Hearts of Darkness: Victorian Imperialism and Travel of the African Continent

Frontiers, Episodes #4 of 4. Find the transcript and complete show notes at digpodcast.org. Victorian-era European imperialism was facilitated by the thousands of missionaries, businessmen, soldiers, and private police forces employed by the religious, economic, and military institutions of “civilized” Europe, but there were also individuals that facilitated this process, such as Henry Morton Stanley, Joseph Conrad, and Roger Casement. These individuals were essential to the larger effort to normalize imperialism. They were seen as national heroes, adventurers, larger-than-life pinnacles of Europe’s “civilizing” mission in sub-Saharan Africa. All of these men treated sub-Saharan Africa as if it were theirs for the taking, where they could play and profit as they saw fit. All of these men were essential to European imperialism in sub-Saharan Africa: its rise, its fall, and its impact on the people it crushed along the way. So today we’re going to take a look at where Conrad, Casement, and Stanley’s stories intersect: in the Congo, or as Joseph Conrad called it, in the “Heart of Darkness.” Brief Bibliography (get the full bibliography at digpodcast.org): Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost (Houghton Miffling, 1999). Tim Jeal, Stanley: The Impossible Life of Africa’s Greatest Explorer (Yale University Press, 2007). Agata Szczeszak-Brewer, Critical Approaches to Joseph Conrad (University of South Carolina Press, 2015) Dean Pavlakis, British Humanitarianism and the Congo Reform Movement, 1896-1913(Routledge, 2015) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices