The White Lie In Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

Almost every person has told a white lie to protect someone’s feelings. Yet, not every white lie can be interpreted in countless ways and demonstrates ulterior motives. Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness follows Marlow’s journey deep into the Congo during an era of European Imperialism. Along his passage he encounters the horrors and immorality of European Imperialism and a deranged yet successful ivory agent named Kurtz, whom he watches achieve success but surrender to madness, disease, and ultimately death. However, a particular scene that sheds a light on the novel as a whole takes place when Marlow visits Kurtz’s Intended a year after his death and lies to her about Kurtz’s final words. Although it could be interpreted in countless ways, Marlow’s lie to the Intended creates a paradox that characterizes his temperament,
Conrad employs a mocking and condescending tone in this scene to assert Marlow’s belief in women’s disillusionment with society. When Marlow first mentions the Intended he asserts that women are and should “be out of it” and that “We [men] must help them to stay in that beautiful world of their own” (147). Marlow believes that women are naïve and unaware of evil and it is up to men to shield them from the truth because they are most likely unable to handle it. This foreshadows Marlow’s lie because it sets forward his belief that women should only distinguish the righteousness in the world, which compels him to lie to the Intended in order to preserve this outlook. After Marlow lies to the Intended by stating that Kurtz’s last words were “her name,” she says that “I knew it- I was sure!” to which he responds by saying that “….She knew. She was sure” (195). The reader is aware that she is not the most important thing in Kurtz’s life because he has an alleged mistress and obsession to collect and own all the ivory in the Congo.