Congo river

Essay by jiggaman June 2004

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History 112

May 20, 2002

Marlow who tells the story of his journey up the Congo River in search of an ivory trader named Kurtz, who is praised as the best ivory hunter by all of the Congo Company, but did not return from his last trip. Up until now Marlow knew very little about Kurtz, and the information he did know was just rumors. Most told Marlow that Kurtz was a well-educated man of many great talents, however, we find that no one really knew much about Kurtz. In truth the only thing that was known about Kurtz was that he brought in the largest amount of ivory. We find that while Kurtz was in search of ivory in the heart of darkness, he finds himself in the situation of having to choose between money and power and thus trying to obtain both, but finds himself having to choose between the two.

To no surprise he chose power, but he still faces an internal conflict of trying to gain the best of both worlds.

Kurtz finds himself pressured by society economics status and wanting to be accepted by his fiancés family, so he became an ivory trader to raise his status. He then enters the Congo in pursuit of riches, and finds himself to be very suscesfull in the ivory trade. Once Kurtz found that the natives believed that he was some sort of god, and that his gun was some short of magical weapon that could create thunder. Kurtz then learning how to manipulate the natives into worshiping him, and this only added to his success in retrieving ivory making him one of the best ivory hunters.

Now that Kurtz finds himself in a position of complete power where he makes all the rules. He...