Exploration Of The Route Schema In Conrad’s Heart Of Darkness

As Joseph Conrad’s most acclaimed work,Heart of Darkness provides a profound allegory for the materialistic obsession and dehumanization of the late Victorian British Empire’s overseas colonies.It has received widespread attention from critics and readers since its publication.Many scholars have conducted fruitful research on the novel from various perspectives including ethical criticism,psychoanalysis,ecocriticism,and post colonialism.However,there are still blank spaces left in the study of the route schema in this novel from the perspective of cognitive psychology.Therefore,this thesis is initiated to explore the route schema in the novel.As for the theoretical foundations,the famous contemporary American psychologist Mark Johnson subdivides the externalization process of spatial experience into two types,“pathways” and “connections”,which together form conceptualized“category associations”,thus providing cognitive possibilities for diagrammatic construction.Another American psychologist,P.N.Johnson-Laird has shown through his research that spatial perception formed by traversing pathways is called route knowledge.In addition to embodied exploration,readers can use “language agents” to input spatial information and gain corresponding emotional experiences while constructing route schema.In Heart of Darkness,the linear scenery of“river-land-river” is outlined through Marlow’s spatial displacement,and the symbolic essence of pathways and diagrammatic representations share a common psychological nature,providing logical support for this study.The main body of this study is divided into three chapters apart from the introduction and conclusion.Chapter One focuses on Marlow’s journey from the mouth of the Congo River to the interior of Africa and its metaphorical semantics.The Congo River basin,depicted as a paradise on earth,has turned into a dreary and sinful gathering place due to the ruthlessness of the white accountant,the greed of the trade station manager,and the cruelty of Kurtz.These elements also constitute the spatial nodes of the novel’s depiction of degeneration.Chapter Two explores Marlow’s downstream route from the heart of Africa and its symbolic significance.After witnessing various degenerated behaviors on the African land,Marlow chooses to return to the river,which can purify people’s hearts and give them hope.Under the influence of the river,Kurtz realizes his past corruption and chooses to end his life to atone for his sins,while Marlow sees through the facade of spreading civilization but actually plundering and oppressing African people,and chooses to flow downstream for a return,thus forming a spiritual diagram of salvation.Chapter Three analyzes the effect of Marlow’s spatial position changes,which form a route schema of“river-land-river”.Through the paradoxical diagram of stark contrast,Conrad expresses Marlow’s cautious thinking about European colonialism and racism,and also his achievement of spiritual growth while improving the protagonist’s cognitive framework.The study found that Marlow’s journey up the Congo River was a journey of corruption,as he approached and entered the heart of darkness.In contrast,his linear spatial journey downstream witnessed a transformation of cognition and purification of the soul.These two journeys are interconnected yet independent,together forming a profound allegorical spatial image of degeneration and salvation.It not only corresponds to the grand U-shaped biblical narrative in Frye’s eyes,but also reproduces the longstanding Western theme of the mind-body duality.At the same time,it matches with the political philosophy of the king-body dualism,where the territory is the body of the empire and the river is the bloodline of the regime.Finally,it writes a psychological allegory of British critical realism.