Beneath the surface. The media metaphors of Heart of Darkness

Le metafore mediali di Cuore di tenebra

Abstract

The article focuses on Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, published in the late 19th century, a significant moment of cultural, social and media paradigm shift. It starts briefly outlining the role of the imagination in elaborating profound symbols and redefining the sensorium and the relationship between body and reality. Then it reflects upon the rich series of representations of the monstrous in that moment of transition. After these introductory notes, the essay aims to analyse some of the reasons for the novel's symbolic force, asking which characteristics, starting with the stylistic ones, make it particularly suitable for describing a particular era but valuable for reflecting on our own as well. The explicit symbolic dimension of Conrad's work is what makes it particularly interpretable sub specie mediale, with references to cinema and, more generally, to the fluidity of the electric age. The feeling is that Conrad perceived the extent of the change that was taking place before his eyes but was unable to rationalise and rework it, except laterally through a proliferation of symbols and metaphors.