Heart of Darkness Essay

Here is my fantastical Heart of Darkness essay which, coincidentally enough, seems to have turned my heart into a place of darkness. As it is now almost 3:30 am, I will quickly post this and sleep like the beast of burden I am.

Gosh I hope everything translates properly (Murphy's Law says it won't.)


Kaiya Narayan-Schmidt

March 6, 2011

English Literature and Composition AP

Burke 2º

Imbalance

The struggle that plagues humanity is the search for balance. Human kind at its very nature desires to be and have the best, and it is only the moral compass that dictates just how far one goes to quench this thirst. When there is an imbalance within a person’s mind, that person may attempt to rationalize one of the causes so that he becomes balanced. As evidenced in Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad, an inner imbalance between humanity’s natural superiority complex and its evolved sense of morality causes even the most focused and dedicated businessman to stray from his profit-minded goal.

The idea of capitalism is based on the principle of a free market, which allows for survival of the fittest. If the fittest survives, the inferior beings perish, and the winners take all. In this sense, it is within human nature to ease out the unfit in order to provide the superior with all it desires. The Europeans in Heart of Darkness are no exception. Their desire for power, in the form of ivory, leads them to Africa, where they discover that they may harvest large quantities of ivory. The need for slaves to collect the ivory becomes apparent, however, so the Europeans waste no time in forcing the natives to do their bidding. This exemplifies the need for one people to be superior to another; the Europeans are exercising their superiority over the Africans, as aligns with their natural state of being. This slavery creates a disparity within the Europeans, some of whom feel deeply conflicted about the brutality inflicted upon the Africans.

 Morality directly contradicts the survival of the fittest theory by Charles Darwin. Therefore, in order for any being to rightfully say that it is superior, a separation between the inferior being and humanity must be made, all the while justifying the actions taken using the process of “othering.” The Europeans take to othering in order to rationalize the cruelty they see in Africa, though the evidence that this does not completely work is scattered throughout Conrad’s novel. Because their morals dictate that the violence and subservience of the native Africans is wrong and unusually malicious, the European workers eventually anchor themselves to a Company station that is as deep in the jungle as their mental confliction will allow. This is the literal and figurative last point where they can explain away any guilt they have for abusing the Africans; any farther and their justification would be illogical, as the deeper one travels in the African jungles, the greater the chaos and brutality.

Indeed, Kurtz himself is evidence that the inequity within a person can cause madness if there is no justification. He is one of few Europeans to travel so deeply into Africa, and seemingly the only one to not let money and power blind him. From his “strange” relationship with the Africans, he seems to have embraced his morals over his goal to make profit, as his depth within the jungle makes the idea of a luxurious life in Europe sound far away and less appealing. Although he does convince the Africans that he is their god in order to collect more ivory, Kurtz uses this method so that he does not have to other and browbeat  them into submission. Other ivory collectors could not manage to travel as far as Kurtz, limiting their ability to collect large quantities and maximize profit. Even though profit maximization was their original goal, they needed to stray from it in order to stay sane. Though the ways in which the people eventually withdrew from the money venture were different, the outcome was the same.

The imbalance that is created by the coexistence of the survival of the fittest nature and a moral code causes the Europeans to stray from the original goal of making money, for the two cannot exist harmoniously together. One must give, and in order for the money to stay the main goal, the Europeans must other the Africans to satisfy that they are not going against their morals. For many Europeans, even othering cannot satisfy all their morals, and they could not reach as deep in the jungle as Kurtz could because of this. The baser human nature of needing to be superior and more powerful than another people clashes with the product of evolution: morality.

Works Cited

African victims of Belgian cruelty. N.d. Wiktor Moszczynski's Blog. N.p., 23 Oct. 2010.

Web. 7 Mar. 2011. <http://polishlondoner.blogspot.com/>.

"Charles Darwin." LucidCafé. Robin Chew, 2011. Web. 7 Mar. 2011. 

<http://www.lucidcafe.com/lucidcafe/library/96feb/darwin.html>.

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New York: Konemann, 1999.

"Free market." Merriam-Webster. N.p., 2011. Web. 7 Mar. 2011.

<http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/free%20market>.

Narayan-Schmidt, Kaiya Maria. Heart of Darkness Map. 6 Mar. 2011. PNG file.

"Othering." Reading Women Writers. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Mar. 2011.

<http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~ulrich/rww03/othering.htm>.

Saiyalel, Soila. African elephant ivory tusks. N.d. Baraza. WildlifeDirect, 8 Jan. 2010.

Web. 7 Mar. 2011. <http://baraza.wildlifedirect.org/tag/ivory/>.