An Analysis On The Call Of Human Nature In Heart Of Darkness From The Perspective Of Postcolonial Criticism Theory

Joseph Conrad who occupies an extremely important position in the 20 th century literature is known for its outstanding artistic achievement, special art advocate and outstanding contribution on the field of modern literature. When his novels are published, readers and critics are extremely attracted. Conrad is regarded as one of the greatest English novelists in the end of the 19 th century. Before the novel is written, he has lived a life at sea for 20 years. Therefore he became one of the greatest writers on the topics of life afloat. Heart of Darkness is one of his most famous novels, the novel is written with his personal experience in Congo, which instantly attracts the attention of literary critics who have attempted to study it from philosophy, psychology and politics, and they all speak highly of it. The article is analyzed with the postcolonial criticism theory, the theme of Conrad’s novel ranges over widely, from political novel to the ocean fiction novel; from the jungle novel to the nautical fiction novel; every novel dig down deep about human nature and time. Literary critics dissected the works with the theories of literary criticism and made detailed and effective researches on Conrad and his texts, social and historical background of the novel and so on. Heart of Darkness is an important part of Conrad’s novels, critics make the deep discussion of this novel and take the text as the basic object, analysis it from the new multiple perspectives of history, post colonialism, racism and many other perspectives.This thesis consists of five parts. The first part briefly introduced the author Conrad and his work Heart of Darkness, exploring the situation of the work and points out the feasibility and significance of the work with the perspective of postcolonial criticism theory. In the first chapter, it is the overview of the origin and development of postcolonial criticism and its features. On this basis, referring to the theory, the novel is analyzed mainly from three characteristics: opposition of culture hegemony, subversion of discursive hegemony and criticism of ethnocentrism. In the second chapter, the article analyzes the three characteristics which are reflected in the work. In the second chapter, it is from the opposition of cultural imperialism and inhuman domination of cultural colonization to elaborate the critique of cultural differences. In the third chapter, it is from the deprivation of political and economic discourse to colonial people to reveal discourse leadership. The fourth chapter, it is from the repulsion of the European ethnocentric consciousness of colonists to criticize the ethnocentric consciousness. The conclusion part is concluding the thesis and reiterating the main arguments.