A review of:

Heart of Darkness

By Joseph Conrad

“The point was in his being a gifted creature, and that of all his gifts the one that stood out preeminently, that carried with it a real sense of presence, was his ability to talk, his words- the gift of expression, the bewildering, the illuminating, the most exalted and the most contemptible, the pulsating stream of light, or the deceitful flow from the heart of an impenetrable darkness.” –Joseph Conrad, speaking as Marlow about Mr. Kurtz from Heart of Darkness

The ability of Joseph Conrad to convey such a large range of themes in his books truly makes him “a gifted creature.” For those of you who have yet to read this book, not even a book, a short story, but one that sucks you in to live a lifetime’s worth of experiences in its sixty or so pages, you are missing out. Fiction only in the most laughable sense, this story is a valuable tool for viewing not only ourselves but our social constructs as well, both when it was written and today.

The story in its literal sense happens upon Marlow in his current voyage telling the story of his trip up the Congo into the heart of Africa. From the earliest outset he sees things that make very little sense to him, things that seem absurd on the face of them, such as a ship firing into the brush. He gets to the wide open, unending jungle only to find a completely disorganized central station run by the most undesirable of characters, a back room dealing, sniveling, conniving liar of a man in the position of general manager. Upon his arrival he learns that his steamship is currently at the bottom of the river, as they had gotten nervous about the certainty of his arrival and had attempted to start without him, obviously failing. It takes months for the parts needed to arrive at central station, and it is during this time we first hear of Mr. Kurtz, captain of the inner station. Having nothing better to do and being a naturally curious character, Marlow becomes enamored with Kurtz, wanting to learn all he can about him. He hears that he may be ill, and this heightens his need to fix his ship soon and see this infamous Mr. Kurtz.

After his ship is fixed Marlow stats out along with a few ‘pilgrims’, the general manager, and some African slaves. All along his trip up the Congo Marlow sees himself more and more removed from his civilization, lost in the vast wilderness that makes up the unending jungle on both sides of the river. At one point he compares it to a snake, winding its way to the heart of the ‘dark continent.’ The further he goes into the jungle the more things he knew before seem absurd to him, until they reach a pile of firewood that used to be a hut with a note saying it was for them. This odd happenstance only adds to his demeanor, that being one who is stripped away of everything they thought they knew and is completely open to a new way of seeing. That is the state we see him in when they finally arrive at Kurtz’s camp, completely populated my natives with the exception of a crazy Russian trader. The camp consists of a house on a hill overlooking the river, with a fence made up of posts with heads of natives stuck on the top. It seems that Mr. Kurtz has set himself up as some sort of deity and the natives now worship him as such. Instead of trading for ivory or digging it up himself he has started taking it from other tribes that live around the lake at the source of the Congo. He has been able to amass a great amount of ivory this way, and has only been sending a portion of it back to the central station. The ‘pilgrims’ bring Kurtz, who is very ill, on board the steamer, and the crazy Russian takes off. After a series of events with the natives they set out for central station, but the ship breaks down and has to be repaired. This is where Mr. Kurtz finally dies, leaving his paper with Marlow and whispering “the horror, the horror” before he finally embarked on his trip to the other side. After this Marlow himself falls ill and barely makes it back to Europe alive, but when he does he is a changed man. Finally going off to see Kurtz’s wife, she asks him what his final words were, and instead of telling her the truth he tells her his last words were her name. Embedded in this rich monologue of Marlow’s tale is some of the best critical commentary on Western civilization that was ever written.

For me the central question that Heart of Darkness asks is ‘Can Kurtz truly be called mad when he adheres to the tenets of the civilization accusing him of such?’ We are repeatedly told by a succession of characters that his “methods have become unsound”, that he “quite literally has gone insane”, and things of that nature, but when we finally meet Kurtz we see that he is adhering to the very rules set out by the ones who consider him insane, only he has none of the mental or moral trappings that keep the selfish desires of those men in check. Through this we see that Kurtz is only judged insane by being the best at what he is supposed to do. His job within “the Company” is to get ivory. Not only does he do that, but he gets more ivory than all the other agents combined. The only difference is that he does away with the usual methods of having the natives sign contracts that mean nothing to them for the ivory or trading them some worthless beads, forcing them into indentured servitude using some notion of “law” not known to them. Kurtz cuts through all that pretense of civilization and just takes it from them. He takes it from them and kills anyone that gets in his way, and the purity of his actions in the face of such hypocrisy is what makes him admirable to us. This is the heart of darkness Conrad refers to in the title, the darkness that is at the core of society, not in the jungle. Kurtz brought the darkness with him, it was bred in him. His ‘civilization’ was the darkness that destroyed him; the jungle was just the catalyst that allowed it to overwhelm “the better angels of our nature.” We are told he has descended into madness, but he has done no such thing. When we see Kurtz he is very much in control of his faculties, and this is evident when he attempts to escape from the boat after they arrive at the inner station. What has happened is that being away from civilization has caused Mr. Kurtz to descend into clarity, seeing the uselessness of pretense. At the final moments of his life he sees the truth about the imperialist nature, the exploitation of all that is possible, the absurdity of his ‘civilized’ way of life and speaks the most honest words that have ever been spoken about it; “the horror, the horror.” And what a horror it is to behold.

 If you read this book and really enjoyed it I suggest you pick Albert Camus' The Stranger for your next literary outing. Trust me, your library has it, and if they don't, move.