ENGL373 - Should We Read "Heart of Darkness"?

Heart of Darkness is one of those stories that can be interpreted in an almost infinite number of ways. Depending on your world view, your race, your religion, and even your sex, you will most likely take something away from "Heart of Darkness" that's different from your peers. Most people that have read it can agree on some very simple tenets of the story: 1) it is a story about a riverboat captain named Marlow, who got a job with a Belgian merchant company to sail a steamship up and down the Congo; 2) Marlow gets to the Congo and tells his “story.” After that, it is almost all up for individual interpretation.

First, a little background. The author, Joseph Conrad, was himself a steamboat captain who arguably had a great deal of personal experience and involvement in much of what Heart of Darkness deals with. Heart of Darkness was written during the height of European colonialism of Africa which is a huge moral argument, in and of itself. Was it wrong for the Europeans to treat Africa and its native inhabitants the way they did? Was the European attitude towards the Africans racist? Was Conrad a racist? These are only the tip of the metaphorical iceberg.

Conrad wrote Heart of Darkness in a manner that insulates him from direct involvement. That is, he is narrating the story, via Marlow, who is narrating the story to a group of sailors sitting on a boat. Knowing about Conrad’s personal experience and close relationship to his subject matter gives rise to the first question, which is, is Marlow really Conrad? Subsequently, if Marlow is Conrad, then is Conrad a racist? Is the story (as Marlow relates it) a racist story about the conquest and destruction of the African continent? Were the events that occurred in the story a reflection of then current European attitudes of race and religion, or those of flat out racists? It goes on and on.

You see, we haven’t even gotten to the controversial figure named Kurtz yet and we’re already swimming in questions without conclusive answers. Kurtz himself brings with him an entirely new set of questions that the reader must grapple with. Is Kurtz evil? Did he do what he did because he was insane? Power crazed? Assimilated? Was Kurtz a racist? A womanizer? On and on we go.

We will never really know what Conrad was thinking or what he really meant when he wrote Heart of Darkness. Should we read Heart of Darkness? The answer, in my humble opinion, is an unequivocal yes. It is the investigation and analyzing of stories that gives us a broader understanding of our own humanity. Without introspection, we can never grow and evolve into something better than what we once were. If you read it, you will most likely be changed…and that’s a good thing!