Achebe on Conrad

[jbor]

Full text:
http://www.erinyes.org/hod/image.of.africa.html

Achebe, Chinua. "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness'"
Massachusetts Review. 18. 1977. Rpt. in Heart of Darkness, An Authoritative
Text, background and Sources Criticism. 1961. 3rd ed. Ed. Robert Kimbrough,
London: W. W Norton and Co., 1988, pp.251-261

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In the fall of 1974 I was walking one day from the English Department at the
University of Massachusetts to a parking lot. It was a fine autumn morning
such as encouraged friendliness to passing strangers. Brisk youngsters were
hurrying in all directions, many of them obviously freshmen in their first
flush of enthusiasm. An older man going the same way as I turned and
remarked to me how very young they came these days. I agreed. Then he asked
me if I was a student too. I said no, I was a teacher. What did I teach?
African literature. Now that was funny, he said, because he knew a fellow
who taught the same thing, or perhaps it was African history, in a certain
Community College not far from here. It always surprised him, he went on to
say, because he never had thought of Africa as having that kind of stuff,
you know. By this time I was walking much faster. "Oh well," I heard him say
finally, behind me: "I guess I have to take your course to find out." A few
weeks later I received two very touching letters from high school children
in Yonkers, New York, who -- bless their teacher -- had just read _Things
Fall Apart_. One of them was particularly happy to learn about the customs
and superstitions of an African tribe.

I propose to draw from these rather trivial encounters rather heavy
conclusions which at first sight might seem somewhat out of proportion to
them. But only, I hope, at first sight.

[ ... ]


A long excerpt from the essay with pictures here:

http://web.wwnorton.com/nael/nto/20thC/postcolonial/chachebefrm.htm