A New Historicist Reading Of Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness stands as a classic in the literary world. It is also considered to be a required text taught in colleges and universities throughout North America and much of Europe and other English-speaking countries. However, this novella also has a disputable position in the literary world. Ever since its publication, it has been assumed to be an anti-imperialism literary work, because Conrad records voices in this novella which are quite different from those of his contemporary authors. But many literary critics think that this novella contains the color of racism. Among these literary critics, Chinua Achebe is one of the typical representatives. This novella also draws the attention of literary critics from other literary critical school.In his Notes on Life and Letters, Conrad claims that"Fiction is history, human history, or it is nothing."Heart of Darkness resembles the author's own travelling experience in Congo. It depicts the miserable living conditions of the native Africans. This novella can be considered to be a recorded history of the Africans in the period of the British imperialism. Therefore, Heart of Darkness cries out for a new historicist analysis. Based on the literary theory of new historicism, this thesis discusses the relationship between history and the novella.New historicists do not consider history as the background of literature. Instead, they focus on the active interaction between history and literature. New historicists assume that the creation of a literary work is actually a process of circulation with the prevailing thoughts in the author's epoch. In the creation of Heart of Darkness, Conrad also circulates with the prevailing thoughts of his epoch:imperialism and Darwinism. Ian Watt claims that "In any case the greatest authors are rarely representative of the ideology of their period; they tend rather to expose its internal contradictions or the very partial nature of its capacity for dealing with the facts of experiences." Though Conrad circulates with the prevailing thoughts, he subverts the prevailing thoughts of his epoch in the novella. New historicists usually focus on the operation of power, and they assume that power and subversion usually co-exist. Though subversion may be contained by power, people can still sense it. The subversions in Conrad's novella also draw people's attention. New historicists focus on the active interaction between history and literature, and assume that literature has the function of shaping history. Therefore, the subversions in the novella mainly have two functions:apocalyptic function and productive function.Reading Heart of Darkness through the aspect of new historicism and exploring the relationship between the subversion in the novella and history, readers know that subversion resists the prevailing thoughts in the society; meanwhile, it facilitates the development of history. According to the functions of the subversion in the novella, Heart of Darkness can be considered to be an anti-imperialism text.