Table Of ContentCase Studies in Contemporary Criticism
JOSEPH CONRAD
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Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism
SERIES EDITOR: Ross C Murfin
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre
EDITED BY Beth Newman, Southern Methodist University
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights
EDITED BY Linda H. Peterson, Yale University
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Wije ofB ath
EDITED BY Peter G. Beidler, Lehigh University
Kate Chopin, The Awakening
EDITED BY Nancy A. Walker, Vanderbilt University
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness, Second Edition
EDITED BY Ross C Murfin, University of Miami
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
EDITED BY Janice Carlisle, Tulane University
Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
EDITED BY Ross C Murfin, University of Miami
Henry James, The Turn of the Screw
EDITED BY Peter G. Beidler, Lehigh University
James Joyce, The Dead
EDITED BY Daniel R. Schwarz, Cornell University
James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
EDITED BY R. B. Kershner, University of Florida
William Shakespeare, Hamlet
EDITED BY Susanne L. Wofford, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
EDITED BY Johanna M. Smith, University of Texas at Arlington
Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels
EDITED BY Christopher Fox, University of Notre Dame
Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth
EDITED BY Shari Benstock, University of Miami
Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism
SERIES EDITOR: Ross C Murfin, University ofM iami
JOSEPH CONRAD
Heart of Darkness
Complete, Authoritative Text with
Biographical and Historical Contexts,
Critical History, and Essays from
Five Contemporary Critical Perspectives
SECOND EDITION
EDITED BY
Ross CMurfm
University of Miami
Palgrave Macmillan
--
For Bedford Books
President and Publisher: Charles H. Christensen
General Manager and Associate Publisher: Joan E. Feinberg
Managing Editor: Elizabeth M. Schaaf
Developmental Editor: Stephen A. Scipione
Editorial Assistant: Mark Reimold
Production Editor: Karen S. Baart
Copyeditor: Nancy Bell Scott
Text Design: Sandra Rigney, The Book Department
Cover Design: Richard Emery Design, Inc.
Cover Art: Cotton and silk wrapper (Asante peoples, Ghana). Photo
graph by Franko Khoury. National Museum of Mrican Art, Eliot
Elisofon Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 95-80800
Copyright © 1996 by BEDFORD BOOKS of St. Martin's Press
Softcover reprint ofthe hardcover 2nd edition 1996 978-0-312-15901-6
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a re
trieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means, electronic, me
chanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be expressly
permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the Publisher.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
09876
fed c b a
For information, write: St. Martin's Press, Inc.
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010
Editorial Offices: Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press
75 Arlington Street, Boston, MA 02116
ISBN 978-0-312-11491-6 (paperback)
ISBN 978-1-349-61321-2 ISBN 978-1-137-05227-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-05227-8
Published and distributed outside North America by:
MACMILLAN PRESS LTD.
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Companies and representatives throughout the world.
ISBN 978-0-333-65707-2
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments and copyrights are at the back of the book on page 315, which con
stitutes an extension of the copyright page. It is a violation of the law to reproduce these se
lections by any means whatsoever without the written permission of the copyright holder.
About the Series
Volumes in the Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism series
provide college students with an entree into the current critical and
theoretical ferment in literary studies. Each volume reprints the com
plete text of a classic literary work and presents critical essays that ap
proach the work from different theoretical perspectives, together with
the editors' introductions to both the literary work and the critics'
theoretical perspectives.
The volume editor of each Case Study has selected and prepared
an authoritative text of the classic work, written an introduction to the
work's biographical and historical contexts, and surveyed the critical
responses to the work since its initial publication. Thus situated bio
graphically, historically, and critically, the work is examined in five
critical essays, each representing a theoretical perspective of impor
tance to contemporary literary studies. These essays, prepared espe
cially for undergraduates, show theory in praxis; whether written by
established scholars or exceptional young critics, they demonstrate
how current theoretical approaches can generate compelling readings
of great literature.
As series editor, I have prepared introductions, with bibliogra
phies, to the theoretical perspectives represented in the five critical es
says. Each introduction presents the principal concepts of a particular
theory in their historical context and discusses the major figures and
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vi ABOUT THE SERIES
key works that have influenced their formulation. It is my hope that
these introductions will reveal to students that effective criticism is in
formed by a set of coherent assumptions, and will encourage them to
recognize and examine their own assumptions about literature. After
each introduction, a selective bibliography presents a partially anno
tated list of important works from the literature of the particular theo
retical perspective, including the most recent and readily available edi
tions and translations of the works cited in the introduction. Finally, I
have compiled a glossary of key terms that recur in these volumes and
in the discourse of contemporary theory and criticism. We hope that
the Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism series will reaffirm the
richness of its literary works, even as it introduces invigorating new
ways to mine their apparently inexhaustible wealth.
Ross C Murfin
Series Editor
University of Miami
About This Volume
Part One of this volume reprints the text of Heart of Darkness
from the 1921 Heinemann edition of Conrad's Collected Works - the
last version of the text that Conrad approved.
Part Two includes five contemporary critical essays on Heart of
Darkness, representing reader-response, deconstructionist, feminist
and gender, new historicist, and cultural approaches to Conrad's most
famous tale. Three of the essays - reader-response, feminist and gen
der, and new historicist - were specifically written for this edition.
New to This Edition
I undertook a second edition to make this Case Study of Heart of
Darkness a more useful and current resource for introducing students
to the latest trends in contemporary criticism. Both the reader
response and the cultural essays are new, reflecting recent develop
ments in those fields of theory. The feminist essay of the first edition
has been revised to encompass a more contemporary gender perspec
tive, and the new historicist essay has been updated. All of the intro
ductions and bibliographies to the critical approaches have been sig
nificantly revised. The critical history now extends well into the 1990s,
and also discusses Chinua Achebe's "An Image of Mrica: Conrad's
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viii ABOUT THIS VOLUME
Heart of Darkness," which has been so influential in recent postcolo
nial and cultural investigations of Conrad's work.
Acknowledgments
I am indebted to those whose comments have improved the intro
ductions to the critical approaches: Shari Benstock, Patrick Brant
linger, Janice Carlisle, Steven Mailloux, J. Hillis Miller; Margot Nor
ris, and Brook Thomas. I am deeply grateful to the authors of the
critical essays, especially Peter J. Rabinowitz for his new reader
response essay, and Johanna Smith and Brook Thomas for the revisions
of their respective essays from the first edition of this Case Study. I
continue to appreciate the exemplary help of the people at Bedford
Books, especially Chuck Christensen, Joan Feinberg, Steve Scipione,
Elizabeth Schaaf, Karen Baart, Laura Arcari, and Mark Reimold. At
the University of Miami, I would like to thank my staff assistant, Tracy
Helenbrook, for her extraordinary competence, diligence, and good
cheer. Patricia Woodward tutored me on the subject of gender studies
and helped me develop the bibliography in that area. This book is
dedicated to Supryia Ray, whose research habits, editorial acumen, de
bating skills, and unfailing, friendly support made it possible for me
to revise and update the introductions to all five critical approaches
represented in this volume.
Contents
About the Series v
About This Volume vii
PART ONE
Heart of Darkness:
The Complete Text
Introduction: Biographical and Historical Contexts 3
The Complete Text 17
PART TWO
Heart of Darkness:
A Case Study in Contemporary Criticism
A Critical History of Heart of Darkness 99
Reader-Response Criticism and Heart of Darkness II5
What Is Reader-Response Criticism? II5
Reader-Response Criticism: A Selected Bibliography I27
ix
