King Leopold's Ghost

“Once upon a time, I had somebody I cared about… It was a partner. Somebody I had to look after. And in this world, that sort of shit’s good for one thing: Gettin’ you killed. So you know what I did? I wizened the f*** up, and realized it got to be just me out there.” -Bill - The Last of Us. The Remanent, The Liberator, and The Annihilator When the Superego is introduced into a place in which the Id is dominant, it will crumble, and it is forced to find the motivation within itself to survive.…

documents. Railways, hospitals, and new currency were just some of Leopold’s reforms in order to modernize the Congo. Much needed reforms came with a price. More often than not Leopold’s benefits provided negative benefits. The heavily biased source one suggests that Leopold and his administration were solely conquerors who only enter the Congo in hopes of stealing resources. “The Free State system was little more than one of plunder, and no…

Violence and exploitation mar colonial history as empirical powers justified their use as an inherent aspect of colonization. Foreign powers used brute force as a means to maintain and expand control over their realm. King Leopold II of Belgium wanted to expand his own power and secure resources by having Belgium become an empire nation like other European countries. To recognize this goal Leopold created the Congo Free State (CFS) in what is presently the Democratic Republic of the Congo. While…

Savage: a term often used to describe someone or something that is unruly and uncivil. Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, is a novella, in which the main character, Marlow, tells of his journey to Africa, a land full of savages, to obtain imperialism. In Heart of Darkness, Conrad uses the Congo habitat as a symbol of darkness to aid the practice of imperialism while also being responsible for the psychologically obscure side of a man. Conrad negatively represents Africa to symbolize that really…

Pilger visits labor camps that are infested with illness and disease. During interviews several of the employees would discuss how they were afraid to be disobedient at their workplace. This is also seen in another documentary called “Congo: White King, Red Rubber, Black Death,”…

Heart of Darkness follows the main character, Marlow, and his journey in search of Mr. Kurtz in the Congo to bring him back to England. Marlow eventually finds Mr. Kurtz and witnesses how he exploits the African people due to the fact that they worship him; Mr. Kurtz dies on the trip back. Conrad’s language throughout the novella is extremely descriptive of the natural landscape of the new land he is traveling around. Within the description of the new land he is witnessing, he also describes the…

In times of distress, or in times of chaos, people will desperately look for something positive or orderly such as in Heart of Darkness (by Joseph Conrad) when Marlow stood amazed at the well-kept Chief Accountant. Even in chaotic areas however, someone may meet a charismatic individual, like how Marlow met Kurtz, and begin to obsess over that person instead of something that reminds them of home. For Marlow in Heart of Darkness, his complexity grows as he transitions from obsessing over the end…

1. During the Victorian Age, The British Empire had greatly flourished in its economical environment. The British Empire sought to control various areas of land, and their people. Some of these areas included parts of India. Imperialism was defined as the control or colonization of land and people, with the use of “military force” or other ways of inhibition. Within the subtext of the novel “Heart of Darkness” we are able to see how even though the imperialistic time had ended, the British…

In his book, Strength in What Remains, Tracy Kidder, tells readers the true story of Deogratias, a young African man who has escaped death during a genocide. Deo is a young African from Burundi, who fled from Africa to New York. In Africa, Deo is caught in an age old feud between the Tutsi and Hutu. The tension between the two have always been high, but the strained peace is broken with the assassination of the Hutu President. All hell breaks loose and both sides engage in genocide. Deo…

Kurtz spent the last years of his life among the natives of the Congo, he going to Africa with the intent to enlighten the natives. In his time there, he becomes a self proclaimed god, holding the power over the people of the Congo and imposing his will onto them through cruel punishments. An example of these punishments being the decapitated heads on stakes that decorate the space around home. These heads not serving any sort of purpose, the heads only showing that, “Mr. Kurtz lacked restraint…