In Lord of the flies, the ‘Darkness’ is portrayed in a number of effective ways. There is a general theme, of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ throughout the novel. By doing this William Golding is able to show the differences between civilized behaviour, and the disintegration into savagery. This theme is represented in the form of conflicts between the ‘conch group’ and the ‘savages’, between the boys and the terrifying ‘beast’ and between rescue from the passing ship and imprisonment on the increasingly insane island.
While society seems to restrain these savage tendencies, it does not get rid of them. The tendency to revert to savagery is seen in Kurtz and Jack. When Marlow meets Kurtz, he finds a man that has totally thrown off the restraints of civilization and has regressed into a primitive state. With Jack, the reader is actually able to identify the gradual disintegration from a normal 13-year-old boy, to a barbaric savage. The example of hunting can be used to reflect this point as it shows how his obsession for hunting eventually grew into something, which was so evil and was used as a method of attempting to kill Ralph: “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in.” These express the increasing intensity of the boys’ savagery. “It was dark. There was that -- that bloody dance. There was lightning and thunder and rain. We was scared!” This describes how the boys’ have gone beyond the point of fun and games. They are no longer boys playing on the island but a bunch of savages. Golding effectively presents the emotional states of Ralph and Jack. We can see Ralph gradually losing hope and understanding the evil, and we can see Jack become power-hungry and savage. The two murders on the island, reflects the intensity of what was happening on the island, and just how out of control the situation had become.
Marlow and Kurtz and Ralph and Jack are two opposite examples of the human condition. Kurtz and Jack represents what every man will become if left to his own intrinsic desires without a protective, civilized environment. Marlow and Ralph represent the civilized soul that has not been drawn back into savagery by a dark, alienated jungle and an island where there are no limits rules and regulations. The fact that at the end of Lord of the Flies “Ralph wept for the end of innocence and the darkness of man’s heart” applies emphasis on this theme and reflects Ralph’s complete realization of mans evil after the experiences he suffered on the island. The same enlightenment is reached by Kurtz when he exclaims ‘The horror! The horror!’ this can be interpreted as a condemnation by Kurtz of what he has done. If one keeps in mind the pride of Kurtz in his ideals, then certainly the ‘the horror’ refers to his awareness of the discrepancy between those ideals and his utter failure to live up to them.
Kurtz and Marlow initially came to Africa with the idealism and desire to bring light of white civilization to Africa. They both as individuals and as agents of Europe, take their own superiority for granted. These two characters even before they were confronted by the so-called ‘darkness’ of Africa, were themselves ‘evil’ and ‘dark’, in the sense that they were egocentric and full of their Western superiority, and felt it was their duty to enforce civilization upon this ‘primitive’ country. This arrogance itself is the seed of evil, which the White man takes and plants in Africa. Conrad through these two characters shows colonialism not only as a political and economic venture but also as a consequence of the individual’s lust for power and possessiveness and as an epitome of man’s capacity for evil. Marlow remarks that Kurtz' head is as bald as an ivory ball and that he resembles "an animated image of death carved out of old ivory." Thereby reflecting the degradation into something so far removed from what he had been when he had first begun his journey. Kurtz can be viewed as a tragic hero, someone who aspires to a greatness and fulfillment, which his human condition prevents his from attaining.
Marlow himself offers a good example of the complexity of human behaviour and of the impossibility of man to remain untainted by evil. Although he was rational enough to understand what is going on in this new environment and had not been fully subjected to this chaos of the African Congo, he is not without his contradictions. His most obvious contradiction is when he says he ‘detests and can’t bear a lie’, and then significantly, he lies to Kurtz’s Intended. These contradictions indicate that Joseph Conrad creates human beings as they are, not as they ought to be.
The language in both books is very effective in creating this sense of ‘darkness’ and ‘evil’. He portrays terrifying images and conveys horrifying truths in a mystic voice that contrasts effectively with the true horrors of his message. “Death sulking in the air, in the water, in the bush. They must have been dying like flies here.” Conrad is able to create an atmosphere of almost supernatural dread in the depth of the jungle.
In The Lord of the Flies, Golding’s language is neutral. However, it is simple and it is as if he is telling the story himself rather than writing prose. Golding makes his novel come alive with a significant use of symbolism, psychological development, and general truths. His writing style is simple but the subject matter is deep. He uses a rather comparatively simple story to convey a weighty idea. The style and tone of the novel is one, which reflects Golding’s pessimism of the natural state of human beings. Golding is able to present the ‘darkness’ of the human heart through the tone of the text, which is one of hopelessness and despondency at the inevitability of evil and unpleasant things happening. One of the initial responses of Piggy to the situation the boys find themselves in is ‘we will stay here till we die.’ The language is matter of fact and straight forward, yet it is very effective in creating this tone of hopelessness and uncertainty.
One of the crucial differences in language between the two books is that Golding does not overstate the more morbid perspective as opposed to the fairly horrific pictures, which are created in Heart Of Darkness. Marlow describes the natives as being ‘black shadows of disease and starvation’ Conrad creates more disturbing images through his writing.
The setting of Heart of Darkness is a very critical part of the book, and Conrad goes to extreme lengths to highlight the evil radiating from the region in which he sets his book, referring to it as “one of the dark places of the earth.” Joseph Conrad’s style is marked by repetitions, which have a cumulative effect, a particular descriptive passage by Marlow bout the horrors that he saw was described as ‘devil of violence, and the devil of greed, and the devil of hot desire’. Conrad uses a ‘framing narrative’ in the opening scene in which Marlow is relating his experience to friends in a setting different from that of the primary tale. But the setting where Marlow tells his tale is a foreshadow of what is to come. Marlow presents his story on a boat in the dark of night, creating a sense of evil surrounding the story. The darkness is so deep where Marlow rests during the telling of his tale, that he cannot see his friends, and instead tells the story to the darkness itself. Once the narrative begins, Conrad quickly places his character in another situation, which only foretells of the place to which he is going.
The setting of Lord of the Flies is also very effective as it shows how a beautiful, paradise like island could be transformed into a backdrop of brutality and killing. The Lord of the Flies takes place on an island during World War II. This is significant since the isolation forms a community, a sort of microcosm of the real world. At the same time, the island lacks a society and the societal laws and rules allowing for the boys to run wild and show their true, ugly, inner selves. Since the island is a microcosm, Golding uses it to reflect our world and give comments on our world and his view of human nature. In this book, the setting is used less to create a mood than to put the characters in a particular situation.
Lord of the Flies can be viewed as like an onion – it has a simple storyline with ever increasing ‘rings’ of meaning round the central core. The story contains, for instance, a number of symbolic objects. The conch is more than just a shell; in the novel it is almost like church bells calling the faithful and embodies some kind of religious ceremonies. For the boys on the island it imposes a sense of order. When the conch is finally crushed, this reflects the end of any form of order and the total take over of evil.
The beast is a symbol of a human. In the beginning of the book, a ‘littlun’ told the others that he saw a beast in the jungle starting everyone's fears. However, it turns out that the beast is actually a parachutist and human, symbolizing that what they should be scared of is not some evil creature, but their own selves and other humans. Its represents what Ralph calls ‘the darkness of man’s heart’. Golding uses this ‘beast’ to present in each of us the capacity for evil and wrongdoing. Simon attempts to explain this to the boy, when he says that the beast ‘maybe it’s only us.’ Simon became inarticulate in his effort to express mankind’s ‘essential illness.’ The pig’s head symbolizes all this to Simon, and also the cynicism of adults and the hollowness and superficiality of their world. It is Simon who sees the parachutist as epitomizing the capacity of adults for death and destruction. Conrad presents a similar idea when at the beginning of Heart Of Darkness the sun over the estuary is ‘striken to death’ by the touch of the gloom over the city, a powerful image suggesting that people are responsible for the darkness in the world. The phrase ‘a brooding gloom in sunshine’ sums up the theme of the novel, the existence of darkness at the core of a shining civilisation.
Conrad uses the symbolism of ‘light’ and ‘dark’ throughout the novel; this symbolism of light and dark has been present in society for centuries. We refer to the middle Ages, when science and knowledge was suppressed, as the Dark Ages. According to Christianity, in the beginning of time all was dark and God created light. According to Heart of Darkness, before the Romans came, England was dark. In the same way, Africa was considered to be in the "dark stage". The ‘light and dark’ imagery pervades the narrative and is one of the most effective tools in conveying his message. Conventional symbolism associates light and white as goodness, enlightenment and civilized and black and dark with death, evil, ignorance, savagery and uncivilized.
The title itself is symbolic and covers a psychological as much as a geographical reality. Its refers to the ambivalent force at the heart of the wilderness; it also stands for the central darkness Kurtz discovers within himself, and possibly at the heart of civilization. The title indirectly alludes to the setting, which is also symbolic. The use of Africa as an inner, unknown, territory is not new, other authors on novels have used it. The plot of Heart Of Darkness, the voyage from Outer to Central to Inner Station, symbolizes a journey into the self.
The painting at the Central Station is perhaps the most extensive symbol in the novel. The painting is of a blindfolded woman carrying a lighted torch, which distorts her face. The woman likely symbolizes the Europeans who have come to civilize the natives. The torch she carries represents the European customs and values that they try to force upon the native Africans. The woman is blindfolded because the Europeans cannot "see" the negative effects that their customs have on the natives. Her face has become distorted because, to the natives, the European customs seem rather repulsive.
The books imply that every man has a heart of darkness that is usually drowned out by the light of civilization. When removed from civilized society, the raw evil of untamed lifestyles within his soul will be unleashed. Thereby suggesting that civilization is superficial. It is a much less stable or permanent state than society may think. It is this theme, which both authors strive to make clear and apparent. Both novels portray this idea of inherent ‘darkness’ within each person, which is very thinly disguised and masked by civilization. Through the elaborate use of language and imagery Conrad is able to present the perfect setting to tell his tale, and create this very sinister, evil, atmosphere which goes perfectly in hand with the moral of the tale. Golding through the simplicity of his language is able to put across this feeling of hopelessness and despondency due to the horrors, which take place in this paradise like island, making it a backdrop of evil and brutality.
Bibliography
Lord of the Flies – William Golding
York Notes – Lord of the Flies
Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
York Notes- Heart of Darkness
Word count including bibliography is 2,725.
