Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad

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Marlowe makes for such an interesting character because he is almost a contradiction to what European society has taught him, courtesy of binaries. He seems to be past the idea that the AFricans are a completely different race, yet he cannot see them as he sees himself, there are binaries still at play. There is also the plain old fact that he refers to them as savages...

....We see the desert as dry, and the jungle as lush and wet, so what would one be without the other. We see the desert as flat, perhaps with some sand dunes, whilst the jungle may have a skyline that is rugged with tall trees. Perhaps some short ones too. Understand though that I am simply going from my own perception of the world, as everyone ties different things to binaries, as the words don't really mean anything.

Marlowe

Advanced to who, or even what then?

Hello binaries.

Okay, so in order for civilized people to exist, there must be those who are uncivilized, yet what is an uncivilized person? Welcome to the rabbit hole, a rabbit hole Conrad uses well to describe Marlowe's trail-blazing through his own mind. Here is a man who believed that the Europeans were civilized and the Africans savages, but his trip up the river makes him see the inverse. So what makes these Africans civilized all of a sudden, their apparent sanity? But then what is this sanity without insanity, where do we source these judgements?

Kurtz

Marlowe is confronted with an issue, a man has just died at his feet, and the only thing immediately concerning him is to change his shoes and socks. Marlowe is slipping here, as he approaches Kurtz he has seen what the jungle does to the men around him, the loss of that sense of civilization, as there are no laws to bind him to anything, and no one sane enough left to question his actions, like the pilgrim beside him who had nothing to say about the dead body at theor feet.

"To tell you the truth, I was morbidly anxious to change my shoes and socks." pg.58

"Since I had peeped over the edge myself, I understand better the meaning of his stare, that could not see the flame of the candle, but was wide enough to embrace the whole universe, piercing enough to penetrate all the hearts of darkness." pg. 84

In the book, Conrad often refers to "inside" and "outside," in one case talking about the jungle as if it is truly different from Europe. This is probably not intentional, but it goes to show the power binaries hold, as the simple addition of an "out," can change one's outlook on a place entirely. From civilized and sane outside, to savage and crazy outside.

"Men who come out here should have no entrails." pg. 31

"Fine fellows - cannibals - in their place. They were men one could work with, and I am grateful to them."pg. 45

Descriptions descriptions descriptions. That's where all our binaries ultimately lie. Why? Because the only thing we can be sure of is that our individual realities exist, and therefore what we perceive in them does too. So in order to separate all the things we see, we have to compare them, and the simplest most effective way to do that? In relation to the quote, Kurtz is actually described as being quite tall, the binary partner of short.

So Binaries are Powerful...

"Kurtz - Kurtz - that means short in German - don't it?" pg.72

Now, throughout the book, Conrad only truly talks about EUrope and Africa, with only Africa being truly in Depth. Now, before getting to the location side of this, it is important to understand that binaries, despite their name, do not have to be in direct correlation, they can loop somewhat, but this loop can be applied loosely. For example, a jungle is a jungle because it is not the desert, the desert is the desert because it is not the plains, the plains are the plains because they are not the mountains (loose correlation). Now I made a point to explain the looseness of this theory because, even with my point on murder, some of you may be saying that murder is murder because it is not manslaughter. But if you look deeper into the individual comparisons, more concrete examples emerge...

Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad (The use of binaries to create that which does not exist)

Thought

Ah, so what is it that makes us decide to link certain things with certain binaries? Well, by default, wherever and whatever we've been brought up in has been taught to us as good, as the center of everything, creating the we-them dynamic seen so often throughout the book. It is not just the white men though, it is the Africans as well.

There will always be others then, it would be nearly impossible to get an entire planet that has compartmentalized itself into many tribes of "we," to get along, without some form of physical or mental violence to validate the differences, to make them, "them."

Characters

Locations

Civilization

Civilizations do not have to be giant lumbering societies that last through time, they simply have to be a group of people who function along the same social contracts and share certain cultural values, along with a level of advancement. According to google's online dictionary, a civilization is simply defined as, "the stage of human social development and organization that is considered most advanced."

On the other hand, civilizations at a large scale only reveal the power of binaries to create, in part by what is explained below on a larger scale, but in laws as well. Laws are the strongest, supposedly most clear cut language we have developed, and many of the terms used do not contain binaries, but were built on them. Take murder, explaining murder would be explaining the end of a life, a life that would not be explainable if it was not for death. So there is no other true side to the coin for murder, as it is an act derived from binaries, something that can stand alone in a pseudo-way. Perhaps that is why we've developed morals so anti-inter-species harm.