Heart of Darkness

In Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, one can draw many theories as to what

Conrad’s views of African Colonization are. One of the most obvious and monotonous themes of

this novel would be African racism and discrimination. So, did Conrad write this novel as a way

to condone the acts of savage European imperialism and slavery, or, to make us realize what

they did was unethical? I believe he was a racist, and you will soon come to see why.

Picture yourself streaming down on the gloomy waters of the Congo River in the heart of

Africa. The water seems calm and the thick fog around you keeps your hair sprung up on the

back of your neck, while you have thoughts of the cannibal steamboat crews eating you while

you are asleep. These are just some of the things that transpires in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

Although events of this novel come across as blatantly racist, the real question is, was the author,

Joseph Conrad, racist? After thoroughly analyzing the novel, I have concluded that Conrad

showed racist traits by using racial slurs, as well as glorifying slavery and the unequal treatment

of the native Africans in this book.

The novel’s main character, Marlow, is hired by The Company, an English shipping

company. It is revealed that Marlow is a sailor/explorer himself, but had never sailed to Africa

before. The officials of The Company in England are so oblivious to everything happening, that

they can’t even fathom the destruction and death caused because of their ivory shipping. Conrad

made this a clear example of how these European companies care for only wealth while

completely neglecting the environment and it’s people and treating them as if they were not

humans. The racism here is shown because The Company lacks the acknowledgment of the

native Africans as people and treat them as property.

In Heart of Darkness, there is an emphasis and dominance in using racist language.

Marlow uses vocabulary such as nigger when referring to native Africans many times. I believe

Conrad used this character, Marlow, as a way to express his racism towards the Africans. “The

fool-nigger had dropped everything to throw the shutter open and let off that Martini-Henry”

(45). The word nigger in this sentence said by Marlow and also from other people in the book

implicates the word as a common term used amongst their people in the book’s time frame. The

word nigger has always had a degrading and racist meaning to it, so when Conrad chooses to use

this word in the novel, he is racist.

In another section of the novel Conrad blew the steam whistle to scare away the foolish natives. Conrad, in his