The Cruelty In Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

In Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad portrays cruelty as the main motivation for the characters as well as a social and political factor. Conrad displayed cruelty throughout the novel with references to colonialism and the darkness. The story is set in the Belgian Congo, colonized by imperialistic Europe, easily depicts how radical the tyrant European Colonists behaved to the natives. With the help of darkness, a constant threat which could easily control men, lurking in the depths of the jungle created ruthless monsters within these pilgrims. In the view of the Europeans, they felt justified in how they treated the cannibals. The tribesmen seemed like heathens and less civilized because they didn't follow laws pilgrims lived by, making them an easy target to enslave and control. "I could see every rib, the joints of their limbs were like knots on a rope, each had an iron collar on his neck and all were connected together with a chain whose bights swung between them, rhythmically."(19) This is how Marlow described the natives conditions when he saw slaves for the first time. At one point, Marlow was more than
You could view this "darkness" as greed The darkness turned its inhabitants mad. A doctor Marlow visited before leaving had noticed a trend in the men who left for the Congo. Most were mad for wanting to go there or if they did return, they returned deranged. Men came to the Congo wanting to climb the social scale and earn more money, only to turn crazy by their own greed. Kurtz was affected mostly by the darkness. He may have been a "man of promise, greatness, a generous mind, and a noble heart," but the darkness turned him greedy and mad. He lived among the tribes, yet had their heads hung up around his house. When he was dying and had to leave, he tried to crawl back into the darkness of the jungle. He wanted to keep his power and this was his