WHITE! WHITE! WHITE!

Is Heart of Darkness a racist text?
In his essay An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness, Chinua Achebe asserts that it is. And that Conrad is a 'thoroughgoing racist'. In the news at the moment, the dead (and black) Floridian teen Trayvon Martin...and in the U.K., the London police have been recorded racially abusing a young black man during the riots.

I am currently a night owl, my hours having shifted in the recent past; I'm falling asleep around four a.m. or so. I've spent a few of those small hours perusing the biographies of white power types on Wikipedia...also reading one of the few right wing blogs I can stand, Takimag. I alternate between despair and fascination--the fact that race is a huge issue for some people never ceases to amaze...but if I'm honest with myself, it's a bigger issue in my own life than I like to admit. Being a brown guy--my exact shade depends on the season--it is an unavoidable factor. My personal ideal is for everyone to be colour blind--let's judge each other on our personalities, people! A cursory look at some of the discussions regarding race shows that that ideal is a long ways away. The spectrum on the right runs from a disgust with politically correct attitudes and a wish for the non-whites of the world to 'get over it already', to a strong belief in the superiority of the white race, to the fear that whites are slowly being choked to death by the immigrant/muslim/choose your poison, hordes. On the left we have your basic 'can we not all just get along?' liberalism to a serious over-compensation where personal responsibility matters not a jot--everything is the fault of 'the man'. I had to remind myself that plumbing the depths of the internet to get a bead on current race relations is perhaps not the best path--I had that thought whilst reading some of the postings on the white power Stormfront blog...be that as it may, I think the superfluity of anonymous electronic 'communication' is good because we get to see what people are really thinking.

And it seems some people are super-fucking choked! Honestly, you'd think the entire world was run by black muslim socialist terrorists, cackling in their mudrassas as they plot the demise of good christian white folks. Who knew?
It almost makes me wish for the return of that old Coke ad where racial harmony was achieved by everyone imbibing a fizzy brown beverage! But enough with the flippancy--it is a complex issue, and beyond the comprehension of my half-drunk ass...not to mention depressing as fuck.

My go-to explanation, as always, is that we are all apes...social animals who have yet to evolve ourselves out of basic, ingrained fears--fear of the other, fear of what is different, etcetcetc. But--is Heart of Darkness racist? Should we stop reading it? These are some of the questions posed in one of my classes, also the subject of an essay I'm working on.

Is it racist? Well it depends on your definition of racist, and how you feel about art and history. Personally, I think it's one of the best things I've ever read. It is a master's class in style. I've read The Secret Agent and Under Western Eyes...not the whole Conrad oeuvre I know, but HofD is his one piece that lodged itself in my brain. Was Conrad a racist? Who cares? I'm not a Conrad scholar, but I suspect he he had the same ideas a lot of turn of the century intellectuals had--namely that colonialism as practiced was morally questionable, but he certainly wouldn't go as far as saying an African was equal to a European. In other words, by our standards, he was racist. The obvious point in its favour is that its subject matter keeps it relevant. It stood out in its time, partly, as an expose of the rapacious colonial project. Achebe takes issue with the description of the Africans in the story. They are de-humanized savage niggers. Can't sidestep that fact. But look at this Trayvon Martin case--there are a lot of apologists for his murder. Why? Well--he was a young black male in a hoody--a denizen of the urban jungle--we all know that young black male urban youth are hopped up on tribal beats, weapons, drugs, plus they've got their eyes on your daughters, right? On the white power blogs, the description of black men runs parallel with Conrad's take. My point is this--we don't live in a post-racial world. The viewpoints expressed in HofD are still relevant.

No, the Africans in the story have no agency, they are a faceless horde emanating from the beating dark womb of the jungle. They are the hidden reef that scuttles Kurtz. In Conrad's time this presentation of Africans invoked pity. In our time it evokes anger. But we live in an era where we are confronted by, on one hand, the Nazi project, and on the other, the fictional ideal of Star Trek where all races and nationalities cooperate to explore the final frontier. We are close to the ultimate nadir in racial conflict and its opposite, an as yet to be achieved post-racial future.

Read it because it's excellent writing. Then make up your own mind, I suppose. After writing all this, I realize I'm going to have to refine my arguments, none of which I've clearly stated, I know. But give me a break--it's 309am and the vodka has finally kicked in methinks...