A discussion of the portrayal of colonialism in Heart of Darkness and in ‘The White Man’s Burden’.

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Introduction ……………………………………………………………. 2

Heart of Darkness ……………………………………………………… 2

- Background and historical context …………………………….. 2

- Literary devices ………………………………………………... 4

- Representation of colonialism …………………………………. 7

‘The White Man’s Burden’ …………………………………………… 10

- Historical context and purpose ………………………………... 10

- External structure ……………………………………………… 11

- Internal structure and colonialism …………………………….. 13

Linguistic features which are different from modern English ………… 15

Conclusion …………………………………………………………….. 17

Bibliography ……………………………………………………………18

Introduction

The topic of this paper is colonialism as it is portrayed in two classic texts, both dating back to the end of the 19th century: the novella Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad and Ruyard Kipling’s famous poem ‘The White Man’s Burden’. Common to the two texts is the colonial timeframe and context in which they are created and also the fact that they do not belong to colonial literature in the normal definition of this term, i. e. written by colonial authors. My study will be divided into two main parts, one concerning Heart of Darkness and one about the poem. For either of the two texts, I will establish a connection to the outer world of their time, related to events in the authors’ lives and to history on a larger scale.
Then I will proceed to an analysis of the texts, presenting first the literary method and devices that are at work, and secondly, analysing the contents with a focus on colonialism though, naturally, the division of the two aspects of external and internal structures may be artificial and difficult to maintain. In a third, shorter part of this paper I will fulfil the second part of