Similarities Between Heart Of Darkness And Things Fall Apart

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Heart of darkness was written by Joseph Conrad in 1899. Things fall apart was written by Chinua Achebe in 1958. These two books described the first encounter of the African people and the European colonists. But the differences between these two books are the point of view of the author. Heart of darkness was written by a non-African. On the other hands, Things fall apart was written by an African man. Their perspectives were also affected by the period of time that each author wrote their books. Author bias in Things fall apart and Heart of darkness affected the book many ways. There are several similarities and differences between these two pieces of works.
The author if Things fall apart, Chinua Achebe. He wanted the reader to understand more about the culture of the Igbo. His narrations were focus on mostly the villager of the Igbo village rather than the European colonist even though his book took place at the first encounters between the Igbo people and the colonist. Chinua talked about how the Igbo people used Kola Nut as present to serve the guest (page 2, chapter 1). He described the beauty of Igbo arts, for example at the beginning of chapter 6, Chinua …show more content…

For example, "They passes me within six inches, without a glance, with that complete, deathlike indifference of unhappy savages" Conrad describe them as soulless, criminals, outraged law, bursting shells. His used of words were very strong and violent on how he describes the Africans. He describes the land in Africa as a "swamp, savagery, cold, fog, exile and death" Conrad referred African man as animal when he said "He was an improved specimen; he could fire up a vertical boiler. He was there below me, and, upon my word, to look at him was as edifying as seeing a dog in a parody of breeches and a feather hat, walking on his hind-legs" What he meant was African is just wild animal under the point of view of European