Core Concept #5: 2/7/11-2/17/11

Allusions in Heart of Darkness

• Eden references (wild forest, river looks like a serpent)
• But Dante references also (three levels of hell)
• Connection: The Dante handout from class should come in especially handy
• Lots of description of maps also because there is a metaphysical map in Africa
• The people represent something; the landscape represents something too

Characters in Heart of Darkness

• The three stages of an archetypal woman shows up in Heart of Darkness
• Marlow's aunt is the smothering mother
• Connection: Juxtaposition to Linda as an absentee mother
• Kurtz's fiancee is the damsel in distress
• The secretary women are the Fates, they represent the crones
• Irony: they are not knitting a golden thread, instead, they are knitting black wool (the hair of Africans were described as black wool)
• This means that the Company holds the fate of the world in their hands because they are extracting resources from Africa (at the expense of the Africans) to power the world
• The Jungle is the sexualized mother figure
• The Russian wears motley, which means that he is the fool, the one who can speak the truth because he's so dumb/innocent
• The Russian also wears clothes of many colors, which reminds us of Joseph, who had worked for the pharoh (the Company)
• Kurtz's mistress is warrior-like, regal, and is the anima (the spirit of the land)
• Thus Kurtz's real mistress is the Congo: he was never going to go home to his Intended because his heart is with the anima
• Connection: she reminds me of Neytiri of the recent movie Avatar

Discussion Items

• Why is the Heart of Darkness written in frame narrative?
• Agree/disagree with Achebe in his article, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness"?
• Reactions to Dintenfass (his central claim, minor points of interpretation)
• Heart of Darkness as a "quest": Romance or Irony?
• Marlowe is portrayed as an idol (bad connotation)
• Connection: in parts of the Bible that we read over the summer, people were punished for worshipping idols
• He doesn't understand the meaning of his journey
• Maybe he's trying to understand by telling his story?
• An irony "quest" undermines the point of a romantic quest (reinforce values) because it's trying to tell us that something's lacking in society because society is meaningless

Final Exam

• Situational irony is when the same situation is turned around (i.e. misery into happiness caused by the same action)
• Dramatic irony is when we know something the characters should know, but don't
• Verbal irony is when someone says something and means the opposite
• Comic characters are blind to their own misperceptions
• Conceit is a long, extended metaphor