Analysis Of Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

In the book “Heart of Darkness”, Joseph Conrad wrote about the horrors that were committed by Leopold’s regime. As one of the first insider to witness these horrors, he wrote “Heart of Darkness”, with this book, he was able to spread the word about the atrocities he had seen in Leopold’s greedy pursuit of rubber and ivory in the congo. This book details closely how Leopold made his humongous profit. Leopold issued decrees on the Congo such as that the native people may only trade with his state agents or with his concessions. Leopold’s concessions were private companies that would sell the ivory and rubber, they would give Leopold 50% of their profits. The Abir Congo Company was one of these concessions that harvest the natural rubber of the Congo.They were granted a large portion of the land in the north and had the right to impose a rubber tax on its inhabitants. It was through concessions like these but also from his personal company (the Congo Free State) that Leopold created his personal wealth. This book brings us one step closer to answering our question since it tells us how Leopold got ahold of all of his profits. But this brings us to another question of, exactly how much money did the Congo bring to Leopold II?

2. “King Leopold’s Ghost” By Adam Hochschild (Chapter 18 & 19)

Adam Hochschild came into great detail of the outcomes and consequences of Leopold’s reign in the Congo. It also brings up Jules Marchal studies on Leopold’s Profits. It says in chapter 18 that he drew about 220 Million Francs from the Congo (or $1.1 Billion in today’s dollar) over the course of his 41 years of ruling. Of course, this sum does not include the more hard-to-trace money that Leopold spent or hid with more secrecy. As mentioned before, t...

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...f signs and symbols depicting his royal greatness.

4. Political Cartoon of Leopold, from “King Leopold’s Soliloquy” By Mark Twain.

In Mark Twain’s book “King Leopold’s Soliloquy”, we find this caricature of Leopold keeping all of the money to himself while his officers are killing Congolese slaves. I feel like this image is very powerful as it depicts many things in one image. It shows that Leopold was aware of the killing in the Congo and didn't feel guilty or pity (as his face emotion only show greed or nervosity). With the image, we learn that Leopold made an enormous profit from the Congo but kept it all greedily to himself. The book itself recounts Leopold speaking in his own defense. For example it talks about him and how he says he did not take any of the government money and that he did not use any of the revenues from the Congo for personal uses.