298 Conrad, Joseph
CONRAD, JOSEPH Heart of Darkness
(1899, 1902)
Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness, a seminal
work in the history of modernist literature as well as
a scathing attack on European imperialism, was first
published in Blackwood ’s Magazine in 1899; it was
published in book form in 1902. Heart of Darkness
tells the story of a young, adventurous English sea-
man, Marlow, and his encounter with the far reaches
of empire as he travels up the Congo River. At the
same time, it is an internal journey of self-discovery
to the heart of darkness that lies within.
Like most of Joseph Conrad’s early stories,
Heart of Darkness is based on his personal experi-
ences as a merchant seaman. Arriving in the Congo
in 1890 to take command of a small steamship,
Conrad (1857–1924) witnessed firsthand the dev-
astating human impact of European colonialism on
an uprooted native population. Yet Heart of Dark-
ness is far more than an anti-imperialist political
tract or an anthropological study of detribalization.
It is also a masterpiece of modernist fiction. Con-
rad’s personal experiences are those of a homeless
exile, a loner and linguistic outsider, a Pole sailing
on French and British ships, a European in Asia or
Africa, a nonnative speaker writing in English. He
was, in short, a man who lived in the borderlands
of culture at the crossroads of tradition and
modernity. Conrad’s narrative techniques in Heart
of Darkness capture this fragmented alienation
and thus prefigure in many ways the multiple per-
spectives, impressionistic representations, linguistic
sophistication, mythic archetypes, and psycho-
logical subjectivity we have come to associate with
modernist literature. Within the framework of
Marlow’s journey upriver to find Kurtz is another
voyage, an inner journey where Conrad’s narrative
confronts such themes as alienation, ambition,
community, freedom, identity, isolation,
oppression, race, and work.
Michael Zeitler
cOmmunity in Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is a novel about
community and the effects of European coloniza-
tion—its disastrous consequences for the stability
of traditional native cultures and its potential moral
and psychological consequences for the European
colonists themselves. The theme of community, in
its diverse possible meanings, emerges in the fram-
ing story on board the Nellie, as Conrad’s unnamed
narrator credits the “bond of the sea” for uniting
the five on board through common work, profes-
sional experiences, and underlying purpose. They
are moored at Gravesend on the Thames, and the
river connects them to London, the “Great City,”
and to the sea and the far reaches of the British
Empire, just as their work connects them to Sir John
Franklin, Sir Francis Drake, and the larger historical
community of British exploration and colonization.
Marlow, as he prefaces his own narrative, suggests
a comparison between themselves and the Roman
conquerors of ancient Britain, who also were “men
enough to face the darkness,” held together only by
their “devotion to efficiency” and “an unselfish belief
in the idea—something you can set up, and bow
down before, and offer a sacrifice to,” as Marlow and
the others aboard the Nellie have done.
Throughout his narrative, Marlow emphasizes
the potential for both individual and communal
degeneration, for losing sight of that “bond,” that
“idea” which ties individuals to a larger community
of meanings, associations, and values. Even before
his arrival in Africa, as Marlow prepares to leave the
Company offices in Brussels, the examining doctor
warns him of the “mental changes of individuals”
that take place on the “inside” of those returning
from the Congo. Marlow’s descriptions convey his
sense of the horrors of the Belgian exploitation
of the Congo. The chain gangs of African native
work conscripts, the whippings and mutilations, the
forced marches, the “grove of death,” the indiscrimi-
nate cannon shots into the bush, and the Europeans’
treatment of the steamboat crew all speak to the
colonizers’ alienation from the moral values of the
larger world community. Marlow, the practical Brit-
ish seaman with his deeply felt allegiance to work,
efficiency, and productivity, sees in the absence of
these values yet another sign of moral degeneracy
replacing community-based responsibility. Build-
ings burn because the fire brigade is helpless and
inefficient; they do not get rebuilt because there is
no straw to make the bricks. Ships are not repaired
because replacement rivets have not been sent. Mar-