Paper Titles in Periodical
International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences
Volume 49

Subscribe

Subscribe to our Newsletter and get informed about new publication regulary and special discounts for subscribers!

ILSHS > Volume 49 > Darkness in the Costume of Whiteness: A Glimpse of...
Darkness<i> </i>in the Costume of Whiteness: A Glimpse of Black Gaze, White Mask in Heart of Darkness
< Back to Volume

Darkness in the Costume of Whiteness: A Glimpse of Black Gaze, White Mask in Heart of Darkness

Full Text PDF

Abstract:

To begin with, Heart of Darkness has always been challenging for every critic who feels the urge to take either pro-colonialist or contra-colonialist positions. However, herein the main focus would be set less upon the binary stances regarding the protagonist and his leanings toward the natives. Based on the indissociability of the psychological-cum-cultural operations, this study lends itself best to an amalgam of Freudian together with Bhabhian theories such as the dreamwork, repetition-compulsion, mimickry and hybridization. That is to say, it deserves attention to see the colonialist ideology through the dissecting lens of psychoanalysis. Besides, Tiffin’s subversive counter-discourse would provide a valuable source to this study. The present study aims to explore the underlying motive for Marlow’s narration and his interaction with the natives free from a slippery evaluation of the narratives prime facie. Since any consideration of the native-settler relation without taking the mutual impact of one on the other would only reveal a limited angle to the events, Marlow’s narration will be less concerned with the Hegelian subject-non-subject dichotomy than the intersection of both, however disguised. Of particular note is that such intersection gives rise to the ensuing ambivalence at the heart of the text, Marlow’s account of events, thence the clash of perspectives, whether fictional or critical, can be discerned. Eventually, this hybrid ambivalence casts the text into a hybrid existence that would account for the narrators’ neurosis on the one hand and the contradictory critiques on the other.

Info:

Periodical:
International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences (Volume 49)
Pages:
135-145
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18052/www.scipress.com/ILSHS.49.135
Citation:
S. Sasani and E. Molaii, "Darkness in the Costume of Whiteness: A Glimpse of Black Gaze, White Mask in Heart of Darkness", International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, Vol. 49, pp. 135-145, 2015
Online since:
March 2015
Authors:
Samira Sasani, Elmira Molaii
Keywords:
Bhabha, Dreamwork, Freud, Heart of Darkness, Hybridizing Ambivalence, Mimickry, Repetition-Compulsion, Tiffin
Export:
RIS, BibTeX, Text
Distribution:
Open Access

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

References:

Assad Nassab, S. A Postcolonial and Psychological Approach to Heart of Darkness. MA thesis. Lulea University of Technology. (2006).

Bradley, C. Africa and Africans in Conrad's Heart of Darkness. A Lawrence University Freshman Studies Lecture. Appleton: Lawrence Univ. (24 Jan. 1996).

Clendinnen, I. Preempting Postcolonial Critique: Europeans in the Heart of Darkness. Common Knowledge 13(1) (2007) 1-17.

Conrad, J. Heart of Darkness. Univ. Park: Penn State Electronic Classics. (2000). Received from: http: /www. hn. psu. edu/faculty/jmanis/josephconrad. htm.

Elliott, D. W. Hearing the Darkness: The Narrative Chain in Conrad's Heart. English Literature in Transition 28(2) (1985) 162-18.

Stampfl, B. Marlow's Rhetoric of (Self-) Deception in Heart of Darkness. MFS Modern Fiction Studies 37(2) (1991) 183-196.

Hansson, K. Entering Heart of Darkness from a Postcolonial Perspective: Teaching Notes. Karlskrona: Psilander Grafiska (1998).

Lear, J. Freud. New York: Routledge (2005).

Morgan, J. Harlequin in Hell: Marlow and the Russian Sailor in Conrad's Heart of Darkness. In Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations: Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Harold Bloom (Ed. ). New York: Infobase Publishing (2008) 95-103.

Nayak, S. Two Narratives of Modernism in Heart of Darkness. Conradiana 44(1) (2012) 29-49.

Peters, J. G. The Opaque and the Clear: The White Fog Incident in Conrad's Heart of Darkness. In Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations: Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Harold Bloom (Ed. ). New York: Infobase Publishing (2008) 37-50.

Rivkin, J., and M. Ryan. Literary Theory: An Anthology. Maiden: Blackwell (2004).

Schwarz, H., and S. Ray (Eds. ). A Companion to Postcolonial Studies. Malden: Blackwell (2005).

Selden, R., P. Widdowson, and P Brooker. A Reader's Guide to Contemporary Literary Theory. London: Longman (2005).

Tabachnick, S. E. Two Tales of Gothic Adventure: She and Heart of Darkness. EnglishLiterature in Transition 56(2) (2013) 189-200.

Tyson, L. Critical Theory Today. New York: Taylor & Francis Group (2006).

Watts, C. Heart of Darkness. In Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations: Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Harold Bloom (Ed. ). New York: Infobase Publishing (2008) 19-36. ( Received 21 February 2015; accepted 03 March 2015 ).

Show More Hide