Prompt #11

Discuss Heart of Darkness from a feminist perspective. Discuss the female characters—their purpose, significance. What is revealed about the place and image of women?


Heart of Darkness is an extremely sexist piece of literature. Marlow’s attitude toward and treatment of women displays extremely sexist ideals. Women are barely mentioned at all in the entirety of the novella, and the ones who are mentioned seem to reinforce Marlow’s skewed ideas about women. The first woman we are introduced to is Marlow’s aunt who believes that he will be doing nearly Godly work and enlightening the poor savages in Africa. Marlow then comments that, “It’s queer how out of touch women are.” This idea presented by Marlow is reinforced by Kurtz who believes that, “We must help them [women] to stay in that beautiful world of their own, lest ours gets worse.” Kurtz’s intended fits perfectly with this view of women. She is blissfully ignorant to Kurtz’s actions. Her perception of Kurtz is in blatant contradiction of the reality Marlow has seen; yet he cannot bring himself to tell her the truth, perpetuating his idea that women live in their own little world. In staunch contrast to Kurtz’s intended is his African mistress. She, unlike the other women in the novel, displays a sort of power. Still, while she is viewed stronger, she still maintains a silent presence that pales in comparison to the men.