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May 22, 2013

John Thorne: They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman

John Rosemond: 'Disciplinary math' adds up to parental successl

Warren Richey: Are prayers before public meetings OK? Supreme Court to decide
Rick Montgomery: Use of ADHD drugs as study aid raises concern on campuses

Brierley Wright, M.S., R.D.: 6 convincing reasons you should keep carbs in your diet

Eoin O'Carroll: Scientists examine nothing, find something

The Kosher Gourmet by Carole Kotkin: This soup is made from one of the great pleasures of spring: A wonderful pairing of rosy color and earthy tang

May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting

May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel


Jewish World Review June 27, 2008 24 Sivan, 5768

Heart of Darkness

By Suzanne Fields


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | If you had met him, you might think he "had kicked himself loose of the earth" and "knew no restraint, no faith and no fear." He was once perceived as "remarkable" and a man of great promise, but had descended into unspeakable madness in the heart of Africa.


That's how the novelist Joseph Conrad describes Kurtz, the white man who leaps into lunacy in the Congo and becomes the focus of "Heart of Darkness," the novel Conrad wrote at the end of the 19th century. His horrific descriptions, I discovered when I recently read the book again, fit Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe.


The black man who transformed himself from idealistic freedom fighter to ruthless tyrant destroyed Zimbabwe along the way. The authentic African hero who set out to do good for his people made a mockery of the dreams and aspirations of those people. He ordered the deaths of at least 86 of his countrymen and the torture of thousands of others for the crime of wanting to vote for someone else to lead the nation.


Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition, yesterday withdrew from the national election, scheduled for tomorrow, because Mugabe's escalating campaign of blood and intimidation makes a free and fair election impossible. "We cannot ask the voters to cast their vote when that vote could cost them their lives," he said. "The regime does not even want to pretend the election would be free and fair."


Kurtz — Conrad gave him no other name — would understand the corruption and violence. The fictional hero was himself larger than life, moving from idealism — from believing he was a civilizing force — to descending into the darkness of his own making in a carnival of barbarity. At the end of his life, he is surrounded by a circle of disembodied heads impaled on spikes.


Robert Mugabe, alas, is real enough — a corrupt and vicious maximum leader who turned his nation from the breadbasket of a continent into a rotting wasteland. He lives in a "bubble of his own creation," observes Heidi Holland, who interviewed him for her book, "Dinner With Mugabe." He sees himself as right, never wrong. He made a hell of his country.


An analogy between fiction and real life is rarely precise, but a great novelist lends understanding of the evil that men can do. This is sometimes painful. "Heart of Darkness," accurate and insightful as it may be, has fallen prey to narrow prejudice, banned from many classrooms. If read at all, it's usually seen as a racist tract, even though the descriptions in the novel are no more racist than the news accounts of the Mugabe madness. Current opinion reflects what "is," just as Joseph Conrad reflected what "was."


"Heart of Darkness" was once assigned reading for schoolchildren in the United States and Great Britain, and is included in the Norton Anthology of English Literature. But just as truth is stranger than fiction, so fiction is sometimes an unbearable truth. Chinua Achebe, the Nigerian poet, novelist, critic and Nobel medalist, denounced the novel as 'bloody racist" and its author as a "thoroughgoing racist." The novel disappeared from classrooms.


Certain passages describe racist episodes, true enough, but Conrad presents them in their authentic era and invites readers to judge for themselves the evil that men do. Accurate news accounts of what Robert Mugabe is doing in Zimbabwe could be described as "racist," too, but Conrad explores racism from different angles, as only a novelist is free to do.


The Belgian colonizers saw the native Africans as "savages" and ruthlessly exploited them for commercial gain. The descriptions in "Heart of Darkness" are grotesque and powerful, and impossible to read without feeling outrage rising like bile in the throat. So, too, the outrage on reading the news accounts from Zimbabwe. Conrad makes it clear that "there was a touch of insanity" to the colonial enterprise in the Congo. There's more than a "touch of insanity" in the criminal Robert Mugabe, too.


Literature at its best describes social changes and emotions through specific plots, characters and settings and invites the reader to look more deeply into the heart of man. Joseph Conrad is no more the creator or condoner of evil than the journalist who observes and describes the evil of Mugabe and his thugs. The novelist captures complexity to expose the gradations of good and evil lurking in the human heart.


At the end of the novel, Kurtz, doomed to live in the heart of darkness created by his own hand, sees and understands what he has wrought, exclaiming: "The horror! The horror!" Robert Mugabe lives in a similar bubble of barbarity, but has yet to understand the evil he has created. The people he betrayed feel it all too well.

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