Heart of Darkness

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What do you know about the European colonization of other parts of the world—e.g. Africa, South and Southeast Asia—including its motives, methods, and ramifications?

Teaching Suggestion: Use answers to gauge students’ awareness of the beliefs and financial motives that drove colonization, the forms that colonization took, and the devastating generational impacts of the colonization of Africa, India, and other parts of Southeast Asia. This foundation can be used as a springboard for a discussion about the Belgian seizure of Congo.

Helpful links:

• a brief National Geographic article describing King Leopold II’s seizure of Congo
• a more in-depth BBC article that describes Leopold’s rule in Congo, its long-lasting impacts on the Congolese, and the difficulty modern Belgians have in accepting Belgium’s colonial past

2. Can you name two or three specific features of an indigenous culture from Africa, the Americas, or Australia?

Teaching Suggestion: Direct students’ attention to the diversity of indigenous peoples around the world. Introduce the Congolese peoples and the richness of their cultures, both historically and presently. Communicate to students that the term "Pygmy," which is sometimes applied to some of the area's indigenous peoples, is considered offensive and should be avoided.

Helpful links:

• a UN fact sheet on the world’s indigenous peoples
• an article about Congolese cultures from the Friends of the Congo

Discussion Prompt

The Europeans who participated in King Leopold’s brutal exploitation of the Congo performed monstrous actions. Do you think that necessarily means they were all monsters themselves? What different kinds of motivations might they have had? What kinds of ideas might they have held about themselves and about indigenous Congolese peoples?

Teaching Suggestion: This discussion is an opportunity to engage students with some of the novel’s important themes, such as imperialism and colonialism, the absurdity of morality, and horror and despondency. Students may point out motives that range from religious altruism to callous greed; they should be challenged to understand that a person’s conscious and subconscious motives might differ and that a person can have good intentions and still be completely wrong.

Helpful links:

• a brief World Atlas fact sheet on the motivations of European colonists in Africa
• Emory University's thorough discussion of European colonists’ justifications for colonialism in Africa