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Examples Of Racism In Heart Of Darkness

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Racism in Heart of Darkness

Heart of Darkness is a novella written by Polish- British writer Joseph Conrad in 1899. Since it was written Heart of Darkness has been criticized as a colonial work. One of the critics who condemn Joseph Conrad and his work has been the Nigerian authors and critics Chinua Achebe in his work "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad 's 'Heart of Darkness". Achebe considers Conrad as “a thoroughgoing racist” (Achebe 5) for depicting Africa as "the other world" (Achebe 2). The aim of this study is to examine Heart of Darkness referring to the Achebe’s ideas in his 1977 essay. Joseph Conrad English novelist and short story writer of Polish descent. He worked as a sailor on French and British ships. Conrad spent most of his life sailing all over the world, it was this experience that provided him with material on exotic location of many of his novels. He visited Australia, various islands in the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific, South America, and he even sailed up the Congo River in Africa. He became naturalized British subject in 1886 then in 1894 at the age of 36 Conrad finally left the sea behind him and settled down in England and then Conrad’s literary career began in 1895 with publication of his first novel Almery’s Folly later he wrote two of his most famous novels Lord Jim (1900) and Heart of Darkness (1902). Heart of Darkness is a novella describing a British man 's journey deep into the Congo of Africa, where he encounters the cruel

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