#5

    Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness portrays the inherent and erroneous belief that the white man has of the black man, specifically the belief in the African's inferiority to the white European.  The European imperialist, represented by Marlow, views the African as a backward and barbaric savage.  The savage is not seen as a human and therefore has no value to Marlow.  This attitude toward the African is seen when Marlow's African helmsman dies from a mortal wound: 'The man ad rolled on his back and stared straight up at me; both his hands clutched that cane..my shoes were full; a pool of blood lay very still, gleaming dark under the wheel; his eyes shone with an amazing lustre...I had to make an effort to free my eyes from his gaze and attend to the steering" (Conrad 122).  Clearly Conrad sees the likeness between the black man and the white man.  Both bleed the same color blood, both die eventually.  It is clear that the African is not a mere savage but also human.  However, even after seeing that both races share humanity, Marlow reverts back to his devaluing of the black race when he expresses that in truth he is "morbidly anxious to change [his] shoes and socks" (Conrad 122).  After a death people are usually sober and want to attend to the mourning and sadness that comes with the passing of a human life from the world.  Marlow does not view the African as a human therefore his death is so insignificant that instead of wanting to care for the dead body, he turns to his shoes and focuses on how soiled they are from being bloodied by the helmsman's blood.  Still Marlow returns to the expected reaction toward death when he "misse[s] his late helmsman awfully" (Conrad 128).  Marlow humanizes the African here by having a longing for him.  He shows that there is an empty space without the African being there, this a human to human reaction toward death.  Yet even after expressing this longing for his old helper Marlow further dehumanizes the helmsman calling him a "savage" and saying that he "was no more account than a grain of sand in a black Sahara" (Conrad 128).  A grain of sand is worth nothing, in comparing the African to a grain of sand Marlow says the helmsman is worth nothing.  Although the European emissaries of imperialism tend to recognize an common ancestry between themselves and the African people, Conrad articulates through Marlow's thoughts that they will always dehumanize the black man and believe him to be inferior.