WILDERNESS AS REVENGEFUL BIOSPHERE: JOSEPH CONRAD’S HEART OF DARKNESS
WILDERNESS AS REVENGEFUL BIOSPHERE: JOSEPH CONRAD’S HEART OF DARKNESS
Author(s): Dimitrie Andrei BorcanSubject(s): Novel, Philology, Theory of Literature, British Literature
Published by: Editura Arhipelag XXI
Keywords: ivory; parable; racism; cornucopia; impressionism; symbolism;
Summary/Abstract: The novella is a symbolist parable of ecocide and genocide, telling stories of a revengeful nature, which kills by means of obsession and disease all the cornucopian intruders greedy for ivory. Kurtz’s story is a parable of a prodigy’s regress and destruction due to both inner and outer darkness, the biosphere avenges its ecocide and genocide by commodificating him into an ivory ball. The symbolic story of the trip into an inferno is also an inner journey into the human soul. Conrad is a complex humane racist and antiracist anticolonialist, very different from the defamatory characterization that Achebe made to him.
Journal: Journal of Romanian Literary Studies
- Issue Year: 2022
- Issue No: 29
- Page Range: 462-469
- Page Count: 8
- Language: English