Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is one of the most famous novellas of the twentieth century. Heavily inspired by Conrad’s own journey into the African jungle, Heart of Darkness follows the steamship captain Marlow into the interior of the wilderness, the literal “heart of darkness.” The novella is fraught with symbolism: many of the characters, and even the jungle itself, can be interpreted as symbols. However, the most significant symbol of Heart of Darkness is the character of Kurtz. Conrad himself admits his “fault of having made Kurtz too symbolic or rather symbolic at all,” proving that Kurtz plays a critical role in the allegory and deeper meaning of the work (Moore 229). In Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Kurtz functions as a symbol for the unmistakable evils of imperialism, in doing so advancing the theme of surface versus inner truth. Kurtz also embodies the deeper meaning of the novella: human nature and the capacity for evil.
Today, the atrocities committed in Africa during the imperialistic era are widely known and denounced. During Conrad’s time, however, pro-imperialist propaganda was used in a variety of ways to bend the truth about colonization and to sway the citizens of Europe to support the empire. Propaganda “was an integral and necessary component of overseas rule in the twentieth century” used by governments to “manufacture consent in societies of mass politics” (Stanard 24). The most widely touted phrase in defense of imperialism was the desire to civilize and improve Africa; King Leopold II himself claimed altruistic motives for his colonization of the Congo. State-issued propaganda furthered the idea of the necessity for the civilization of Africa by creating “a denigrating image of Africans” and “contrasting Belgian civilization with African backwardness” (Stanard 16). In Heart of Darkness, Conrad creates an analogy for this false pretense of bringing light to the ‘African darkness’ in the “flabby, pretending, weak-eyed devil of a rapacious and pitiless folly,” characterized by the Company that operates under the façade of African betterment (Conrad 16). This devil is the devil of the lying, imperialistic, pro-empire propaganda in Europe. In contrast to this “weak-eyed devil” is the “strong, lusty, red-eyed devil…the devil of violence, and the devil of greed, and the devil of hot desire,” all of which Kurtz symbolize (Conrad 16). Conrad’s opinion on the imperialistic culture of twentieth-century Europe is made clear through Marlow: he decides that Kurtz is Marlow’s “choice of nightmares” over the cowardly false devil of the Company and of Europe (Conrad 62). Kurtz has shed the pretense of any desire to bring civilization or development to Africa in favor of the true motives of both himself and of Europe: the “desire to control the Congo, profit from it, and expand its borders,” goals achieved by the ruthless exploitation of the land and of the natives (Stanard 29). This disconnect between Kurtz’s surface and inner truth is exemplified in his report for the International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs. He writes seventeen pages of eloquent writing detailing the possibility for the Europeans to “‘exert a power for good practically unbounded,’” yet his handwritten postscript reveals his true feelings: “‘Exterminate all the brutes!’” (Conrad 50). The extreme difference between the illusion of humanitarian motives for colonization created by European propaganda and the stark reality of the horrors inflicted upon Africa and its people is symbolized in the contrast between Kurtz’s humane surface truth and his violent, abusive inner truth.
Kurtz’s inner truth of violence and evil is symbolic of the treatment of Africa by European imperialist powers. The exploitation of Congolese natives is evident throughout Heart of Darkness. Despite the popular refrain of Leopold II and the Belgian state, the true motive of Kurtz, and by extension all European imperialists, was, in truth, “the extraction of maximum amounts of raw materials at the lowest possible cost, leading to the savage exploitation of human, animal, and plant life in the Congo” (Stanard 30). Kurtz’s unscrupulous exploitation of the natives is both explicit and implied in Heart of Darkness. He intrudes upon the natives bearing “the thunderbolts of that pitiful Jupiter” to exert control over them, and participates in “certain midnight dances ending with unspeakable rites,” implying that he controls the natives with his guns and manipulates them to offer him savage, uncivilized tribal rituals that appear unthinkable to Europeans (Conrad 60, 50). Kurtz’s violence and disregard for Africa are explicitly stated in the conversation between Marlow and Kurtz’s worshipper, the Russian trader. Kurtz’s isolation at the Inner Station means that he has not received any new shipments of European goods to pay the African natives, yet Kurtz still ventures deeper and deeper into the jungle, returning with huge amounts of ivory. The naïve, brainwashed trader attempts to convince Marlow that Kurtz’s actions are justified, but Marlow realizes the truth: “‘To speak plainly, [Kurtz] raided the country’” (Conrad 56). Kurtz’s unmistakable acts of evil are symbolic of the atrocities committed by European countries during the imperialistic era. Despite the positive messages broadcast by the governments of imperialistic countries, the true evils of colonization are exposed through the symbolism of Kurtz’s actions. The horrific abuses committed under Belgium’s rule of the Congo “included summary execution, kidnapping, mutilation, torture, whipping, and the burning of villages” (Stanard 30). The horror of these acts is mirrored in Kurtz’s treatment of the natives, particularly the placement of heads on stakes outside his hut. Marlow notes that the “round knobs were not ornamental but symbolic; they were…striking and disturbing,” emphasizing the foreboding message behind Kurtz’s action (Conrad 57). The Russian trader claims that the heads were those of rebels, but Marlow sees through the deception and understands the heads on the stakes for what they truly are—an extreme act of evil and violence. Kurtz’s disturbing actions are symbolic of the real-life atrocities committed by the imperial powers of the twentieth century.
Man’s capacity for cruelty is a theme that has often been explored in literature. In Heart of Darkness, Kurtz functions as a symbolic representation of the base nature of man; in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the shipwrecked group of boys also function as an allegory for man’s capacity for violence. According to Golding, the moral of Lord of the Flies is that “‘the shape of a society must depend on the ethical nature of the individual,’” a theme that is also apparent in Heart of Darkness in the character of Kurtz (Epstein). Kurtz, with everything he once knew of European society and order stripped away, is forced to rely on his own inner morality to retain his humanity. Unfortunately, Kurtz’s own “ethical nature” is found to be lacking, “the wilderness [finding] him out early” (Conrad 58). The jungle’s whisper creeps into Kurtz’s mind, “and the whisper prove[s] irresistibly fascinating… it echoe[s] loudly within him because he [is] hollow at the core” (Conrad 58). Marlow’s analysis of Kurtz’s hollowness is correct: Kurtz has no empathy for his fellow man, and his lack of beliefs has caused him to become “the veriest savage of them all” (Conrad 58). Kurtz succumbs to the “powers of darkness” and takes “a high seat amongst the devils of the land,” his brutality evident in his treatment of the natives and the Russian trader, whom he attempts to shoot due to a disagreement over a batch of ivory (Conrad 49). Kurtz’s lack of empathy and principles demonstrates the need for an individual ethical code; his downfall demonstrates the consequences of a lack thereof. Kurtz’s descent into savagery is a commentary on humanity’s capacity for evil and what previously unthinkable depths humans will fall to once the rules of society no longer apply.