Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, through its protagonist Charlie Marlow, portrays the non-European,
non-masculine living beings as inferior and othered. Women, who are ostracized from the male world,
are expected to “... be out of it ... (and) to stay in that beautiful world of their own ...” 3 Marlow’s
critique of women comes from a typically male-dominated view of the social order, where they are
treated as mere objects at the hands of their “superior” masters. So much as the novella is a
representation of the European society deeming overpowering over the Africans; it also portrays the
society’s misogynistic gaze over the women, whether or not of their own community.
There are three significant women in the story: Kurtz’s …show more content…
It is also striking
how no woman character in the novel is given a name, they are just referred to as objects or as some
acquaintance of the men (Marlow’s aunt, Kurtz’s Intended). To sum it up in David Ward’s words, “ ...
women are as marginalized as the blacks; they become semantic markers only ... the novella turns out to
need both Africa and women to complete its strategies. They are needed, but strictly in that
metaphorical role: they retain intrinsic meaning only vestigially ... Women become majestic ways of
defining men, revealing their power and charm, their inadequacies and lies, metaphorically, indeed,
becoming men’s virtues and vices, no longer women.”13 Thus by not giving them any agency, Conrad,
through Marlow presents a patriarchal realm where rational thinking is a man’s job and women are
non-masculine living beings as inferior and othered. Women, who are ostracized from the male world,
are expected to “... be out of it ... (and) to stay in that beautiful world of their own ...” 3 Marlow’s
critique of women comes from a typically male-dominated view of the social order, where they are
treated as mere objects at the hands of their “superior” masters. So much as the novella is a
representation of the European society deeming overpowering over the Africans; it also portrays the
society’s misogynistic gaze over the women, whether or not of their own community.
There are three significant women in the story: Kurtz’s …show more content…
It is also striking
how no woman character in the novel is given a name, they are just referred to as objects or as some
acquaintance of the men (Marlow’s aunt, Kurtz’s Intended). To sum it up in David Ward’s words, “ ...
women are as marginalized as the blacks; they become semantic markers only ... the novella turns out to
need both Africa and women to complete its strategies. They are needed, but strictly in that
metaphorical role: they retain intrinsic meaning only vestigially ... Women become majestic ways of
defining men, revealing their power and charm, their inadequacies and lies, metaphorically, indeed,
becoming men’s virtues and vices, no longer women.”13 Thus by not giving them any agency, Conrad,
through Marlow presents a patriarchal realm where rational thinking is a man’s job and women are