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The Symbolism of Darkness in "Heart of Darkness
Symbolism in the heart of darkness review essay
The Symbolism of Darkness in "Heart of Darkness
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In Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, symbolism is quite prevalently used to portray the development of the heart of darkness. Conrad used a variety of symbols, including characters, objects, and ideologies.
The first narrator and Marlow supply contradicting beliefs on the colonization of Africa. The first narrator believed that it was England's duty to save Africa from their own savage ways, like the Romans did to England many year before. When the Romans first went to England it was a vast and wilderness to them, as Africa was to England. He thought that colonialism would assist the African people to find a purpose and aid the country to prosper, as England
had.
In today‘s civilization, we find many menacing emotions that keep us humans from doing good deeds. We have different states of mind, and consciousness. There are levels that allow us to openly express what we are thinking. But there are also levels we know exist, but we refuse to allow others to know. Also, there are even states of mind we can’t even comprehend on our own. In Joseph Conrad’s The Heart of Darkness, the 3 states of the conscious mind are connected, displayed and ignored as the Europeans conform to what everyone else is doing and disregard their own true thoughts. The consciousness of the mind is easily overpowered by menacing forces, such as conformity, savagery and ignorance. These menacing forces encircle all forms of civilization, and have an effect on the human brain whether it’s realized or not.
There are three main topics to discuss when it comes to analyzing Conrad’s Heart of Darkness - symbolic interpretations, character development and language. Heart of Darkness has an abundance of almost subliminal undertones. This novella is written to such precision and high detail that almost every paragraph has a significant part to play in the overall plot. The author, Conrad, concentrates on creating a story to illustrate ideas and themes, rather than just a simple narrative. These ideas and themes are constantly pitched at the reader in a very intense and unrelenting manner, which makes them all the more powerful. Therefore, even a passage of just five pages can have a remarkable amount of detail to discuss.
In analysis of Heart of Darkness, much is made of Conrad’s intentions in telling his
As Marlow assists the reader in understanding the story he tells, many inversions and contrasts are utilized in order to increase apperception of the true meaning it holds. One of the most commonly occurring divergences is the un orthodox implications that light and dark embody. Conrad’s Heart of Darkness brims with paradoxes and symbolism throughout its entirety, with the intent of assisting the reader in comprehending the truth of not only human nature, but of the world.
Vague Descriptions in Heart of Darkness. A dark, unfamiliar setting and a suspenseful plot give Heart of Darkness the characteristics of a good novel, but what really stands out is Conrad's writing. The story is full of vague imagery and descriptions that the reader must contemplate in order to fully understand. Writing so vividly was an impressive feat for Conrad, who was actually not a native English speaker.
An iconography is a symbolic representation that carries hidden meaning of a term, image, and item. Both Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Achebe’s Things Fall Apart fully describe many symbolisms of specific items and all of them are attached to different kinds of meaning behind. Although Heart of Darkness is a famous literature that was criticized by Chinua Achebe and each of their work represents different point of views during similar time of history, both literatures have a similarity that they operate iconography in relation to race, class and identity with their own interpretations of symbols and icons.
Without personal access to authors, readers are left to themselves to interpret literature. This can become challenging with more difficult texts, such as Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness. Fortunately, literary audiences are not abandoned to flounder in pieces such as this; active readers may look through many different lenses to see possible meanings in a work. For example, Conrad’s Heart of Darkness may be deciphered with a post-colonial, feminist, or archetypal mindset, or analyzed with Freudian psycho-analytic theory. The latter two would effectively reveal the greater roles of Kurtz and Marlow as the id and the ego, respectively, and offer the opportunity to draw a conclusion about the work as a whole.
One interpretation of Marlow's relationship to colonialism is that he does not support it. Conrad writes, "They were not enemies, they were not criminals, they were nothing earthly now,-nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation, lying confusedly in the greenish gloom" (p. 27-28). Marlow says this and is stressing that the so-called "savages", or Africans, are being treated and punished like they are criminals or enemies when in fact they never did anything. He observes the slow torture of these people and is disgusted with it. Marlow feels sympathy for the black people being slaved around by the Europeans but doesn't do anything to change it because that is the way things are. One can see the sympathy by the way that he gives a starving black man one of his biscuits. "To tear treasure out of the bowels of the land was their desire, with no moral purpose at the back of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe" (p. 54). This statement by Marlow conveys that he doesn't believe that the Europeans have a right to be stripping Africa of its riches. He views the Jungles of Africa as almost it's own living, breathing monster.
Throughout the excerpt from, Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad uses many forms of imagery and figurative language to reveal the mood. The imagery used is a key factor to get the reader involved in the novella and truly understand the excerpt. The figurative language used demonstrates an ominous and uneasy mood through the metaphors, similes etc.
Beyond the shield of civilization and into the depths of a primitive, untamed frontier lies the true face of the human soul. It is in the midst of this savagery and unrelenting danger that mankind confronts the brooding nature of his inner self. Joseph Conrad’s novel, Heart of Darkness, is the story of one man's insight into life as he embarks on a voyage to the edges of the world. Here, he meets the bitter, yet enlightening forces that eventually shape his outlook on life and his own individuality. Conrad’s portrayal of the characters, setting, and symbols, allow the reader to reflect on the true nature of man.
The "Heart of Darkness," written by Joseph Conrad in 1899 as a short story, is about two men who face their own identities as what they consider to be civilized Europeans and the struggle to not to abandon their themselves and their morality once they venture into the "darkness." The use of "darkness" is in the book's title and in throughout the story and takes on a number of meanings that are not easily understood until the story progresses. As you read the story you realize that the meaning of "darkness" is not something that is constant but changes depending on the context it used.
Every great author posses the ability to create a novel deeply woven in symbolism and subliminal messages. Underneath the literal journey encountered in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness lies a tale saturated with subtle, yet, significant imagery that brings forth the true meaning of the novella. Throughout Heart of Darkness Conrad uses a plethora of simple colors, objects, and places to convey multifaceted images and ideas. His fine execution of the tools of the English language allows him to quickly lure the reader aboard the Nellie and not release him until the horror is over. Although the interpretation of symbols in the Heart of Darkness is elaborate, due to their simplicity they are often overlooked.
This justified European exploitation of Africa and many other areas of the world by claiming that indigenous people of Africa need the technological and religious knowledge that Europe has. In the novel, Conrad proves that Africans are fit to survive in the native land and Darwin's theory was never meant to be applied to races or nations. For the attack on work ethics of Victorian standards, the work ethic Marlow embraces, is effective by not allowing unwanted thoughts to enter his mind, blinds him to events that are really happening around him. Conrad's representation of European ideologies that failed in Africa proposes the failure and immorality of
Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is a great example of a Modernist novel because of its general obscurity. The language is thick and opaque. The novel is littered with words such as: inconceivable, inscrutable, gloom. Rather than defining characters in black and white terms, like good and bad, they entire novel is in different shades of gray. The unfolding of events takes the reader between many a foggy bank; the action in the book and not just the language echoes tones of gray.
In his novel, Conrad uses the literary element of symbolism through the painting, darkness, and the white sepulcher to demonstrate the theme of As Marlow continues to work for the Company, he continues to see darkness revealed in a plethora of ways. As the story begins, Marlow talks about how the Congo is dark. Readers later come to see specific examples of what he meant. " ' And this also, ' said Marlow suddenly, 'has been one of the darkest places of the earth '" (Conrad 3).