Knights In Exile: The Internal Contradictions Of Colonialism In Heart Of Darkness And Lord Jim

Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim are Joseph Conrad’s masterpieces, whichdisclose the internal contradictions of colonialism. Kurtz in Heart of Darkness isdepicted as the representative of the colonizers’ greed for materials grabbing, whileJim in Lord Jim represents the colonizers’ spiritual hegemony to enslave the colonizedby their transmission and spreading of western values under the cover of civilizing“the savages”. The duality of western colonialism lies in the fact that it is the productof the salvation concept and knighthood of western civilization. The binary oppositionbetween self and other and the elite impulse to rule over the other is the essence ofwestern civilization, while the knighthood with elitism and salvation as the essence isthe representative phenomenon of the colonial age.Marlowe in Heart of Darkness is the embodiment of the internal contradictionsof colonialism, existing as a criticism of western colonialism, while Marlowe in LordJim expresses coolly the author’s attack of western colonialism in an indirect way bymeans of special narrative and ironies. On the other hand, Marlowe also shows clearlyhis sympathy and support of colonialism and racism, for he himself is a member ofthe colonial group and he can’t escape the control and influence of westerncolonialism. What is important is that Marlowe is the propagandist of westerncolonialism, so his purpose doesn’t lie in his attack of colonialism and his narrative isheavy with strong ideological color either in form or in content.The narrative angle and narrative style also expresses the internal contradictionsof colonialism. Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim take a multiple points of view toproduce a polyphonic effect, which makes it possible for the readers to doubt about itsreliability so as to be alert to the presence of the ideology. This expression ofambiguity is the subversion of the imperialist sense of superiority and certainty, whichto some extent is an attack of colonialism and racism. In terms of the narrator’snarrative style, Marlowe’s endless self-justification and his powerlessness before thefate of inevitable predestination suggest the decaying process of western colonialism.This kind of narrative tone and posture symbolize the dying of western colonialism.