Post/Colonial Linguistics: Language Effects and Empire in Heart of Darkness and Nostromo

2019 ◽

Vol 8 (5) ◽

pp. 116

Author(s):

Nushrat Azam

Keyword(s):

Point Of View ◽

The Novel ◽

Post Colonial ◽

Works Of Art ◽

Heart Of Darkness ◽

Visual Description ◽

Constant Source

The paper analyses the underlying racism present in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Although Heart of Darkness has been considered one of the greatest works of art ever since it was first published, one aspect of the novel has been a constant source of criticism and debate among scholars and readers: racism. Whether this novel is racist is a question of utmost importance because this question puts the greatness of the novel in doubt. The purpose of this study is to answer this very question of racism through the analysis of the author’s point of view, characterization, visual description, use of symbols and language used in the novel with regards to racism. Through the analysis it has been concluded that through Conrad’s method of narration, style and literary skill, Conrad expertly masks racist viewpoints and hides the fact that at its core, Heart of Darkness is in fact a racist novel.

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Post-Colonial Analysis of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness

Journal of History Culture and Art Research ◽

10.7596/taksad.v2i2.233 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

Author(s):

Samet Güven

Keyword(s):

Post Colonial ◽

Heart Of Darkness

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Gaming the Heart of Darkness

Arts ◽

10.3390/arts7030046 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 7 (3) ◽

pp. 46 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Fruzsina Pittner ◽

Iain Donald

Keyword(s):

Computer Games ◽

War Crimes ◽

Original Fiction ◽

Chinua Achebe ◽

Post Colonial ◽

Francis Ford Coppola ◽

Heart Of Darkness ◽

History Of ◽

Historical Fact ◽

Original Story

The history of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness has been one of adaptation and change. The enduring story is based upon Conrad’s experiences in the Congo in the 1890s and was published as a novella in 1902. Since then, the story has been criticised for racism by Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe and relocated to Vietnam by Francis Ford Coppola as Apocalypse Now, influencing computer games such as Far Cry 2 and Spec Ops: The Line. In examining the adaptations of Heart of Darkness, we can consider how the story evolves from the passive reading of post-colonial narratives through to the active participation in morally ambiguous decisions and virtual war crimes through digital games: examining Conrad’s story as it has been adapted for other mediums provides a unique lens in which to view storytelling and retelling within the context of how we interpret the world. This paper compares the source material to its adaptations, considering the blending of historical fact and original fiction, the distortion of the original story for the purpose of creating new meaning, and reflects on whether interactivity impacts upon the feeling of immersion and sense of responsibility in audiences of different narratives.

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An Ecocritical Reading of Paul Bowles's The Sheltering Sky

International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature ◽

10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.6n.5p.232 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 6 (5) ◽

pp. 232

Author(s):

Hossein Sheikhzadeh ◽

Abdolghafour Bejarzehi

Keyword(s):

North Africa ◽

Cross Cultural ◽

The Novel ◽

The West ◽

Post Colonial ◽

Waste Land ◽

American Expatriates ◽

Heart Of Darkness ◽

Actual Environment ◽

The Mind

Landscapes are not simply something objective and unchallenged out there but the work of the mind made by the strata of memory. This paper attempts to show that an ecocritical reading of Paul Bowles’s The Sheltering Sky (1949) helps one in better understanding of this novel of post-colonial alienation and existential despair. Bowles is an American writer and a composer who is undoubtedly the most arresting example of cross-cultural influence concerning a Western author and the Middle East and North Africa. His fiction mostly focuses on American expatriates travelling in exotic locations. The Sheltering Sky is an encounter with the Sahara, not only the physical one but the desert of moral nihilism into which one may wander blindly. The boundless desert acts here as a metaphor and the journey symbolizes one’s own journey into the depth of his/her soul. The desert also projects an apocalyptic vision in the struggle between the West and the East and the Sahara becomes in fact a Conradian Heart of Darkness, an Eliotian Waste Land, and a Sartrean No Exit. In the novel the actual environment becomes in some ways pale and covert under the psyche of the writer. Consequently we come to know that Bowles's own knowledge and awareness of the same environments left traces in his work. Accordingly we may wrap up that the environment bears a direct impact on our understanding of it.

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An Image of Europe: Yinka Shonibare's Postcolonial Decadence

PMLA ◽

10.1632/pmla.2013.128.2.299 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 128 (2) ◽

pp. 299-321

Author(s):

Robert Stilling

Keyword(s):

Oscar Wilde ◽

The Real ◽

Post Colonial ◽

Film Version ◽

Heart Of Darkness ◽

Picture Of Dorian Gray ◽

Dorian Gray

In 1891 Oscar Wilde argued that “Lying, the telling of beautiful untrue things, is the proper aim of art.” A hundred years later, the Anglo-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare MBE takes up where Wilde left off, arguing that “[t]o be an artist you have to be a good liar.” This essay explores how Shonibare reinvents Wilde's antirealism for a globalized, postcolonial world. Building on Leela Gandhi's notion of “interested autonomy,” I argue that in works such as his 2001 photo series Dorian Gray, Shonibare turns to Wilde's aestheticism as a means of upending the relation between realism and politics found in Chinua Achebe's critique of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, rediscovering the disparate racial and sexual geographies at stake in Wilde's novel The Picture of Dorian Gray and in Albert Lewin's 1945 film version of it. Shonibare's post-colonial decadence, I argue, demonstrates how decadent aestheticism may become central to postcolonial imaginings of the real.

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