Chinua Achebe was a Nigerian novelist who criticized Joseph Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness as racist. In his 1975 lecture "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness," Achebe argued that the novella portrayed Africa and Africans in a negative, stereotypical light. While some saw this portrayal as reflecting the character Marlow's views rather than Conrad's own, Achebe believed Conrad himself held racist beliefs that influenced his writing. Achebe's critique highlighted how colonial-era literature could propagate harmful stereotypes and still impact views of Africa today.

1. 20th century
From An Image of Arfica:
Rasicm in Conrad's
Heart of Darkness
Done by: Dareen

2. Chinua
Achebe
-1930-2013
-He was a Nigerian
novelist, poet, and critic who is regarded
as the dominant figure in modern African
literature.
-His first novel (Things Fall Apart (1958))
occupies a pivotal place in African
literature
and remains the most widely studied,
translated and read African novel.

3. • In 1975 he gave a controversial lecture, "An Image of Africa: Racism in
Conrad's Heart of Darkness"
• which was a landmark in postcolonial discourse.
• Subsequently published in The Massachusetts Review , it featured
criticism of Joseph Conrad,
• who Achebe described as "a thoroughgoing racist."
• Achebe's own novel Things Fall Apart can be read as a response to
Conrad's story.

4. Heart of
Darkness

5. characters
Marlow
-The protagonist of Heart of Darkness.
-Marlow is philosophical, independent-minded.
-He is also a master storyteller.
-he has seen enough of the world and has encountered enough
debased white men to make him skeptical of imperialism.
- He was shocked by what he sees the European traders have done to the
natives.

6. Kurtz
• an ivory trader for the Company.
• he sets himself up as a god to the natives.
• By the time Marlow reaches him, he is dying.
General Manager
• The chief agent of the Company in its African territory, who runs
the Central Station.

7. • Heart of Darkness is an 1899 novel by Joseph Conrad detailing the story
of Marlow,
• the captain of a steamboat, who travels up the Congo River to find a man
named Kurtz.
• Heart of Darkness begins on the deck of the Nellie, a British ship on the
coast of the Thames.
• Marlow begins to reminisce about the time when, struggling to find work,
he decides to take a job on a steamboat in the Congo.

8. • Marlow begins telling the three men about a time he journeyed in
a steamboat up the Congo River.
• At the Company's Outer Station in the Congo, Marlow witnesses scenes
of savagery, chaos, and waste.
• he witnesses that the Company has forced the locals into service,
whereupon they are overworked and brutalized in the name of profit.

9. • Marlow realizes that the Africans are kept as slaves, and many are dying
from the brutality of the conditions.
• These Africans, he realizes, and "not inhuman.
• In fact, the more he hears about Kurtz, the more obsessed Marlow
becomes.
• Who is this Kurtz? Why is he such a powerful figure?
• Marlow's met by a weird Russian dressed like a clown.
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10. • This "harlequin" informs Marlow that Kurtz is a god
• When he returns to Europe, Marlow is disillusioned with both "The
Company" and Europe in general.
• The superficial themes of the novel are imperialism and cruelty of the
European powers.
• All the European powers engaged in Africa are occupying their land and
plundering resources while propagating it as a civilizing mission.

11. Achebe:
Racism in Heart of
Darkness

12. • In "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness ," Achebe
accuses Conrad of racism as the essential "heart of darkness."
• Heart of Darkness projects the image of Africa as 'the other world'
• the antithesis of Europe and therefore of civilization.
• One might contend that this attitude toward the African in Heart of
Darkness does not belong to Conrad, but rather to Marlow,

13. • Achebe views Conrad as espousing a kind of liberalism that "touched all
the best minds of the age in England, Europe and America​.
• Achebe responds by doubting Conrad's talents as a writer.
• Achebe accounts for Conrad's racism against black Africans because of
his personal history.

14. • Thus, Achebe clearly sees Heart of Darkness as a racist text,.
• and insults from which a section of mankind has suffered untold agonies
in the past and continues to do so in many ways and many places today.

15. • The image of Africa and its people as backwards and primitive exists in
many forms today,
• including that we group the whole African continent together as a group
and remain largely ignorant to the fact that Africa is composed of many
countries,
• just like the Americas Europe, and Asia.
• The issues set forth by Achebe in his essay are still very prominent today.

16. Thank you