Heart of Darkness

The Heart of Darkness Themes

I struggle so hard with this book even after reading a twice. I decided to pick out some themes that can be taught in The Heart of Darkness. As a future teacher I knew I will teach books that I do not like or just don't quite understand, but if I find something out the book that I can relate to the students I think it will help. These themes can be used in writing projects of all kinds. Here are some themes that I came up with and got some from the Internet from teachers that have taught the book.

Alienation and Loneliness
The book begins and ends with silence
The question of how silence and loneliness are seen to damaged the characters

Deception
In the book, they claim to educate the people to bring them to a new way of life, but they end up starving and murdering the people for profit.
Marlow lies to Kurtz fiancee, he told her that Kurtz died with her name on his lips.

Order and Disorder
How the characters in the book still carrying on with their lives while chaos was around them

Race and Racism
The constant reference to calling Africans "niggers", "cannibals" and "criminals"

Violence and Cruelty
The acts of inhumane violence committed on the people

One writing project I was thinking of for students is have students write a forgiveness letter to someone that maybe deceived them or was cruel to them. Or they can write a letter to someone and explain to them how they may of felt lonely or alienated. This will help students connect with a book that is difficult to read.