One Hundred Years of Darkness [Hardcover]

Marcus Bleasdale (Author), Jon Swain (Author), Marcus Bleasdale (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 2003

Published to mark the centenary of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" this large format book of black and white photographs of contemporary Congo combines haunting images by Marcus Bleasdale with an essay by Jon Swain of London's Sunday Times. Each photograph is accompanied by a quote from the classic novel and extended captions detail life today in the former Belgian colony. This book is based on Marcus Bleasdale's travels throughout Congo between 2000 and 2002. 82 tri-tone photographs. 290mm wide x 245mm deep.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Marcus Bleasdale has produced a sensitive but by no means sentimental portrait of an extraordinary nation and its thwarted people. -- Michela Wrong - Author of 'In the footsteps of Mr Kurtz'

Marcus clearly felt the "continued vibration" of Conrad’s words his photographs also attest to the remarkable spirit of the Congolese. -- Professor Robert Hampson, Royal Holloway, University of London, Conrad Editor for Penguin Books

These images overflow with mood, and the everpresent threat of violence from boot or gun. Conrad would approve -- Tom Stoddart, Photographer

From the Publisher

Published to mark the centenary of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" this large format book of black and white photographs of contemporary Congo combines haunting images by Marcus Bleasdale with an essay by Jon Swain of London's Sunday Times. Each photograph is accompanied by a quote from the classic novel and extended captions detail life in the former Belgian colony. This book is based on Marcus Bleasdale's travels throughout Congo between 2000 and 2002. Conrad called the exploitation by the white colonialists he found in the Congo -personified by Kurtz -the "vilest scramble for loot that ever disfigured the history of human conscience." A century on from Conrad s indictment of colonialism, the Congo continues to be the symbol of darkest Africa: a place of decay, inhumanity and endless fascination. Rusted overcrowded ferry boats still ply the Congo River, laden with a menagerie of forest animals bound for market. Pygmies still dwell in the vast and forbidding equatorial forests, as do rebels and smugglers, who still live off Congo s riches -from ivory to cambium to oil. Jailed four times in the two years he spent taking these photographs, Marcus Bleasdale faced daily threats and intimidation in order to capture life under Kabila s brutal regime. He is one of the few photographers to penetrate contemporary Congo's interior. Bleasdale s photographs peel away the strata of mud, water and time that overlay a century of life on the Congo River, to reveal that not very much has changed.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: Pirogue Pr (July 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0954301501
• ISBN-13: 978-0954301507
• Product Dimensions: 11.7 x 9.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,326,585 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fine quality photojournalism, August 20, 2003

By 

londonreader21 - See all my reviews

This review is from: One Hundred Years of Darkness (Hardcover)

Fifth longest river in the world and second only to the Nile on the African continent, the Congo river is 2720 miles long. It is also sub-Saharan Africa's greatest thoroughfare: a living roadway up which, even at the driest times of the year, barges in excess of 1000 tons are able to penetrate more than 650 miles. But the heart of darkness referred to in the title of Conrad's famous story didn't originate in the unexplored far reaches of the river. Instead it slid against the flow towards the interior during the vast region's exploitation by nineteenth century colonialists. Conrad witnessed this rape first hand in 1890, was horrified by it, and Heart of Darkness was the parable by which he described its effect upon him.

One hundred years on from first publication of Conrad's classic story the photographer Marcus Bleasdale found himself sitting on the banks of the river reflecting on the manner in which the inheritors of the colonial past have so easily adopted the manner of their European predecessors. In his introduction to One Hundred years of Darkness he talks of witnessing through Conrad's lens the "anonymous lives" of today's Congolese: "as desperate and as dire today" as in the time of Conrad's fictional creation Kurtz.

Bleasdale describes his journey in monochrome. Colour is cheaper to print today but Pirogue Press have spared no expense, reproducing Bleasdale's imagery in delicate tri-tone. And the words of Conrad's story intertwine themselves with Bleasdale's contemporary captions. Bleasdale's own journeys on the river do not however adopt the traditional photojournalistic narrative, the images instead revealing their layered secrets slowly and in details often placed at the edges of the frame. Captions describe the subject of individual pictures as we learn of child soldiers, millions displaced by wars rarely mentioned in Europe, salaried employees of the UN sunning themselves beside hotel swimming pools, children born with Malaria and abandoned by parents, ferryboats that remain the region's lifeblood and pygmies: the original inhabitants of the Congo, apparently still renowned as trackers. But taken as a whole the photographs combine to bear witness to the greater truth: the darkness first witnessed by Conrad remains to this day.

A fascinating book and far from the last I imagine we will see from the camera of Mr Bleasdale.