Heart of Darkness

One of the many interesting topics in Hear of Darkness is the chauvinistic attitude portrayed towards European women. Conrad sets the scene on a boat, which is sailing down Thames River, where he creates a central narrator, Marlow, who recounts his experience in Africa to a group of four men. This choice of a setting where women would not be present at the time creates an atmosphere for Marlow to recount his journey with no input from a female perspective. He only introduces three relatively minor female characters. I think, Conrad’s choices which are only concerned with the male experiences, illustrate a typical product of a patriarchic society. After the first female encounter (with Marlow’s aunt), he expresses his opinion to his audience on the boat. “It’s queer how out of touch with truth women are! They live in a world of their own and there had never been anything like it and never can be. It is too beautiful altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset. Some confounded fact we men have been living contentedly with ever since the day of creation would start up and knock the whole thing over”. Its amazing how there is no objection to this statement, all four men seem to agree that women are completely ‘out of touch with truth’ and they are incapable of handling the reality. It is clear that such a mentality was accepted by the European society, otherwise why would they all agree to such a degrading statement. He excludes women from the real world by idealizing their existence and through this created idealism Conrad shows that women can not exist and function in the real world.