The piece of writing I read this semester that stood out the most to me as discussing postcolonial times is Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. The story gives direct insight into the colonization of the Congo, colonists’ view of natives, and the atrocities forced on the indigenous people. Before European colonization, the southern part of the Congo did form political systems with “symbolic kingship and military force” (Democratic Republic of Congo - History). This system had a central capital whose power moved down chiefs and local clan heads. Of course, the kingship brought competition and war as people fought over the position. Eventually, the system fell to fragmentation. This was the setup of the southern region of the Congo. The rainforest region, where Heart of Darkness takes place, was a different story. This area was never able to form a state. Rather, villages and small societies ruled this area. The communities in this area exchanged goods and gave gifts. They even intermingled so much that they became homogenous with other surrounding communities and intermarried. Because they never formed a central state system like the southern portion of the Congo, the rainforest region was much less able to withstand and resist the invasion of the European colonists (Democratic Republic of Congo - History). The Congo was valuable to Europeans because of “abundant natural resources, [the] urge to spread religion, and overall [the Europeans’] crave for power” (Colonization of the Congo). I recommend checking out the Democratic Republic of Congo - History for more on precolonial Congo and the rest of the Congo's history.
Now that we have a background of the original conditions of the Congo, let’s dive into the time of invasion and colonization—the time Conrad’s Marlow is in the Congo. One of the biggest parts of Heart of Darkness is the colonists’ sentiment toward the natives, as I covered in my blog post titled Savagery During the Imperialist Era: Natives or Colonists? Marlow regularly refers to the indigenous people as “savages” or “wild men” and the colonists as “civilised m[e]n” (Greenblatt, 2018, p. 76). Marlow also conveys the colonists’ constant dehumanization of the natives in passages like these from page ninety-nine: “a burst of yells, a whirl of black limbs, a mass of hands clapping, of feet stamping, of bodies swaying, of eyes rolling” and the natives “howl[ing] and leap[ing], and sp[inning], and ma[king] horrid faces” (Greenblatt, 2018, p. 99). Because Marlow sees the natives not as individuals, but as a group of yells, limbs, hands, feet, bodies, and eyes, we know the colonists did view the natives as individual people, effectively taking their humanity away. Similarly, because of the way Marlow describes their actions in the next passage and he says that those actions make them savages, we know the colonists’ feelings toward natives.
Another important part of Heart of Darkness is the treatment of the natives by the colonists. Marlow describes this treatment throughout the story; for example, he talks about the “chain-gang” he encounters that he fears will attack him (Greenblatt, 2018, p. 84). He calls this group of Africans a chain-gang because they are chained together—a common sight in postcolonial Congo. The colonists enslaved the natives to work for them, even children, and those natives faced brutal punishment for mistakes. The colonists used a “Transgression—punishment—bang!” strategy to maintain control over the natives, not hesitating to kill them and instilling fear in their victims (Greenblatt, 2018, p. 91). In addition, they frequently cut off the hands of natives for mistakes, even the children. They also whipped natives for laziness or mistakes (Life Under Imperialist Power). As Colonization of Congo explains, some immediate effects of the invasion by Europeans were “groupings or separation of native Congon groups, extraction of raw materials, and exploitation for the slave trades” (Colonization of Congo). So, those close-knit, intermingled communities in the rainforest region were ripped apart and regrouped, the raw materials of the Congo were stripped for European use, and the Congo people not only became enslaved by the colonists in their homeland, but also were sold to others and ripped from their home and families. The treatment these natives faced was brutal and grave, as conveyed through Marlow’s experiences in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.
Eventually, the Congo gained independence, but not before the natives were violated, killed, and sold. Imperialism took a major toll on the Congo and its people. Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness details the extreme effects of imperialism, from maltreatment to slave trade to genocide. Even today, “Most Congon countries are still filled with corruption, poverty and are basically in a state of chaos” as they are reminded of the atrocities of imperialism (Colonization of Congo). Imperialism presented challenges not only during the time it actually happened, but also all the way up to the present day, which we can see in the literature from that time and on.
Works Cited
Colonization of the Congo. Retrieved from www.researchomatic.com/Colonization-Of-Congo-20674.html.
Day, E. Savagery During the Imperialist Era: Natives or Colonists? Retrieved from emilykday.weebly.com/blog/savagery-during-the-imperialist-era-natives-or-colonists.
Greenblatt et. al., (Eds). (2018). The Norton Anthology of English Literature The Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.
Democratic Republic of Congo - History. Retrieved from www.britannica.com/place/Democratic-Republic-of-the-Congo/History.
Life Under Imperialist Power. Retrieved from drcimperialism.weebly.com/life-under-imperialist-power.html.
Works Cited
Colonization of the Congo. Retrieved from www.researchomatic.com/Colonization-Of-Congo-20674.html.
Day, E. Savagery During the Imperialist Era: Natives or Colonists? Retrieved from emilykday.weebly.com/blog/savagery-during-the-imperialist-era-natives-or-colonists.
Greenblatt et. al., (Eds). (2018). The Norton Anthology of English Literature The Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.
Democratic Republic of Congo - History. Retrieved from www.britannica.com/place/Democratic-Republic-of-the-Congo/History.
Life Under Imperialist Power. Retrieved from drcimperialism.weebly.com/life-under-imperialist-power.html.