Profound Darkness

Into the Profound Darkness

A short novel centering around a multitude of esoteric themes and motifs, Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad details how an exploration and colonization expedition is the climactic turning point in a young sailor’s life. The protagonist Charlie Marlow takes an introspective journey as he remembers the horrors he witnessed while working for an English trading company. Though all the themes in the book are relevant in their own ways, the most prevalent is the presence of an intense darkness within the world. There are many types of darkness the main character describes, such as the physical blackness of the jungle, the helplessness of Kurtz in his final moments, and the darkness that Marlow sees everywhere he looks.

While forging into the unknown forests along the Congo River, Marlow notes that the farther they go, the more sinister everything seems. He comments that nature itself, “‘…seemed to beckon with a dishonouring flourish before the sunlit face of the land a treacherous appeal to the lurking death, to the hidden evil, to the profound darkness of its heart’” (Conrad 65). This passage hints that there are perhaps deeper, more malicious evils hiding within the jungle. The sunlight does not even seem to penetrate the incomprehensible dark, and Marlow feels the anxiousness of the unknown creeping upon him. As the Company continues on the river, they face a fog that disorients them for days. Marlow narrates the journey: “‘The rest of the world was nowhere, as far as our eyes and ears were concerned. Just nowhere. Gone, disappeared; swept off without leaving a whisper or a shadow behind’” (81). Through all the abnormal and frightening sounds that pervade the endlessly dense mist, Marlow senses they are approaching something that does not wish to be uncovered because the world disappears in the face of it. Demonstrating this concept, he says a few pages later, “‘The woods were unmoved, like a mask—heavy, like the closed door of a prison...’” (118). The so-called mask of the jungle hides what Marlow wants to find most: the elusive Mr. Kurtz, who later shows that the natural darkness in which he lives

It is the most unexciting contest you can imagine. It takes place in an impalpable greyness, with nothing underfoot, with nothing around, without spectators, without clamour, without glory, without the great desire of victory, without the great fear of defeat, in a sickly atmosphere of tepid scepticism, without much belief in your own right, and still less in that of your adversary’” (146). This is an extremely important passage. It demonstrates what Marlow has learned as he watched the world and the people around him shift. In the end, there is no winner in the battle called life. One must fight one’s own depravity for oneself, despite the turbulence of the waters in which one resides. Heart of Darkness is a book soaked with meaning, but the most prevalent theme is that of darkness. This motif is evident through the physical blackness of nature during the excursion, Kurtz’s mind and mannerisms in his final moments, and the everyday turpitude with which Marlow has grown