Heart of Darkness / Apocalypse Now: An Analysis Essay

The novel Heart of shabbiness by Joseph Conrad, published in 1902, is astir(predicate) the tommyrot of a cosmos named Marlow, a steamship captain whose character is ground on Conrads let experience. The score is told from Marlows perspective in a narrative. Marlow describes describes unmatched referenceicular journey he took on an Afri batch river as part of an assign custodyt by his family to devour charge of a barge stuck in the interior. In addition to his regular projection of transporting ivory, Marlow has orders to bring back Kurtz, a man con steadred a legend in his company. on the journey, Marlow makes his elan through the jungle, witnessing the how whites exploit the natives tied(p) to the point of oppressing them in their quest for male monarch and gain (Conrad 155 Gall(a)oway Grant 215). Upon stint Kurtzs compound in a remote outpost, he is appalled to essay a row of human heads attach on poles. Marlow later realise that Kurtz has freed himself from the saltation of civilization, trading his soul for power resulting in him fleetning his own fiefdom in the interior. only if he paid a terms for it in losing his humanity as he led the natives under him in raids along the touch aras to collect ivory and these raids argon brutal as evidenced by the displayed heads (Conrad 160). It is also discovered that Kurtz is anxious(p) of an illness as Marlow took him back to civilization. On the way back, the dying Kurtz gives to Marlow a bold declamation of his works as a quest determined by visions he sees, at round point, the life in Kurtz slowly ebbed and his dying words were, The horrorThe horror which accentuates the hopelessness at the encounter with human rottennessthe heart of darkness (Conrad 192 Galloway). Seguing more than 70 years later, Francis Ford Coppola wrote, produced and directed the look at revelation Now in 1979. The story of the film is loosely based on Conrads novel. Using artistic license, Coppola cast e the story in Vietnam at the upper side of the conflict there instead of the Congo.Coincidentally, the of import antagonist of the film is also named Kurtz (played by Marlon Brando). Instead of Marlow, the other protagonist is police chief Willard (played by Martin Sheen), a special operations officer who has been having difficulty adjusting to a imperturbable atmosphere as his body craves for reach as shown in the scene where he is having withdrawal symptoms from being away in combat for quite some time. Likle Marlow, Willard is the unrivalled who narrates the story (Coppola Galloway Kinder 14).A new charge galvanized him into action as he is staged by his superiors to kill Kurtz who is believed to arrive at done for(p) insane and like Conraads Kurtz, has throwd his reclusive fiefdom in the heart of the Vietnamese jungle where he has app bently done for(p) rogue, all the more reason why Willard is staged to kill him (Coppola). Instead of commanding a steamship, Willar d traveled on a riverine gunboat run by an eccentric crew and instead of seeing ivory traders attacking villages, his eyeball feasted on the sight of an Air horse regiment run by a Colonel Kilgore (played by Robert Duvall) whose disposition resembled that of General George S.Patton with a passion for combat when he uttered, I love the smell of napalm in the sunrise (Coppola) as soundly as a passion for surfing. Like Conrads Marlow, Willard came upon Kurtzs fiefdom and sees why the brass in Saigon treasured Kurtz dead. Willard is captured but has managed to escape and complete the charge by killing Kurtz at his dangerous moment making a recording. As Kurtz lay dying, his dying words are similar to Conrads Kurtz as he uttered, the horror the horror as thoroughly (Coppola Galloway Kinder 15, 18).In analyzing two stories, there is a parallelism that exists in terms of theme. feel at it from the political perspective, both stories underscore the evil of imperialism. In The He art of Darkness, Africa is trusty for mental disintegration as intimately as for physical illness of Mr. Kurtz epoch Vietnam does the same thing for Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now. It would appear that both Kurtzes concord been in the service of their masters. Both men exhaust been its servants and at the same time, its victims (Galloway). Mr.Kurtz has been conisdered a legendary man of the company for his ability to hand over the goods ivory, a very valuable trade good among white traders in Africa. But in the course of carrying out his duties, it requires him to conduct raids on surrounding villages which entails killing people in the name of profit. As for Col. Kurtz, his mission as a Special Forces officer is to calculate the indigenous tribes of Vietnam, the Montagnards into a paramilitary intensity level intended to act as a deterent against marauding Vietcong guerillas but like Conrads Mr.Kurtz, his ragtag army also pull atrocities, only it is in the name of tra sh communism and upholding democracy as his superiors would recount him (Coppola Kinder 13, 15). It is in the service of their masters that litter these two men into foolishness. It is a derangement non necessarily bordering on mania or craziness, but it is the kind that cause them to take away themselves from this cruel and maddening reality and create their own world to escape it with their own norms to follow to the point of megalomania.Both Conrad and Coppola used this device to elicit sympathy on the part of the audience as well as reflect on the human nature and experience they start out gone through which could happen to anyone (Grant 215 Kinder 13, 18 Galloway). By way of clarification, Conrad and Coppolas Kurtz are non inherently evil. Both men have started out as the ideal of the company they serve. What drove them to the proverbial dark side is that obsession (for lack of a meliorate word) in carrying out their mission.Their duties have someway made them jaded and desensitized as they realized that what they are doing appear to violate theology when their duty entails killing people for profit and politics respectively. Thus it has become establish for both Marlow and Willard why their Kurtz need to be taken care of. Both men have been corrupted to the point of madness that they are out of control and they have to be dealt with lest they cause more cost and turn against their own masters (Galloway, Kinder 19). In conclusion, both William Conrad and Francis Coppola showed through their works the dark side of the individual when pushed to the limit.While one may be appalled by the horrors depicted in both stories, both Conrad and Coppola has managed to somehow make the audience harmonized towards the two Kurtzes rather than loathe them all told for they used to be human and it is not their own fault why they have gone off the deep end. What Conrad and Coppola are doing is that they helped guide the audience on who is trustworthy for t he madness that has befallen the two Kurtzes who could have been destined for greater things instead of the tragic circle that befell them. The bottom line is man is not inherently evil but they can be seduced into it by the circumstances surrounding them.