In the dawn of the nineteenth century a drastic change was taking place in technology, economy, and wealth among first world countries. As a result, business flourished and the “material age” was ushered in. It is no surprise that morals then took a distant backseat to profit during this era, one fine example being the greed and lack of compassion shown by trading companies. These companies often raped what they deemed less civilized land and horribly abused the native people by forcing them into labor and stealing all of their resources. This practice, known as colonialism, is depicted perfectly in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.
Heart of Darkness follows Marlow, a sailor for an English trading company, deep into the Congo jungle where the practice of colonialism exploits the land and natives in hope of exporting large amounts of ivory back to Britain. The company masks these horrible actions by telling the public that their main goal is to civilize the savages inhabiting the land. Through the book, Conrad shows the imperialism taking place in the Congo to be hypocritical, absurd, and truly evil through an ongoing negative tone and brutal detail of the inhumane acts taking place. A key issue pertaining the extent of exploitation taking place is the inhumanity by which the white men looked upon the Africans. Conrad describes them as savage beasts. “It was unearthly…
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They howled and leaped, and spun, and made horrid faces” On many accounts he also refers to Africans as machinery only used to serve labor purposes. This dehumanization Conrad assigns to the Africans is very accurate in the way which the white man had to look upon the natives to morally commit such horrible crimes. To further advance the level of exploitation the colonialism was achieving, the use of bureaucracy, or the breakdown of a function into individual departments or bureaus, was applied to further dehumanize the natives and entire expedition. The breakdown of business into three different parts and a strong command chain was able to partially shield many employees from realizing the true evil taking place. It provided a method of distancing the savage acts committed from any one person or group, allowing them continue on as though they were normal and / or acceptable. It was just another method by which the company was able to mask the greed and lust that propelled the whole operation.
After all ivory was everything, “The word ‘ivory’ rang in the air, was whispered, was sighed. You would think they were praying to it.” so murder, torture, slavery, and corruption are all merely necessary means that must covered up to maintain business. After all, that is the nature of the exploitation brought on by colonialism. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad provides a chilling, yet honest look at the brutality of colonialism. The book describes the different mentalities of the individuals committing the acts and explains how it was masked to appear as something more moral, or at least more humane. Conrad maintains an very dark and negative tone through the entire book and clearly seeks to expose colonialism in the Congo for what it was, pure exploitation of a weaker people in the interest of profit..
