Discuss your views on the racism inherent (or not) in Conrad’s novella. What implications does this have for reading, teaching, and its place in the canon?
To say that Conrad's novella is racist would be to ignore the fact that it speaks about and from the perspective of an incredibly racist time period. This would be like saying that a novel written to be from Hitler's perspective during World War II and the holocaust would be anti-semitic or anti-democratic. To clarify, such a novel would most certainly have to contain discussions and ideas about killing jews and taking over the world, but that isn't the novel, it's the topic.
The characters and the entire situation which Heart of Darkness revolves around is inherently racist, proven by the constant inclusion of racial slurs, crude descriptions of the African people in contrast to more civilized descriptions of Europeans, and the general sense that the Europeans were superior. However, this is a cultural view consistent with the time period. European culture was far more advanced than that of the Africans, or at least it was in the European mindset. So the Europeans set out to bring culture to the savages. Well, that was what they claimed they were doing, although most people today would claim it to be more along the lines of extorting wealth from people with no means of protection against superior technology.
To summarize, Conrad's novella is not racist, but the topics contained within it are due to historical accuracy. Conrad may have intended it to be racist, or he may not have. Either way, the book serves as an accurate depiction of the typically racist culture of the time period of the story. In this way it should be seen as a learning instrument about past culture. For a book to be racist, it would have to be written with its main purpose being to offend without the offense serving a greater thematic purpose. Any offense gained from Heart of Darkness comes simply as a literary tool either to give insight to the culture and the darkness of its imperialistic nature or to set a passage's tone and bring the reader's attention to an important realization.
Chandler, I agree wholeheartedly with this interpretation of racism in Conrad’s novella ‘Heart of Darkness’. The way in which Conrad describes the natives or “inferior beings” as they are called was not simply done just to state an opinion widely regarded as fact at the time, but rather serve to enhance themes such as light versus dark and civilization versus nature. Like you previously said the concept of racism or ethnocentric behavior was so ingrained within the culture of Conrad’s time that the fact he was being racist was irrelevant because it ultimately achieved Conrad’s goal of displaying the savageness of the native people while also maintaining an air of authenticity unique to this time period.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, but anti-democratic sentiments are much different than anti-Semitic and racist statements. One confronts an idea; the others, groups of real people. Ideas can be molded and modified to fit the time and situation, but people cannot... or so we figured out. The idea of bringing culture to an uncivilized world may have been effective in the end, but only at the cost of many lives and extortionist efforts. However, traveling to Africa and pushing our way of life onto the natives changes us in many ways as well; the novel The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver also expresses this same principle. Kurtz was most certainly affected by his environment after the opportunity to profit from Africa presented itself.
ReplyDeleteChandler, I liked your point about books only being racist when the racism does not "serve a greater thematic purpose." I partly agree with you, I think: it enhances the characters of the Company men to make them violently racist, because it's the logical continuation of their imperialistic nature and the purposeful darkness of their characters. However, it seems to me that there is racism written into the book as well which was not included purposely to enhance the novel. The black characters throughout are non-central, stereotyped, and one-dimensional, and our anti-imperialistic Marlow expresses much subtle racism even as he rejects the more overt violence committed by the company-men. This racism does not enhance the novel, but it was also not intended to offend, and I would argue it still makes the book racist.
ReplyDeleteI also don't think I agree that the time period in which it was written excuses it. It may excuse the author morally, as the unconscious racism written into the book would have been part of his everyday life, but the content of the novel is problematic no matter when it was written.