Much more than a voice: literary symbolism and the voice in Heart of Darkness
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Abstract
This essay deals with literary Symbolism and Joseph Conrad 's novel, Heart of Darkness. One aim of this work is to define Symbolism by providing a brief history of the movement and by briefly exploring the ideas of those writers who are considered to be part of the movement. A second is to consider some ideas about the literary symbol itself. This defining literary Symbolism and the literary Symbol and discussing Conrad's use of language and the Symbol will eventually lead to an examination of Heart of Darkness and its use of voice to reveal this text as a Symbolist work. Penetration of the symbols will bring us to conclusions about the telling of the story by the narrator, Marlow's experience in the jungle and later, Kurtz's redemption and self-knowledge, the Intended's role and her influence on Kurtz and Marlow, and the transcendent reality behind the physical setting.