2nd body

Freud’s exploration of humans’ level of awareness and components of personality effectively justify Conrad’s psychoanalysis of Marlow’s journey. Consider Frederick R. Karl’s interpretation of Freud. “Confronting similar material, the scientist Freud was concerned to analyze logically the seeming illogic, the apparent irrationality, of dreams, and, on occasion, of nightmares. Both he and Conrad penetrated into the darkness, the darkness entered into when people sleep or when their consciences sleep, when they are free to pursue secret wishes, whether in dreams, like Freud’s analysands, or in actuality like Kurtz and his followers” (Karl 124). In other words, whereas Conrad perceives the darkness through the illustration of images, Freud interprets the darkness through dreams. Nevertheless, both Conrad and Freud agree that darkness exists in one’s subconscious. Indeed, Freud logically analyzes the seemingly illogic through the three components of personality: the super ego, ego, and id. He explains that the super ego contains our values and social morals, which we are often taught at a young age, the ego controls the sophisticated mental manners that conduct reasoning and problem solving, and the id encompasses our primitive drives. In fact, Freud elucidates how the id is where our darkness exists. He goes on to illustrate that the id has no sense of reality and solely seeks to satisfy its needs through primary processes such as self-defense and hunger. Furthermore, the libido, the energy storehouse, is what provides the incentives for the id. In fact, the id has two major instincts: Eros and Thanatos. Eros, the life instinct, promotes self-satisfaction tendencies. This is where sexual desires, according to Freud, originate. Thanatos, the death instinct, arouses the urge for violent motives. Evidently, both Eros and Thanatos, Freud argues, is what ultimately make up the darkness. Thus, Freud would perceive Marlow’s irrational behavior purely as acts of his id.   

First body

Joseph Conrad utilizes Marlow’s internal voyage to his heart of darkness in order to express the true meaning of darkness. Moreover, Conrad illustrates Marlow’s inadvertent path to irrationality to demonstrate the dangers of the unrestrained mind. In fact, when Marlow first arrives in the Congo, representing a mind that is constrained by the pressures of society, he has British principles. However, as his journey progresses, he begins to crack and his darkness begins to see the light of day. For example, Marlow’s irrationally is apparent when he throws his bloody shoes overboard. This immoral urge reveals Marlow’s impulsive nature, Conrad believes, at the unconscious level. Indeed, by demonstrating what actually takes place in the darkness, Conrad effectively exposes its true danger. 

3rd body

I believe that we can see right through the darkness, we just choose not to due to society’s judgment. In fact, society’s repression of one’s inner feelings is so severe that we often ignore our true selves to blend into the norm of society. Often, the iron shackles confining ones darkness can be detrimental to an individual’s moral conscience and society’s wellbeing. Imagine your conscious is like a balloon, and the air that is pumped into the balloon is the darkness that fills your mind. If you keep pumping air into the balloon, the air will have nowhere to go and eventually the balloon will pop. This concept is the same as society’s repression. If you keep your darkness trapped in your mind to seem normal, eventually you will pop. Obviously, the extent of the pop will vary depending on the nature of the person; yet, an outcome will result. For example, …    

Rough Intro

Darkness. This word evokes feelings of solitude, anger, immorality, and obscurity. However, it can also be seen as a vehicle, a vehicle that pilots one into the light of his true nature; the true nature that society suppresses. You might think: If darkness reveals my true nature, why does society suppress it? Well, it is not until you really explore the real meaning of darkness until you will get it.  Merriam-Webster dictionary defines darkness as: not clear to the understanding. The first idea that pops into most people’s minds is: how is this definition going to help me find the real meaning of darkness? Consider Sigmund Freud, an Austrian neurologist, and Joseph Conrad, the polish author who wrote Heart of Darkness. With no proven connection to each other, these psychoanalytic philosophers adopted the same view of the human mind. They both recognized that darkness is a place to conceal one’s immoral conscience at the unconscious level. Conrad employs Marlow’s internal journey in The Heart of Darkness as an instrument to prove the unclear. Additionally, Freud’s psychoanalysis of the superego, ego, and id further upholds what Conrad illustrates.  

Essay question

I'm going to explore the word darkness using Conrad's illustration of Marlow's journey and Freud's analysis of the id for evidence.

Karl

"Now aware of depths in himself that he cannot hide"
-Marlow discovers his inner feelings through his nightmare
"The very qualities in Kurtz that horrify him are those he finds masked in himself

These two ideas from Karl are ideas that I will employ in my essay. I want to explore how human's discover the true self through their nightmares

Ideas + in class

Irrational: human's mindset, unrestrained by society
Ex. Shrunken heads- used for ornamentation on fence posts. Intimidating, warning
In class: Marlow first arrives in the Congo with British morals and sensibilities. However, soon he starts to break down and act irrationally. He is drawn to and fascinated by Kurtz and his lack of restraints. He begins himself to act irrationally when he throws his bloody shoes overboard. He eventually chooses the cannibals over the Europeans because they are hypocrites. His unnatural fascination with Kurtz and his leaky to his memory