MacKenzie Creech
Professor Timmons
English 105
September 27, 2010
“Choice of nightmares”: Marlow’s attraction to Kurtz’s
In the novella, Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad, Marlow goes through various opinions of Kurtz. Marlow is so intrigued by Kurtz because of the “first-class agent” (Conrad 19) he is proclaimed to be. On the journey that Marlow is on, he describes it as “one of the dark places of the earth” (Conrad 5) because it is so dark it is becoming hard for everyone to keep their own sanity. Kurtz comes across as a man that is still sane and is very successful. He is portrayed to have not only good morals and values but also backbone, or does he? Having backbone at this point in time was a fascinating thing to Marlow but it was also a rarity to come across in the environment he was surrounded by. Is the Company more superior compared to Kurtz? Is Kurtz capable of pursuing work for its own sake? Marlow tries to find out the mystery that Kurtz exemplifies throughout Heart of Darkness, which by being so infatuated, alludes to the truth of how Kurtz actually is and absorbed in Kurtz because he might have the answers to some of the questions he has throughout his expedition.
Kurtz is so highly thought of throughout the company. The manager of the company told Marlow, “Mr. Kurtz was the best agent he had, an exceptional man, of the greatest importance to the Company” (22). After hearing this from the manager, it was inspiration to Marlow. He knows how vital Kurtz is to the company and wants to do all that he can as sufficient as he can to help better the company. At this point, the feelings Marlow has towards Kurtz could almost be described as an obsession and he hasn’t even met the man yet. He is so fixated on Kurtz because he could possibly hold some of the answer to the questions Marlow might have.
Is a man capable of maintaining backbone throughout this voyage? To maintain backbone in general means you must maintain all of your regular morals and values and it takes true will power to do that. Also to maintain backbone you must maintain sanity. To uphold sanity in an environment like the one they’re in is a difficult. If you get to where you are thinking about keeping it, you will lose it quicker than you could imagine. You must pay attention to the surface of what is going on. Reality plays a key part in keeping your sanity. You must really focus on what is right and wrong and you must also recognize the difference between right and wrong. If you look to deeply into what you are doing it could be too disturbing which could also make you lose sanity. During the majority of this journey, many things occur that make you question your morals or values. Kurtz reaches a point where he lacks restraint and no longer applies his external values. He gets carried away in his work and making sure that he is the best and fails to grasp the concept of reality. He gets seduced by the dark side.
What happens when you believe in something so steadfastly and you find it isn’t what you perceived it to be? Marlow religiously believed in Kurtz it was such a let-down once he establish who he really was and what he was truly doing as a business man. “Being a gifted creature and that of all his gifts the one that stood out…his ability to talk, his words- the gift of expression… the deceitful flow from the heart of an impenetrable darkness” (47). Kurtz was killing anyone who disobeyed him, he was raiding villages, and stealing ivory more than all the other agents put together. This is not the kind of man Marlow thought Kurtz was nor was it the kind of man he wanted to see him as. Kurtz was a crooked business man which let Marlow down and disappointed him very much. “There is no disguising the fact, Mr. Kurtz has done more harm than good to the Company” (61).
What makes Kurtz more intriguing rather than the company itself? Marlow is more interested in Kurtz rather than the business because he feels as if Kurtz is more brutally honest compared to the business. The company is more about practicing the unsound method. On the other side of that, “Exterminate all of the Brutes!” (50). As Kurtz says. He knows how powerful he is and how highly thought of he is. Marlow respects Kurtz more for his honesty. The company practices more of a euphemistic point of view and Marlow doesn’t appreciate it as much because the company is more so beating around the bush rather than Kurtz who is more blunt about things. Marlow is more knowledgeable about what to expect from Kurtz and could be more caught off guard by the company. The uncertainty is what makes Marlow lean more towards Kurtz.
Is Kurtz or the Company capable of pursing work for its own sake? When you first start reading this book, you read of how highly thought of the Company and Kurtz are. The Company is proclaimed to be in the leading of sales and a top notch business. Kurtz is single handily doing better than all of his competition. And from that point right there, all we know as readers is that the Company itself and Kurtz are working for the sake of working. They enjoy succeeding in sales. Little do we know what they are doing to be so highly thought of and at the top? We didn’t know how they were treating the people that worked for them or people that disobeyed them. “It was reckless without hardihood, greedy without audacity, and cruel without courage” (30) this is pure contradictory and this is the way we as readers comprehend the Company and Kurtz when it comes to business. They had no grasp of morals or values anymore. They had completely lost sight of that.
Kurtz may have not been the greatest man, and he may have fooled us. But from Marlow’s perception, he wasn’t that bad after all. He has the same respect he had toward him when we was first hearing about Kurtz.
Anything approaching the change that came over his features I have never seen before and hope never to see again. Oh, I wasn’t touched. I was fascinated. It was as touched. I was fascinated. It was though a veil had been rent. I saw that ivory face the expression of sombre pride, of ruthless power, of craven terror-of an intense and hopeless despair. Did he live his life again in every detail of desire, temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of complete knowledge? He cried in a whisper at some image, at some vision- he cried out twice, a cry that was no more than a breath: “The horror! The horror!”
He admitted to what he had done. He knew what he did was wrong and he could confess to it. He understood that some of the methods he used to get his way and to become one of the best might not have been the right thing to do but until right before he died, he never thought he was doing anything wrong. He thought everything that he was doing was okay. He saw no flaw in it.
They had completely lost sight on what the difference was between right and wrong and did not comprehend them at all. Marlow was so obsessed with Kurtz because in the end he had his backbone. He ultimately admitted that he was wrong because he came back to reality before he died. He was astonished knowing what all he did just to be better than everyone else. What he put people through. He realized he ultimately became insane during his time on the Congo River. He got carried away in being the best and lost track of truth. “I would not have gone so far as to fight for Kurtz, but I went for him near enough to a lie,” (27) Marlow says. This was an unusual act for Marlow. He lied to Kurtz finance so he wouldn’t look like a coward. He didn’t want her knowing what kind of man he had turned in to. She wanted to make him sound honorable and caring.
Imagine how it would be if you lost the concept of your own morals and values. Think about what state of mind you would have to be in to have lost grasp on everything you were taught to do and not to do when you were a child. It would be horrifying. It would be like living a nightmare. Doing something wrong and not recognizing that it is wrong would be terrifying if you truly think about. For instance, think about walking into a mall with the sole purpose of taking something valuable knowing that you can’t afford it. Never does is cross your mind that you might not need this object nor does it cross your mind that stealing is wrong. You have the choice of stealing or not stealing and that is where your morals and values should kick it telling you “no, stealing would be unethical.” Morals and Values are a choice, and the Company and Kurtz chose to follow the path they took. Although it may not have been the ethical path to take, Kurtz still helped Marlow answer the questions he had when he started the journey. Marlow learned that Kurtz was more superior between Kurtz and the Company because he was more straightforward with what he was doing and didn’t use any euphemistic traits like the Company did. He realized what it truly takes to maintain backbone throughout such a horrific travel. He understands how easy it is for reality to slip away. Not only reality but also just your general morals and values as a human being can become absent. He learns that it may be difficult for Kurtz to pursue for its own sake rather than knowing you are the best and better than all of your competition. Yes, Marlow found out who Kurtz truly was. He finds out the mystery Kurtz is exemplifying throughout the journey on the Congo. His opinions changed multiple times but in the end, Marlow still respected Kurtz for the man he was and then man he ended up being after his death.
Works Cited
Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. Ed. Paul B. Armstrong. W.W. Norton: New York, 2005.
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