7 June 2001

Dialogue between Heart of Darkness and Things Fall Apart

One of the questions that an African might ask is: "What did I become when I met colonization?" In both Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Achebe's Things Fall Apart, Africa is described from two sides: The first is Conrad's colonizer's point of view , and the second is the colonized prospect. On page 38 of Heart of Darkness, Marlow, the colonizer is back in time for a view of prehistory, viewing the naked truth between the blacks and the whites . In his opinion, there is the blacks' truth and the whites' truth. In Africa's wild life, the blacks exhibit more civilized self-control than the whites onboard. As Marlow reaches Kurtz's camp, he finds a reality that is not civilized, the broken roof is a sign of the unconquered, and hence the unknown "There's no signs of life…as it were"(57). The culture and civilization of Europe have contributed to the making of Kurtz; a shell of a man,a murderer, and a thief. Though Marlow is conscious that the white man is not that good, still he turns towards him (67)."It was not my strength that wanted nursing, it was my imagination…what to do with it"(70) here, there's a sense of fear created by Marlow. This fear is related to the wild place that he is present at. He himself considers it as the darkest places on earth, this burden is an indication to the Romans, who were civilized, yet once came to conquer the "wild untamed British Isles" with this we might say that history repeats itself.

In Things Fall Apart, Achebe foreshadows the end of the world ;the incursion of the African Ibo and the subsequent dissolution of the indigenous culture. On page 13 of Things Fall Apart" Okonkwo was ruled with one passion--to hate everything his father Unoka loved". Here the tragic hero, Okonkwo represents a constant fear of failure; fear of resembling his father. Achebe attempts to shed the light on this in order to remind his people not to be ashamed of their ancestors' past , and to refuse the European notion that Africa has no history nor culture that worth any value. However, Achebe describes Okonkwo as a persistent figure who tries to challenge failure" He knew he was a fierce fighter, but that year had been enough to break the heart of a lion"(24). Ibo's culture is held together by one string ,which is its own tradition. This string will not break, but when pulled it, the string is going to cause everything it holds literally fall apart. This is clearly presented when Ezeani, the priest warned Okonkwo of the evil he did towards his gods, and how this would affect the whole tribe. Okonkwo represents the break-up of the Ibo clan before the forces of the white man's religious and political organizations.

Helen Tiffin in her essay, Post-colonial Literatures and Counter-discourse suggests that purity cannot be applied to colonized cultures. Hence, reality is not free when it is still under the European domination. Reality should be revealed away from the control of both the colonized and the colonizer. "Post-colonial cultures are inevitably hybridised" and the process is to create an independent local identity (95 PCSR). However, between traditional culture and the modern world, what role did colonization play in changing the African life? To answer this question we have to consider notions such as culture, religion, commerce, and government.

With respect to the mentioned question, we have to say that hybridization of culture did play an important role in changing the African life, for example in Achebe's book, the ceremonial grounds that were used to be held for meetings, were gone with a different government. After colonization, modern technology was present in Africa , but it wasn't beneficial because of the lack of experience with the new tool, which the white man left in Africa. Moreover, Africa moved from pantheistic life to monotheistic life, and with this process monogamy replaced polygamy. However, Achebe in Things Fall Apart portrays the change in Africa with the encroachment of Europe's colonialism. This accompanied a shift from patrimony to matrimony. Women became more independent and with this change, the European social system verses the African system for example, in Europe the role of women was in the church, but later they resisted the decorative role and shared the male in building an equitable society. With hybridization the culture's purity is lost and this is revealed in Achebe's book " He died of the swelling which was an abomination to the earth goddess…when a man was…not allowed to die in the house"(18).

In Jamaica Kincaid's essay, A Small Place, we hear the voice of the colonized who cannot forget the English traders who stole the treasures of the Africans' woods. This reminds us with " Mr. Kurtz…his various lusts…there was something wanting in him" (Heart of Darkness 57). Jamaica Kincaid hints to the negative side that the colonizer played in Africa and that is by teaching the Africans their own traditions through the schools that they opened there "…you distorted or erased my history and glorified your own"(94). Kincaid speaks ironically of the only language she speaks, and which is the colonizer's own language. Helen Tiffin believes that it is not possible to develop regional formations away from their historical implications during the European colonization, and what we are going to have is the "fixity of that alterity, naturalising difference within its own cognitive codes"(PCSR 95,98).