Configuration of Female Characters in Conrad’s Novels
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This paper aims to explore the ways in which Joseph Conrad portrays female characters in his works, ranging from his first novel Almayer’s Folly through The Secret Agent to Under Western Eyes. There might be a possible link between Conrad’s anti-imperialistic stance and his feminist views in terms of sharing a common endorsement for the liberation of the oppressed and his female characters. Conrad takes an ambivalent view of his female characters who are simultaneously justice-doers and outlaws. On the one hand, they are capable of inflicting a savage wound on Euro-centric, patriarchal, white male supremacy. On the other hand, they are on the verge of hysteria, madness, and self-destruction. The female figures under scrutiny are wide-ranging. Nina, in Almayer’s Folly, is a rebel disillusioned with Western civilization. Aissa, in An Outcast of the Islands, kills her lover, Peter Willems, a white European lost in the Malay. In Heart of Darkness, Kurtz’s Intended is pictured as a despicable figure living in a world of illusion and Kurtz’s African mistress as a noble savage. Winnie Verloc, in The Secret Agent, brutally murders her husband with a knife after he betrays her. Finally, Nathalia Haldin, in Under Western Eyes, naively advocates Russian revolution. Arguably, Conrad is neither fully misogynist nor feminist, but perhaps a bit of both. Conrad takes an ambivalent view of female characters whose actions, in his view, have both potential and limitations, allowing the reader to impose his/ her own ideas on them.
Abstract
This paper aims to explore the ways in which Joseph Conrad portrays female characters in his works, ranging from his first novel Almayer’s Folly through The Secret Agent to Under Western Eyes. There might be a possible link between Conrad’s anti-imperialistic stance and his feminist views in terms of sharing a common endorsement for the liberation of the oppressed and his female characters. Conrad takes an ambivalent view of his female characters who are simultaneously justice-doers and outlaws. On the one hand, they are capable of inflicting a savage wound on Euro-centric, patriarchal, white male supremacy. On the other hand, they are on the verge of hysteria, madness, and self-destruction. The female figures under scrutiny are wide-ranging. Nina, in Almayer’s Folly, is a rebel disillusioned with Western civilization. Aissa, in An Outcast of the Islands, kills her lover, Peter Willems, a white European lost in the Malay. In Heart of Darkness, Kurtz’s Intended is pictured as a despicable figure living in a world of illusion and Kurtz’s African mistress as a noble savage. Winnie Verloc, in The Secret Agent, brutally murders her husband with a knife after he betrays her. Finally, Nathalia Haldin, in Under Western Eyes, naively advocates Russian revolution. Arguably, Conrad is neither fully misogynist nor feminist, but perhaps a bit of both. Conrad takes an ambivalent view of female characters whose actions, in his view, have both potential and limitations, allowing the reader to impose his/ her own ideas on them.
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