Conrad’s Heart of Darkness
Terry W. Thompson
Most modern theologians view the story of Saint Christopher as little more than a medieval legend, a charming but apocryphal tale that was perhaps originally based on a real historical personage--not unlike King Arthur or Robin Hood--but was heavily embellished by the imagination and superstition prevalent at the time. According to John Coulson's The Saints: A Concise Biographical Dictionary, Christopher was born somewhere in Asia Minor during the first half of the third century and eventually "died a martyr, probably in Lycia, during the persecution of the Emperor Decius in 250" (110). His enduring story "appears to have been formulated first in the east in the sixth century and to have reached the west some three centuries later" (Coulson 110). As a young man, Christopher "wished to serve the mightiest of masters"; to find such a great master and teacher, the future saint made his home next to a popular ford in a swift river (Attwater 85). There, so that he could meet and converse with as many wayfarers as possible, he became a ferryman, hoisting travelers onto his shoulders and carrying them one by one across the river for a small fee. In this manner, he hoped some day to encounter the great man who would prove worthy of his faith and who would become his spiritual guide.As the years passed, thousands rode across the river on his broad shoulders, but none measured up to the requirements that Christopher had set for the man to whom he would dedicate his life. Then one night, when he had begun to despair of ever meeting his long-sought master, "he was carrying a child across the river when the child became so heavy that Christopher could hardly get across. 'No wonder!' said the child. 'You have been carrying the whole world. I am Jesus Christ, the king you seek'" (Attwater 85). The saint-to-be then gave up everything to follow the new faith and serve the risen Lord: "After such an experience it is not surprising that, in spite of all dangers, Christopher should preach Christ to all who came his way, with such conviction and zeal that the earthly agonies of martyrdom were as nothing to him" (Coulson 111). From that day onward, Christopher--whose name translates from the Greek Christophoros as "The one who carries the Christ"--became the patron saint of all travelers.Late in the final chapter of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness--"now the most celebrated short novel in the English language"--there is a fleeting but very illuminating allusion to this enduring Christian legend (Billy 65). After the "law-abiding, morally sensitive" Marlow has completed his arduous journey up the Congo River to Kurtz's isolated station and has found the object of his search in horrible condition, both physically and mentally, he takes Kurtz aboard the small river boat to ferry him back downstream to a European settlement (Karl 126). Once there, Kurtz can be treated and cured, then assimilated back into "civilized" society. However, Kurtz is irresistibly drawn back toward the jungle because, as Marlow soon discovers, "'it had taken him, loved him, embraced him, got into his veins, consumed his flesh, and sealed his soul to its own by the inconceivable ceremonies of some devilish initiation'" (Conrad 84). That night, under cover of darkness and despite his illness, Kurtz escapes from the ship. Crawling on all fours like a small child, he makes his way back through the tall grass, creeping desperately toward the dancing fires and throbbing drums of the native village.Fearing that Kurtz will incite the tribesmen to massacre the handful of whites aboard the boat, Marlow makes a frantic effort to find the escaped invalid. In utter desperation, Marlow declares, "'I tried to break the spell--the heavy, mute spell of the wilderness--that seemed to draw him to its pitiless breast by the awakening of forgotten and brutal instincts, by the memory of gratified and monstrous passions'" (116). Marlow sees movement in the tall grass and, by circling around, intercepts Kurtz before he can rejoin his Congolese myrmidons. He then takes the dying man back to the relative safety of the small vessel: "'I kept my head pretty well; but when I had him at last stretched on the couch, I wiped my forehead, while my legs shook under me as though I had carried half a ton on my back down that hill. And yet I had only supported him, his bony arm clasped round my neck--and he was not much heavier than a child'" (118; my emphasis).In his 1991 biography of Conrad, Carl D. Bennett writes that even though Marlow peers into the dark soul of Kurtz and learns of the many atrocities that the out-of-control colonial agent has joyfully committed, "Marlow's instinct to personal loyalty never wavers, in spite of the soul-shaking moral illuminations. He is driven early to a commitment to Kurtz, moving steadily through progressive experiences of horror," up to and including his terrifying nighttime rescue of Kurtz from his own irresistible demons (75). Marlow--who at the outset of his journey upriver describes himself as "'something like an emissary of light, something like a lower sort of apostle'"--finds a type of negative savior in Kurtz (Conrad 19). Much like Robert Walton, the framing narrator in Frankenstein, Marlow witnesses firsthand how unchecked ambition can utterly destroy a man who is, at bottom, very much like himself: intelligent, civilized, progressive, European. Thus, Marlow is saved from destruction by the "dark enlightenment" of Kurtz (Bennett 83) and given the rare privilege of plumbing "the innermost recesses of his own psyche" without losing his soul--or mind--in the process (Billy 72).In this dark, surreal allusion to the Saint Christopher legend, Marlow helps a mass murderer and colonial despot stagger down to the river's edge, feeling the skeletal man grow heavier and heavier with every step. Because his mother was half-English and his father was half-French, "'all Europe contributed to the making of Kurtz,'" explains Marlow (86). Just as the Christ child carried the weight of the world's sins upon his shoulders and then transferred that awful burden to Saint Christopher's, the symbolic weight of all the sins of European colonialism in the late nineteenth century--a time of rapine seldom matched in recorded history, whether in the Belgian Congo or elsewhere--come to rest on the shoulders of Marlow. If Kurtz is a type of Christ figure offering up his life for Europe's sins, as many readers have described him, then Marlow, the contemplative loner who seeks a great man to follow, provides a world-weary Saint Christopher figure, a "Kurtzophoros," as it were, "The one who carries the Kurtz.""Marlow is regenerated through his bond with Kurtz, and his saving illusion is to be transformed into an image of Kurtz, to become a voice whose task is to tell the story," to become, in essence, a traveling evangelist, a not-so-secret sharer of Kurtz's deeper meaning (Ressler 21). Even many years after the horrifying events that transpired in the upper reaches of the Congo, as he crouches still and Buddha-like on the darkened deck of the Nellie, Marlow cannot stop himself from recalling, remembering, resurrecting Kurtz, the "'wandering and tormented thing'" he encountered in the primeval African darkness (Conrad 116). The man who gave his life for European colonialism, who died to spread "the Victorian religion of progress," remains at the very center of Marlow's existence, and always will (Murfin 109).
Most modern theologians view the story of Saint Christopher as little more than a medieval legend, a charming but apocryphal tale that was perhaps originally based on a real historical personage--not unlike King Arthur or Robin Hood--but was heavily embellished by the imagination and superstition prevalent at the time. According to John Coulson's The Saints: A Concise Biographical Dictionary, Christopher was born somewhere in Asia Minor during the first half of the third century and eventually "died a martyr, probably in Lycia, during the persecution of the Emperor Decius in 250" (110). His enduring story "appears to have been formulated first in the east in the sixth century and to have reached the west some three centuries later" (Coulson 110). As a young man, Christopher "wished to serve the mightiest of masters"; to find such a great master and teacher, the future saint made his home next to a popular ford in a swift river (Attwater 85). There, so that he could meet and converse with as many wayfarers as possible, he became a ferryman, hoisting travelers onto his shoulders and carrying them one by one across the river for a small fee. In this manner, he hoped some day to encounter the great man who would prove worthy of his faith and who would become his spiritual guide.As the years passed, thousands rode across the river on his broad shoulders, but none measured up to the requirements that Christopher had set for the man to whom he would dedicate his life. Then one night, when he had begun to despair of ever meeting his long-sought master, "he was carrying a child across the river when the child became so heavy that Christopher could hardly get across. 'No wonder!' said the child. 'You have been carrying the whole world. I am Jesus Christ, the king you seek'" (Attwater 85). The saint-to-be then gave up everything to follow the new faith and serve the risen Lord: "After such an experience it is not surprising that, in spite of all dangers, Christopher should preach Christ to all who came his way, with such conviction and zeal that the earthly agonies of martyrdom were as nothing to him" (Coulson 111). From that day onward, Christopher--whose name translates from the Greek Christophoros as "The one who carries the Christ"--became the patron saint of all travelers.Late in the final chapter of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness--"now the most celebrated short novel in the English language"--there is a fleeting but very illuminating allusion to this enduring Christian legend (Billy 65). After the "law-abiding, morally sensitive" Marlow has completed his arduous journey up the Congo River to Kurtz's isolated station and has found the object of his search in horrible condition, both physically and mentally, he takes Kurtz aboard the small river boat to ferry him back downstream to a European settlement (Karl 126). Once there, Kurtz can be treated and cured, then assimilated back into "civilized" society. However, Kurtz is irresistibly drawn back toward the jungle because, as Marlow soon discovers, "'it had taken him, loved him, embraced him, got into his veins, consumed his flesh, and sealed his soul to its own by the inconceivable ceremonies of some devilish initiation'" (Conrad 84). That night, under cover of darkness and despite his illness, Kurtz escapes from the ship. Crawling on all fours like a small child, he makes his way back through the tall grass, creeping desperately toward the dancing fires and throbbing drums of the native village.Fearing that Kurtz will incite the tribesmen to massacre the handful of whites aboard the boat, Marlow makes a frantic effort to find the escaped invalid. In utter desperation, Marlow declares, "'I tried to break the spell--the heavy, mute spell of the wilderness--that seemed to draw him to its pitiless breast by the awakening of forgotten and brutal instincts, by the memory of gratified and monstrous passions'" (116). Marlow sees movement in the tall grass and, by circling around, intercepts Kurtz before he can rejoin his Congolese myrmidons. He then takes the dying man back to the relative safety of the small vessel: "'I kept my head pretty well; but when I had him at last stretched on the couch, I wiped my forehead, while my legs shook under me as though I had carried half a ton on my back down that hill. And yet I had only supported him, his bony arm clasped round my neck--and he was not much heavier than a child'" (118; my emphasis).In his 1991 biography of Conrad, Carl D. Bennett writes that even though Marlow peers into the dark soul of Kurtz and learns of the many atrocities that the out-of-control colonial agent has joyfully committed, "Marlow's instinct to personal loyalty never wavers, in spite of the soul-shaking moral illuminations. He is driven early to a commitment to Kurtz, moving steadily through progressive experiences of horror," up to and including his terrifying nighttime rescue of Kurtz from his own irresistible demons (75). Marlow--who at the outset of his journey upriver describes himself as "'something like an emissary of light, something like a lower sort of apostle'"--finds a type of negative savior in Kurtz (Conrad 19). Much like Robert Walton, the framing narrator in Frankenstein, Marlow witnesses firsthand how unchecked ambition can utterly destroy a man who is, at bottom, very much like himself: intelligent, civilized, progressive, European. Thus, Marlow is saved from destruction by the "dark enlightenment" of Kurtz (Bennett 83) and given the rare privilege of plumbing "the innermost recesses of his own psyche" without losing his soul--or mind--in the process (Billy 72).In this dark, surreal allusion to the Saint Christopher legend, Marlow helps a mass murderer and colonial despot stagger down to the river's edge, feeling the skeletal man grow heavier and heavier with every step. Because his mother was half-English and his father was half-French, "'all Europe contributed to the making of Kurtz,'" explains Marlow (86). Just as the Christ child carried the weight of the world's sins upon his shoulders and then transferred that awful burden to Saint Christopher's, the symbolic weight of all the sins of European colonialism in the late nineteenth century--a time of rapine seldom matched in recorded history, whether in the Belgian Congo or elsewhere--come to rest on the shoulders of Marlow. If Kurtz is a type of Christ figure offering up his life for Europe's sins, as many readers have described him, then Marlow, the contemplative loner who seeks a great man to follow, provides a world-weary Saint Christopher figure, a "Kurtzophoros," as it were, "The one who carries the Kurtz.""Marlow is regenerated through his bond with Kurtz, and his saving illusion is to be transformed into an image of Kurtz, to become a voice whose task is to tell the story," to become, in essence, a traveling evangelist, a not-so-secret sharer of Kurtz's deeper meaning (Ressler 21). Even many years after the horrifying events that transpired in the upper reaches of the Congo, as he crouches still and Buddha-like on the darkened deck of the Nellie, Marlow cannot stop himself from recalling, remembering, resurrecting Kurtz, the "'wandering and tormented thing'" he encountered in the primeval African darkness (Conrad 116). The man who gave his life for European colonialism, who died to spread "the Victorian religion of progress," remains at the very center of Marlow's existence, and always will (Murfin 109).
WORKS CITED
Attwater, Donald. The Avenel Dictionary of Saints. New York: Avenel, 1981.
Bennett, Carl D. Joseph Conrad. New York: Continuum, 1991.
Billy, Ted. "Heart of Darkness: A Critical Overview." A Joseph Conrad Companion. Ed. Leonard Orr and Ted Billy. Westport: Greenwood, 1999. 65-78.
Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. Heart of Darkness and The Secret Sharer. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1994. 1-137.
Coulson, John, ed. The Saints: A Concise Biographical Dictionary. New York: Hawthorn, 1958.
Karl, Frederick R. "Introduction to the Danse Macabre: Conrad's Heart of Darkness." Joseph Conrad Heart of Darkness: A Case Study in Contemporary Criticism. Ed. Ross C. Murfin. New York: St. Martin's, 1989. 123-38.
Murfin, Ross C. Introduction. Joseph Conrad Heart of Darkness: A Case Study in Contemporary Criticism. New York: St. Martin's, 1989. 3-16.
Ressler, Steve. Joseph Conrad: Consciousness and Integrity. New York: New York UP, 1988.
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