-like figure on a
stretcher. The area fills with natives ready for battle, but Kurtz
shouts something and they retreat. His entourage carries Kurtz to the
steamer and lays him in a cabin. The manager tells Marlow that Kurtz
has harmed the company's business in the region because his methods
are "unsound". The Russian reveals that Kurtz believes the company
wants to kill him, and Marlow confirms that hangings were discussed.
After midnight, Kurtz returns to shore. Marlow finds Kurtz crawling
back to the station house. Marlow threatens to harm Kurtz if he raises
an alarm, but Kurtz only laments that he did not accomplish more. The
next day they prepare to journey back down the river.
Kurtz's health worsens during the trip. The steamboat breaks down, and
while stopped for repairs, Kurtz gives Marlow a packet of papers,
including his commissioned report and a photograph, telling him to
keep them from the manager. When Marlow next speaks with him, Kurtz is
near death; Marlow hears him weakly whisper, "The horror! The horror!"
A short while later, the manager's boy announces to the crew that
Kurtz has died (the famous line "Mistah Kurtz--he dead" would become
the epigraph of T. S. Eliot's poem "The Hollow Men"). The next day
Marlow pays little attention to Kurtz's pilgrims as they bury
"something" in a muddy hole.
Returning to Europe, Marlow is embittered and contemptuous of the
"civilised" world. Several callers come to retrieve the papers Kurtz
entrusted to him, but Marlow withholds them or offers papers he knows
they have no interest in. He gives Kurtz's report to a journalist, for
publication if he sees fit. Marlow is left with some personal letters
and a photograph of Kurtz's fiancée. When Marlow visits her, she is
deep in mourning although it has been more than a year since Kurtz's
death. She presses Marlow for information, asking him to repeat
Kurtz's final words. Marlow tells her that Kurtz's final word was her
name.
Critical reception
======================================================================
The novella was not a big success during Conrad's life. When it was
published as a single volume in 1902 with two novellas, "Youth" and
"The End of the Tether", it received the least commentary from
critics. F. R. Leavis referred to 'Heart of Darkness' as a "minor
work" and criticised its "adjectival insistence upon inexpressible and
incomprehensible mystery". Conrad did not consider it to be
particularly notable; but by the 1960s it was a standard assignment in
many college and high school English courses.
Literary critic Harold Bloom wrote that 'Heart of Darkness' had been
analysed more than any other work of literature that is studied in
universities and colleges, which he attributed to Conrad's "unique
propensity for ambiguity". In 'King Leopold's Ghost' (1998), Adam
Hochschild wrote that literary scholars have made too much of the
psychological aspects of 'Heart of Darkness', while paying scant
attention to Conrad's accurate recounting of the horror arising from
the methods and effects of colonialism in the Congo Free State.
"'Heart of Darkness' is experience ... pushed a little (and only very
little) beyond the actual facts of the case". Other critiques include
Hugh Curtler's 'Achebe on Conrad: Racism and Greatness in Heart of
Darkness' (1997). The French philosopher Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
called 'Heart of Darkness' "one of the greatest texts of Western
literature" and used Conrad's tale for a reflection on "The Horror of
the West".
'Heart of Darkness' is criticised in postcolonial studies,
particularly by Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe. In his 1975 public
lecture "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness'",
Achebe described Conrad's novella as "an offensive and deplorable
book" that dehumanised Africans. Achebe argued that Conrad, "blinkered
... with xenophobia", incorrectly depicted Africa as the antithesis of
Europe and civilisation, ignoring the artistic accomplishments of the
Fang people who lived in the Congo River basin at the time of the
book's publication. He argued that the book promoted and continues to
promote a prejudiced image of Africa that "depersonalises a portion of
the human race" and concluded that it should not be considered a great
work of art.
Achebe's critics argue that he fails to distinguish Marlow's view from
Conrad's, which results in very clumsy interpretations of the novella.
In their view, Conrad portrays Africans sympathetically and their
plight tragically, and refers sarcastically to, and condemns outright,
the supposedly noble aims of European colonists, thereby demonstrating
his scepticism about the moral superiority of European men. Ending a
passage that describes the condition of chained, emaciated slaves,
Marlow remarks: "After all, I also was a part of the great cause of
these high and just proceedings." Some observers assert that Conrad,
whose native country had been conquered by imperial powers, empathised
by default with other subjugated peoples. Jeffrey Meyers notes that
Conrad, like his acquaintance Roger Casement, "was one of the first
men to question the Western notion of progress, a dominant idea in
Europe from the Renaissance to the Great War, to attack the
hypocritical justification of colonialism and to reveal... the savage
degradation of the white man in Africa." Likewise, E.D. Morel, who led
international opposition to King Leopold II's rule in the Congo, saw
Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' as a condemnation of colonial brutality
and referred to the novella as "the most powerful thing written on the
subject."
Conrad scholar Peter Firchow writes that "nowhere in the novel does
Conrad or any of his narrators, personified or otherwise, claim
superiority on the part of Europeans on the grounds of alleged genetic
or biological difference". If Conrad or his novel is racist, it is
only in a weak sense, since 'Heart of Darkness' acknowledges racial
distinctions "but does not suggest an essential superiority" of any
group. Achebe's reading of 'Heart of Darkness' can be (and has been)
challenged by a reading of Conrad's other African story, "An Outpost
of Progress", which has an omniscient narrator, rather than the
embodied narrator, Marlow. Masood Ashraf Raja has suggested that
Conrad's positive representation of Muslims in his Malay novels
complicates these charges of racism.
In 2003, Motswana scholar Peter Mwikisa concluded the book was "the
great lost opportunity to depict dialogue between Africa and Europe".
Zimbabwean scholar Rino Zhuwarara, however, broadly agreed with
Achebe, though considered it important to be "sensitised to how
peoples of other nations perceive Africa". The novelist Caryl Phillips
stated in 2003 that: "Achebe is right; to the African reader the price
of Conrad's eloquent denunciation of colonisation is the recycling of
racist notions of the 'dark' continent and her people. Those of us who
are not from Africa may be prepared to pay this price, but this price
is far too high for Achebe".
In his 1983 criticism, the British academic Cedric Watts criticises
the insinuation in Achebe's critique--the premise that only black
people may accurately analyse and assess the novella, as well as
mentioning that Achebe's critique falls into self-contradictory
arguments regarding Conrad's writing style, both praising and
denouncing it at times. Stan Galloway writes, in a comparison of
'Heart of Darkness' with ' Jungle Tales of Tarzan', "The inhabitants
[of both works], whether antagonists or compatriots, were clearly
imaginary and meant to represent a particular fictive cipher and not a
particular African people". More recent critics like Nidesh Lawtoo
have stressed that the "continuities" between Conrad and Achebe are
profound and that a form of "postcolonial mimesis" ties the two
authors via productive mirroring inversions.
Radio and stage
=================
Orson Welles adapted and starred in 'Heart of Darkness' in a CBS Radio
broadcast on 6 November 1938 as part of his series, 'The Mercury
Theatre on the Air'. In 1939, Welles adapted the story for his first
film for RKO Pictures, writing a screenplay with John Houseman. The
story was adapted to focus on the rise of a fascist dictator. Welles
intended to play Marlow and Kurtz and it was to be entirely filmed as
a POV from Marlow's eyes. Welles even filmed a short presentation film
illustrating his intent. It is reportedly lost. The film's prologue to
be read by Welles said "You aren't going to see this picture - this
picture is going to happen to you." The project was never realised;
one reason given was the loss of European markets after the outbreak
of World War II. Welles still hoped to produce the film when he
presented another radio adaptation of the story as his first program
as producer-star of the CBS radio series 'This Is My Best'. Welles
scholar Bret Wood called the broadcast of 13 March 1945, "the closest
representation of the film Welles might have made, crippled, of
course, by the absence of the story's visual elements (which were so
meticulously designed) and the half-hour length of the broadcast."
In 1991, Australian author/playwright Larry Buttrose wrote and staged
a theatrical adaptation titled 'Kurtz' with the Crossroads Theatre
Company, Sydney. The play was announced to be broadcast as a radio
play to Australian radio audiences in August 2011 by the Vision
Australia Radio Network, and also by the RPH - Radio Print Handicapped
Network across Australia. In 2011, composer Tarik O'Regan and
librettist Tom Phillips adapted an opera of the same name, which
premiered at the Linbury Theatre of the Royal Opera House in London. A
suite for orchestra and narrator was subsequently extrapolated from
it. In 2015, an adaptation of Welles' screenplay by Jamie Lloyd and
Laurence Bowen aired on BBC Radio 4. The production starred James
McAvoy as Marlow. Another BBC Radio 4 adaptation, first broadcast in
2021, transposes the action to the 21st century.
Film and television
=====================
In 1958, the CBS television anthology 'Playhouse 90' (S3E7) aired a
loose 90-minute television play adaptation. This version, written by
Stewart Stern, uses the encounter between Marlow (Roddy McDowall) and
Kurtz (Boris Karloff) as its final act, and adds a backstory in which
Marlow had been Kurtz's adopted son. The cast includes Inga Swenson
and Eartha Kitt.
Perhaps the best known adaptation is Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 film
'Apocalypse Now', based on the screenplay by John Milius, which moves
the story from the Congo to Vietnam and Cambodia during the Vietnam
War. In 'Apocalypse Now', Martin Sheen stars as Captain Benjamin L.
Willard, a US Army Captain assigned to "terminate the command" of
Colonel Walter E. Kurtz, played by Marlon Brando. A film documenting
the production, titled 'Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse',
was released in 1991. It chronicles a series of difficulties and
challenges that director Coppola encountered during the making of the
film, several of which mirror some of the novella's themes.
A 1993 television film adaptation was written by Benedict Fitzgerald
and directed by Nicolas Roeg. The film, which was aired by TNT,
starred Tim Roth as Marlow, John Malkovich as Kurtz, Isaach de Bankolé
as Mfumu, and James Fox as Gosse.
James Gray's 2019 science fiction film 'Ad Astra' is loosely inspired
by the events of the novel. It features Brad Pitt as an astronaut
travelling to the edge of the Solar System to confront and potentially
kill his father (Tommy Lee Jones), who has gone rogue.
In 2020, 'African Apocalypse', a documentary film directed and
produced by Rob Lemkin and featuring Femi Nylander portrays a journey
from Oxford, England to Niger on the trail of a colonial killer called
Captain Paul Voulet. Voulet's descent into barbarity mirrors that of
Kurtz in Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness'. Nylander discovers Voulet's
massacres happened at exactly the same time that Conrad wrote his book
in 1899. It was broadcast by the BBC in May 2021 as an episode of the
'Arena' documentary series.
A British animated film adaption of the novella is planned, directed
by Gerald Conn. It was written by Mark Jenkins and Mary Kate O
Flanagan and is produced by Gritty Realism and Michael Sheen. Kurtz is
voiced by Sheen and Harlequin by Andrew Scott. The animation uses sand
to better convey atmosphere of the book. A Brazilian animated film
(2023) also adapts the novella. It is directed by Rogério Nunes and
Alois Di Leo and moves the story to a near future Rio de Janeiro.
Video games
=============
The video game 'Far Cry 2', released on 21 October 2008, is a loose
modernised adaptation of 'Heart of Darkness'. The player assumes the
role of a mercenary operating in Africa whose task it is to kill an
arms dealer, the elusive "Jackal". The last area of the game is called
"The Heart of Darkness".
'Spec Ops: The Line', released on 26 June 2012, is a direct modernised
adaptation of 'Heart of Darkness'. The player assumes the role of
Delta Force operator Captain Martin Walker as he and his team search
Dubai for survivors in the aftermath of catastrophic sandstorms that
left the city without contact to the outside world. The character John
Konrad, who replaces the character Kurtz, is a reference to Joseph
Conrad.
Literature
============
T. S. Eliot's 1925 poem "The Hollow Men" quotes, as its first
epigraph, a line from 'Heart of Darkness': "Mistah Kurtz - he dead."
Eliot had planned to use a quotation from the climax of the tale as
the epigraph for 'The Waste Land', but Ezra Pound advised against it.
Eliot said of the quote that "it is much the most appropriate I can
find, and somewhat elucidative." Biographer Peter Ackroyd suggested
that the passage inspired or at least anticipated the central theme of
the poem.
Chinua Achebe's 1958 novel 'Things Fall Apart' is Achebe's response to
what he saw as Conrad's portrayal of Africa and Africans as symbols:
"the antithesis of Europe and therefore civilization". Achebe set out
to write a novel about Africa and Africans by an African. In 'Things
Fall Apart' we see the effects of colonialism and Christian missionary
endeavours on an Igbo community in West Africa through the eyes of
that community's West African protagonists.
Another literary work with an acknowledged debt to 'Heart of Darkness'
is Wilson Harris' 1960 postcolonial novel 'Palace of the Peacock'. J.
G. Ballard's 1962 climate fiction novel 'The Drowned World' includes
many similarities to Conrad's novella. However, Ballard said he had
read nothing by Conrad before writing the novel, prompting literary
critic Robert S. Lehman to remark that "the novel's allusion to Conrad
works nicely, even if it is not really an allusion to Conrad".
Robert Silverberg's 1970 novel 'Downward to the Earth' uses themes and
characters based on 'Heart of Darkness' set on the alien world of
Belzagor. In Josef Škvorecký's 1984 novel 'The Engineer of Human
Souls', Kurtz is seen as the epitome of exterminatory colonialism and,
there and elsewhere, Škvorecký emphasises the importance of Conrad's
concern with Russian imperialism in Eastern Europe.
Timothy Findley's 1993 novel 'Headhunter' is an extensive adaptation
that reimagines Kurtz and Marlow as psychiatrists in Toronto. The
novel begins: "On a winter's day, while a blizzard raged through the
streets of Toronto, Lilah Kemp inadvertently set Kurtz free from page
92 of 'Heart of Darkness'." Ann Patchett's 2011 novel 'State of
Wonder' reimagines the story with the central figures as female
scientists in contemporary Brazil.
Comics
========
A comics adaptation, 'Au coeur des ténèbres', written by and
illustrated by , was published by Soleil in 2014. and created
another French comic adaptation, published as 'Coeur de ténèbres' by
Delcourt in 2020.
A graphic novel adapted by David Zane Mairowitz (script) and Catherine
Anyango Grünewald (artwork) appeared in 2010 from alternative comics
publisher SelfMadeHero. A separate adaptation by Peter Kuper, appeared
2019 from W. W. Norton & Company. The latter contained an
introduction by historian Maya Jasanoff.
Georges Bess' 2021 'Bande dessinée' 'Amen' is a liberal adaptation of
'Heart of Darkness' in a space opera setting.
External links
======================================================================
*
*
* [
http://www.loudlit.org/works/heartofdarkness.htm Downloadable audio
book of 'Heart of Darkness' by LoudLit.org]
*
* [
http://www.mercurytheatre.info/ Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre on
the Air audio books, also of 'Heart of Darkness']
*
[
https://archive.org/details/OrsonWelles-MercuryTheater-1938Recordings
Orson Welles Mercury Theatre 1938, also of 'Heart of Darkness']
*
[
http://www.paleycenter.org/collection/item/?q=orson+welles+radio&p=3&item=R89:0038
'This Is My Best'--'Heart of Darkness'] (13 March 1945) at the Paley
Center for Media
* [
https://openchapter.io/Rg9LUOl/heart-of-darkness 'Heart of
Darkness'] on OpenChapter
License
=========
All content on Gopherpedia comes from Wikipedia, and is licensed under CC-BY-SA
License URL:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
Original Article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Darkness
