¡Descarga Symbols & Imagery in Heart of Darkness y más Apuntes en PDF de Idioma Inglés solo en Docsity! • SYMBOLS AND IMAGERY Many symbols and imagery appear in the novel. Dark and threating imagery with omen character that announce bad things. The duality of black and white representing goodness and badness but not necessary in this order. The women who knit black wool (The Fates), discuss for black chicken what makes that Marlow’s predecessor dies, black heads that decorate the outside of Kurtz’s house, the picture that Kurtz painted with black background or the black man with a white string. Contrast between the accountant’s physical appearance and his character. The Light: There is a part of Kurtz’s picture where there is an important light intensity, the expression “fierce light” that appears very often in the novel like “blinding sunshine” that can be compared with darkness because in both cases we seem blind. Yellow: In the map it is Congo. Ivory is a symbol of corruption and deceit. The pale appears many times and it’s related with death. In contrast, the Russian character appears with his coloured dress that indicates a change of his humour state. The Jungle: Symbol of truth and reality. We can also observe references to the grass. When apparently useful tools appear like hidden by the grass as if nature would hide something that must not be there. Marlow’s predecessor dies by an arrow and through his skeleton, between his ribs, the grass appears again. The Snake. It is the form of the river. It’s like a premonition or an advert of the danger that awaits Marlow. Flies: At start were the symbol of unease that Marlow’s problems produce him al his arrival. Along the novel we see that the flies reduce in size indicating that Marlow has grown up as a human while his problems fall. The River: It represents the way to the treasure and afterwards the flight of the danger. The river seems to have the power to expel the European, due to the difficulties to rise for it. However, the river gives a fast way out of the continent. The formalist’s explain the rise of the river s a symbol of Marlow’s fight to understand Kurtz’s character. On the other hand, the easily descend of the river, has been interpreted as a moment of identification between both characters. The fog catches the boat in the river, this represents the uncertainty of where is someone going, of the changes that lie in wait for them. Fog is very related with darkness according to the sense of not being able to see anything when you are in the middle of any of them both. Fog Fog is a sort of corollary to darkness. Fog not only obscures but distorts: it gives one just enough information to begin making decisions but no way to judge the accuracy of that information, which often ends up being wrong. Marlow's steamer is caught in the fog, meaning that he has no idea where he's going and no idea whether peril or open water lies ahead. The “Whited Sepulchre” The “whited sepulchre” is probably Brussels, where the Company's headquarters are located. A sepulchre implies death and confinement, and indeed Europe is the origin of the colonial enterprises that bring death to white men and to their colonial subjects; it is also governed by a set of reified social principles that both enable cruelty, dehumanization, and evil and prohibit change. The phrase “whited sepulchre” comes from the biblical Book of Matthew. In the passage, Matthew describes “whited sepulchres” as something beautiful on the outside but containing horrors within (the bodies of the dead); thus, the image is appropriate for Brussels, given the hypocritical Belgian rhetoric about imperialism's civilizing mission. (Belgian colonies, particularly the Congo, were notorious for the violence perpetuated against the natives.) Women Both Kurtz's Intended and his African mistress function as blank slates upon which the values and the wealth of their respective societies can be displayed. Marlow frequently claims that women are the keepers of naive illusions; although this sounds condemnatory, such a role is in fact crucial, as these naive illusions are at the root of the social fictions that justify economic enterprise and colonial expansion. In return, the women are the beneficiaries of much of the resulting wealth, and they become objects upon which men can display their own success and status. The River The Congo River is the key to Africa for Europeans. It allows them access to the center of the continent without having to physically cross it; in other words, it allows the white man to remain always separate or outside. Africa is thus reduced to a series of two- dimensional scenes that flash by Marlow's steamer as he travels upriver. The river also seems to want to expel Europeans from Africa altogether: its current makes travel upriver slow and difficult, but the flow of water makes travel downriver, back toward “civilization,” rapid and seemingly inevitable. Marlow's struggles with the river as he
