The Symptoms of a Heart of Darkness

In Heart of Darkness, Conrad appears to construct a symptomatic narrative a narrative which is, itself, intended to be read as a collection of symptoms indicating an underlying historical agent. This symptomatic approach may be read as extending through every aspect of the novella, from characterisation to Conrad's use of metaphor. Symptoms are subjective abnormalities in the status quo, observed or experienced indications of a change the end point of a causal chain the measure of which may only be gauged (at least initially) by the extent and the severity of the symptoms it renders. As such, symptoms, by definition, cannot be directly measured and are therefore ineffable. As such, reading Heart of Darkness as a symptomatic text also entails the reading of the means by which Conrad depicts causal chains and that which is ineffable within the text.