Achebe objects to how Conrad's Heart of Darkness perpetuates and ignorant and false view of Africa and African people being less humane and developed than the western world. According to Achebe’s article, Heart of Darkness portray Africa as an uninhabitable jungle and the people who live there as more animalistic than human. Achebe says Africa is used as a “setting and backdrop which eliminates the African as human factor... devoid of all recognizable humanity” (9). Achebe continues to argue that, “a novel which celebrates this dehumanization, which depersonalizes a portion of the human race” cannot be called a great work of art (9). A large part of Achebe's objection is that not only does Conrad's book contain racism, its wide acceptance is makes it one of the works that have fueled people to consider such dehumanization as something that is normal.
Heart of Darkness relates to Apocalypse Now is multiple ways. Both Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now are concerned with ‘the other’ and foreign land. In Heart of Darkness, the other is the African people, and in Apocalypse Now it is the people of Cambodia. Both of these works portray the non-western world as something frighteningly mysterious. An element present as a result of this mystery is the fear that the white man has about how his own humanity could be reflected or represented by the savage other. Achebe states that what “frightens and at the same time fascinates Conrad” is the the idea that the humanity of the other barely-humans is like that of their own, “Ugly” (8). In Apocalypse Now, Kurtz is an example that a person who is supposed to bring civilization to these perceived jungle people could instead ‘sink’ to their level. This could be considered a confirmation of the fear that Conrad, according to Achebe, admits to. This fear is not simply just fear of the unknown, but fearing getting too comfortable or recognizing the alleged savagery in oneself.
I think that when Achebe talks about what frightens and fascinates him simultaneously is that the ugliness of the "others" is similar to ours is the exact reason that they portray them the way that they do in Apocalypse Now. They are afraid that if they let themselves get any closer that they will realize that they are not as developed as they would like to believe that they are. The more that they interact with the "savages" the more that they will become like them. For this reason they need to be the "white man" hero type because if they do not rub off onto the "lesser", then they might rub onto them.
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