"He must meet that truth with his own true stuff—with his own inborn strength. Principles won't do. Acquisitions, clothes, pretty rags—rags that would fly off at the first good shake. No; you want a deliberate belief. An appeal to me in this fiendish row—is there? Very well; I hear; I admit, but I had a voice, too, and for good or evil mine is the speech that cannot be silenced" (Conrad 247). This passage from Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (Harper & Row 1967) echoes the sentiment of Kurtz, existential hero and symbol of progress whose ambition leads him into the darkest recesses of the Congo in search of fortune from the ivory trade. As a tragic figure, Kurtz sacrifices love, talent, and prominence to discover sadly that his untimely death in this primitive environment deprives him of achieving those goals which ironically had been within his reach. Conrad uses irony, symbolism, and naturalism to create a tone of loss and betrayal, as the hero undergoes the transformation from a young and robust idealist to that of a weak and dying fatalist. Kurtz's transition for innocence to awareness corresponds with the narrator's view of him, as the young seaman-narrator ingratiates himself to him during those final days. The author depicts these two characters' coming of age as they realize that the dreams of life, like the sad case of Icarus, have been merely dangled before their eyes, as delusions of achievement and notoriety. In this setting, as in Victory and Nostromo, Conrad censures the ideals of western imperialism at the expense of Third-World countries. Conrad creates the following image of death to indict the industrial world for its criminal mistreatment of the undeveloped nations: "Black shapes crouched, lay, sat between the trees leaning against the trunks, clinging to the earth, half coming out, half effaced within the dim light, in all the attitudes of pain, abandonment, and despair. Another mine on the cliff went off, followed by a slight shudder of the soil under my feet. The work was going on. The work! And that place where some of the helpers had withdrawn to die." The young narrator goes on to say, "They were dying slowly—it was very clear. They were not enemies, they were not criminals, they were nothing earthly now, nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation, lying confusedly in the greenish gloom" (226). Conrad uses irony and invective to contrast empty accomplishments of the white, educated bookkeeper with the contorted bodies of the dead surrounding him, all in the name of western progress , giving the starving black strings of beads and brass wire in exchange for "a precious trickle of ivory" (226-227). The author appropriately uses the word inferno to describe these heaps of death and disease (225). Unfortunately, this cruel practice, in one form or another, continues into the twenty-first century, be it for gold, diamonds, oil, or water. Speaking for Conrad, the young explorer bitterly criticizes the El Dorado Exploring Expedition and its goal: "To tear treasure out of the bowels of the land was their desire with no more moral purpose at the back of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe" (241). " As Thomas Carlyle affirms in Sartor Resartus, "If Clothes, in these times, 'so tailorize and demoralize us,' have they no redeeming value; can they not be altered to serve better; must they of necessity be thrown to the dogs?," so does Conrad suggests that the rags of European progress fail to clothe us spiritually or emotionally. In fact, the road to progress has led nineteenth-century industrialists into a world of mystery and darkness that commands a totally different set of values, one which compels Kurtz to search within the darkness of his own soul to discover the truth. Tragically, the hero describes his untimely fate as one of horror and loss. In his Recollections: An Autobiography (1997), Viktor Frankl suggests, "The experiential evidence confirms the survival value of the 'will to meaning' and of self-transcendence—the reaching out beyond ourselves for something other than ourselves" (Frankl 97). In his Natur and Idee, C. G. Carus writes, "The highest aspiration of the conscious mind, the attainment of God, can be approached only by its submission to the deepest of what to us is purely unconscious." In essence, Kurtz's merging of material and spiritual goals creates in him a metaphysical tension which Conrad uses to enhance his theme of fatalism and irony. Psychologically, Kurtz must undergo what Carl Jung calls individuation, a term describing the psychological process of transformation ending with a stage "characterized by a conscious dialectic relationship between ego and Self" (Jung in Edinger 7). In his book Why Men Fight (1916), Bertrand Russell calls for a type of spiritual transformation which the civilized world must undergo to be saved from decay. He suggests a change in the world's economic structure and in its philosophy of life (Russell 266). From a theological point of view, Kurtz experiences a Kierkegaardian form of despair, or Sartrean nausea ; however from a literary perspective, his ideals fail as a result of Conrad's cleverly contrived, fatalistically designed universe, much like the victims of Shakespearean tragedy.

           Conrad also capitalizes upon the Freudian psychoanalytic theory of his day which stresses the dark and mysterious nature of the mind. Writing in A General Introduction to Psycho-Analysis (Garden City 1938), Sigmund Freud suggests," Going away on a journey stands in dreams for dying; similarly, it is the custom in the nursery, when a child asks questions, as to the whereabouts of someone who has died and whom he misses, to tell him that that person has 'gone away.'" Freud goes on to say, "The poet uses the same symbol when he speaks of the other side as 'the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler returns.' Again, in everyday speech it is quite usual to speak of the 'last journey,' and everyone who is acquainted with ancient rites knows how seriously the idea of a journey into the land of the dead was taken, for instance, in ancient Egyptian belief. Since burial grounds have been placed at a distance from the houses of the living, the last journey of the dead has indeed become a reality" (Freud 144). In this passage, Freud's allusion to that undiscovered country corresponds with events in Conrad's tale because Hamlet's immersion into a kingdom of moral corruption parallels the young seaman's voyage into a world of madness and irrationality. In this case, the narrator's journey into the heart of darkness symbolizes an archetypal journey into the depths of his unconscious, and Kurtz himself, as a wish-fulfillment or projection of his dreams and ideals. In this context, the two characters serve as different aspects of the same personality, and the dark journey into the Congo, the path in which one psychologically travels in his quest to achieve the other. In this respect, the entire adventure yields fertile ground as a dream sequence detailing the hopes and aspirations of the young narrator. This duality further explains the young sailor's emulation of Kurtz as a genius who sacrifices himself, the prospect of prominence, his family, and his beloved as a scapegoat for the imperialistic illusions of his country, as well as his own. Kurtz himself suffers from a characteristic form of neurosis as the result of his separation from the love of his fiancé, family, and associates. Commenting on the likelihood of neurosis of non-sexual origin, Freud alludes to a form of this disorder that Kurtz manifests: "It did not escape me at that time either that sexuality was not always indicated as the cause of a neurosis; one person certainly would fall ill because of some injurious sexual condition, but another because he had lost his fortune or recently sustained a severe organic illness. The explanation of these variations was revealed later, when insight was obtained into the interrelationships suspected between the ego and the libido; and the further this subject was explored, the more satisfactory became our insight into it. A person only falls ill of a neurosis when the ego loses its capacity to deal in some way or other with the libido" (Freud 336). This separation consequently becomes the motivating force which drives him to his own destruction. Unable to recognize or control his disorder, Kurtz projects his inability into a victimization posture which he uses to rationalize the "horror" of life's purpose. The author tragically foreshadows Kurtz's untimely fate even in the connotation of his name, meaning short. Conrad's young steamboat traveler even comments on the dreamlike nature of the circumstances he faces in the Congo and of Kurtz, the phantom prophet: "He was just a word for me. I did not see the man in the name any more than you do. Do you see him? Do you see the story? Do you see anything? It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream—making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream-sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams" (237). Here Conrad uses the surreal atmosphere of the Congo to reinforce the tone of inscrutable mystery and helplessness. The narrator attempts to construct an underlying truth from these dark and confusing events, yet fails, as Conrad would suggest about life in general. According to the young explorer, "No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one's existence—that which makes its truth, its meaning—its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream—alone . . ." (237). Sadly, this sense of loneliness and isolation holds the essence of truth and meaning for Kurtz, his young counterpart, and the author himself . . . This split in Kurtz's personality leads him into a world of darkness where he becomes its sovereign. According to Marlow, "The thing was to know what he belonged to, how many powers of darkness claimed him for their own" (260). Conrad compares Kurtz to a modern Faust who gradually and unknowingly suffers as the devil's pawn. Just as Macbeth, enticed by the lure of the witches' prophecy and the lust for power, so is Kurtz disillusioned by the prospect of enormous wealth and prominence (282). This would technically be considered Kurtz's tragic flaw, one which his pride or hubris cannot allow him to relinquish. The author laments this "barren darkness of his heart" and describes his betrayal in tragically ironic terms: "The wilderness had found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vengeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude—and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core . . ." (270). Kurtz now realizes that he must find the truth within himself. This awareness denotes the initial stage of the protagonist's psychological transformation. Kurtz's tragic conclusion drives him insane, leaving him to struggle blindly within himself, with a spirit "that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear" (280). Alluding to Kurtz, the narrator observes, "His was an impenetrable darkness. I looked at him as you peer down at a man who is lying at the bottom of a precipice where the sun never shines . . . I saw on that ivory face the expression of somber pride, of ruthless power, of craven terror—of an intense and hopeless despair. Did he live his life again in every detail of desire, temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of complete knowledge? He cried in a whisper at some image, at some vision—he cried out twice, a cry that was no more than a breath: 'The horror! The horror!'"(283).

            Conrad's focus upon the darkness of a primitive world represents the young hero's initial step toward emotional awareness, as well as a phase in the collective evolution of psychological determinism. According to Freud, "We believe that civilization has been built up, under the pressure of the struggle for existence, by sacrifices in gratification of the primitive impulses, and that it is to a great extent for ever being re-created, as each individual, successively joining the community, repeats the sacrifice of his instinctive pleasures for the common good" (Freud 23). Thus, the source of human progress commences with man's primitive, inexplicable impulses, as opposed to faith, or reason (Freud 23-24). As the innocent trader acknowledges, "No fear can stand up to hunger, no patience can wear it out, disgust simply does not exist where hunger is; and as to superstitions, beliefs, and what you my call principles, they are less than chaff in a breeze" (253). From this primeval soil, Conrad creates a sinister initiation into an inverted paradise, the object of which culminates in the symbolic demise of the young traveler's dreams. Conrad's choice of darkness could also represent a hidden portion of the truth which the young narrator refuses to accept. As Freud maintains, "The concept of the dream-element is as follows: it is not in itself a primary and essential thing, a thought proper, but a substitute for something else unknown to the person concerned, just as is the underlying intention of the error, a substitute for something the knowledge of which is indeed possessed by the dreamer, but is inaccessible to him" (Freud 102). Freud further holds that the manifest dream content can be completely undisguised or consist of a mixture or compromise of hidden and obvious images (Freud 115-117). In the more serious cases of neurosis or psychosis, these recurring images often become distorted or disguised by what he terms the dream censor, a function of the super-ego that enables the subject to retreat into denial. According to Freud, "We actually use the term DREAM-CENSORSHIP, and ascribe part of the distortion to its agency Whenever there are gaps in the manifest dream, we know that the censorship is responsible; and indeed we should go further and recognize that wherever, among other more clearly defined elements, one appears which is fainter, more indefinite or more dubious in recollection, it is evidence of the work of the censorship" (Freud 125).Freud elaborates upon the nature of censorship and repression in the following passage: "But we know that the attitude of the dreamer towards his wishes is a peculiar one: he rejects them, censors them, in short, he will have none of them. Their fulfillment then can afford him no pleasure, rather the opposite, and here experience shows that this opposite, which has still to be explained, takes the form of anxiety" (Freud 192). In this context, the overwhelming reliance upon dark and sinister forces in setting and characterization serves to reinforce the extent of man's spiritual alienation, loss of purpose and ignorance of the truth. Ironically, Conrad chooses to cloak the truth in a veil of darkness, mystery, and inscrutability, a word the author repeatedly employs. This also accounts for the surreal nature of the story. Conrad's use of both Marlow and the young adventurer as narrators could further support the concept of the youth and his mentor in its dual mental role, as possibly ego and alter-ego. Biographically, as in the works of Dickens, these two roles could also represent the different phases of Conrad's life, certainly in terms of his fatalism.

           Conrad enhances his theme of primitivism in his description of the forest and the winding river that snakelike crawls and twists mysteriously. In the young narrator's words, "Going up that river was like traveling back to the earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on the earth and the big trees were kings. An empty stream, a great silence, an impenetrable forest. The air was warm, thick, heavy, sluggish. There was no joy in the brilliance of the sunshine. The long stretches of the waterway ran on, deserted, into the gloom of overshadowed distances. On silvery sandbanks hippos and alligators sunned themselves, side by side. The broadening waters flowed through a mob of wooded islands; you lost your way on that river as you would in a desert, and butted all day long against shoals, trying to find the channel, till you thought yourself bewitched and cut off forever from everything you had known once—somewhere—far away—in another existence perhaps" (244). From this setting Conrad expresses a sense of loneliness, isolation, and despair. There is no brilliance here, only gloom, emptiness, and alienation. This description corresponds with the darkness of the young traveler's mind as he searches for the truth. In this way, Conrad creates an external setting that parallels the inner thoughts of the character. In other places, the author adds a touch of naturalism by personifying this impenetrable nature, having it menacingly observe the young visitor. According to the innocent boatman," I felt often its mysterious stillness watching me at my monkey tricks, just as it watches you fellows performing on your respective tightropes for—what is it? Half a crown a tumble--" (244-245). Conrad uses the character's sense of paranoia to intensify the danger and suspense of the story, while more importantly, attributing a sense a timeless dominance to primeval nature , in contrast with the insignificance and futility associated with the plans of men. On his first day at work in the Congo, the young narrator realizes this fact, as he says, "By Jove! I've never seen anything so unreal in my life. And outside, the silent wilderness surrounding this cleared speck on the earth struck me as something great and invincible, like evil or truth, waiting patiently for the passing away of this fantastic invasion" (232). In another instance, the young narrator observes that "all along the formless coast bordered by dangerous surf, as if Nature herself had tried to ward off intruders; in and out of rivers, streams of death in life, whose banks were rotting into mud, whose waters, thickened into slime, invaded the contorted mangroves, that seemed to writhe at us in the extremity of an impotent despair" (223). In another instance, the young narrator comments that "this stillness of life did not in the least resemble a peace" but "was the stillness of an implacable force brooding over an inscrutable intention" which "looked at you with a vengeful aspect" (244). Thus, Conrad depicts a vindictive, uncaring Nature that fills the character with a sense of paranoia that intensifies the danger and suspense of the story, while more importantly, attributing a sense a timeless dominance to primeval nature , in contrast with the insignificance and futility associated with the plans of men. The inexperienced boatman indeed felt very small and lost compared to the millions of massive, immense trees surrounding him.   In a chapter entitled "Race and Bureaucracy," from her Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt describes Conrad's world in the following passage: "Under a merciless sun, surrounded by an entirely hostile nature,. they were confronted with human beings who, living without the future of a purpose and the past of an accomplishment, were as incomprehensible  as the inmates of a madhouse" (Arendt 190). Like Kafka, Dante, and Dostoyevsky, Conrad here uses the metaphor of the insect to describe the insignificance of man. According to the young explorer, "Trees, trees, millions of trees, massive, immense,