Lithien, in your discussion of evil in relation to Conrad's Heart of
Darkness, you persist that the darkness/evil was the savage way of life
(abandonment of civilization) that lies at the core/heart of Mankind.
That it was the lie we follow, how we lie to ourselves with trussed up
rules and "civilized" customs, when we are really these brutal,
animalistic savages underneath.
i disagree. i believe that the true horror that Kurtz spoke of was the
truth, not the lie. How the whole imperialistic operation could seem so
savage and unordered, how we could convince ourselves that it was
uncontrolled to justify the evils of the colony, while it was actually
so WELL ORGANIZED and controlled. the bosses knew exactly what was going
on and they didn't care.
i haven't read this book since ninth grade but i wrote a paper on it
then, when i knew what was going on, that ill just paste in an excerpt
from my harddrive. please excuse the melodrama and high diction, as it
was needed in order to get an A from that damn teacher....
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An important line in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness appears on page
98 when Marlow is discussing his reactions (or lack thereof) to Kurtz's
choice of gardening materials, the "heads drying on stakes":
"After all, that was only a savage sight, while I seemed at one bound to
have been transported into some lightless region of subtle horrors,
where pure, uncomplicated savagery was a positive relief, being
something that had a right to exist- obviously- in the sunshine."
Marlow here reveals how the needless violence, the overt, blatant evil
that is so easily grasped, is not as formidable as the well thought-out
and artfully insidious malignancy that one sees when one steps back to
behold the big picture and is pulled back in with such force as to
penetrate the surface and plunge darkly into the depths of depravity.
The blunt and unfocussed evil that charges straight at you could only
pound into the stomach, bringing disgust or nausea at most. But the
finely honed subtleties can slowly weave into your very being,
terrifying the heart, maddening the mind, and finally consuming the
soul. Oh, to see the blatant horrors of starving children fall dead from
their barren table cannot compare to the disturbing evil of the barely
glimpsed, jewel encrusted hand that has pinched away their last morsel.
But I digress.
This is a major theme in Conrad's novel. Marlow's real horror isn't
realized when he sees the savage conditions of the natives/ slaves, but
when he recognizes the system that causes them. When Marlow travels to
Kurtz (and to Kurtz's mode of understanding), he doesn't trek downriver
but up. To descend would be sinking into purer anarchy and chaos, while
his ascension finds him seeing the big picture, and therefore the true
nature of the Colonization. This is the more complex evil; planned out
and ordered.
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