The Heart of Darkness

Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness portrays the soul of man as evil, to him the heart is a dark place filled with malcontent. The heart of man is not naturally evil; man is sick, and sick people do bad things. The appearance of man in an outward form suggests evil intent; however, this is just the byproduct of a spiritual war that is being waged for man’s soul. Just as when a man is sick and he lashes out from pain; humanity is doing the same, lashing out from the spiritual anguish that they all feel inside of their hearts. A heart saturated by the feeling of darkness. This darkness is not natural, but rather an inherited trait that was produced, or rather, twisted into form by The Fall. As one moves away from the epicenter of society, it will become clear that the whole of creation is, in fact, good. The beasts and the cattle, creeping things, winged birds, the elders with the younger are originally good. Created with the sole purpose of love, which was perverted by The Fall.

Taking into account Conrad’s worldview, the wilderness of Africa is an evil, demonic place with no redeeming factors save the wealth available deep in its jungles. Devoid of human touch, excepting the natives, its frenzied reach touches the heart of any man who may set foot on its shores. The heart of Africa, known to the men as “The dark continent”, has the ability to strip the ‘culture’ from a man. Kurtz, a long time ivory harvester and the most profitable at that, loses his grip on culture and falls into insanity. This ‘insanity’ is caused and driven by the wild nature of the natives. From a modern, cultured perspective, he is insane, but is this true when observed from the culture of the natives? Kurtz has fallen into a life of impulse, “all that myster...

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...s in conflict. In conflict over the state of man’s soul and the effect it is having on the heart of darkness that is Africa.

Joseph Conrad holds a view of humanity that is skewed in ways, but holds true, obviously, to the novel that he has written. Humanity is dark, and it carries this “brooding gloom” with it wherever it goes. Under the guise of “enlightenment”, they carry their darkness into Africa, where they steal the wealth of a continent. The men are stripped of their culture as they strip an entire landmass of its treasure. Yet, each man understands that to an extent, what he is doing is wrong. Humankind is sick, in many ways do people attempt to cure their sickness. These ivory hunters are attempting to self-medicate through the acquisition of wealth and power, and end up hurting themselves and the ones that they love. This is the heart of man’s darkness.