Heart of Darkness is a novel that continues to be relevant even after over a century after its publication, and while there are some obvious elements that are easy to find in modern day pop culture, there are still some ideas that are not that easy to spot. Upon thinking about its modern relevance, I found a surprising connection between the book and the feature film "The Dark Knight".
One of the most important characters in Heart of Darkness is the man known as Kurtz. Hailing from Belgium, he was sent to establish a station at Kisangani along the Congo River. He had a very positive reputation among those who met him and was almost idolized by some. Unfortunately, his time in the depths of the Congo proved to be too much for him, as he went crazy and retreated into the darkness of the forest, allying himself with the native tribes. After Kurtz falls into bad health and dies, the protagonist Marlow goes to visit his wife and must defend his reputation in front of her, lying about his last words to make him sound like the man she married.
The Dark Knight contains many elements similar to this. The character Harvey Dent is the new District Attorney of Gotham City and is adored by everyone. He's put so many criminals behind bars that he is pretty much considered Gotham's superhero. In a freak accident, half of Harvey's face becomes scarred and his girlfriend Rachel is killed. Eventually Harvey becomes corrupted by the Joker, the main villain of the movie, and goes on a mad rampage killing everyone he believes was responsible for Rachel's death. Batman, aka Gotham's other superhero, eventually hunts down the newly named Two-Face after he captures the commissioner and his family. After he and Batman fall off a ledge, Two-Face is killed by the impact. Realizing that the Joker will have done exactly what he wants if Two-Face's reputation is tarnished, Batman lies and assumes responsibility for Two-Face's murders so that the public always sees him as the hero he once was.
The big similarity between these two plots is that they both feature a great man turned bad by the alluring power of darkness. Due to their reputations, nobody ever expected them to become monsters, but the conditions were just right for it to occur. Both men had a woman they loved and were motivated by her in many of their actions. Upon both Kurtz and Dent's deaths, the main protagonists had to defend the men's reputations in front of who mattered most.
The relationship between these two works is important to me because it shows how important the ideas in Heart of Darkness still are. I would have never expected to see these themes in a movie like The Dark Knight, but after thinking about it a little, it made perfect sense. This enduring relevance is one of the many reasons why I love Heart of Darkness, and it will continue to be one of my favorite books.
I think there are a lot of similarities between the Joker and Colonel Kurtz as is evident from the following quote:
ReplyDeleteJOKER: Their morals, their code; it's a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble. They're only as good as the world allows them to be. You'll see- I'll show you. When the chips are down these, uh, civilized people? They'll eat each other. See I'm not a monster, I'm just ahead of the curve.