Heart of Darkness Second Paragraph

Marlow did not want to taint Kurtz’s cousin’s belief that Kurtz was a musical genius and instead convinced himself of the plausibility of this claim. Kurtz’s cousin tells Marlow that Kurtz “ was a great musician” and “an immense success”(Conrad, 425). Although Marlow says that there was no reason to doubt the validity of what the cousin believed Kurtz to be, he was unsure if a “great musician” was the most accurate statement. However, Marlow says, “to this day I am unable to say what was Kurtz’s profession, whether he ever had any—which was the greatest of his talents“ (Conrad, 425).  The fact that Marlow can consider Kurtz’s lack of a profession as his greatest talent shows that Marlow tries to only see the good in Kurtz. Marlow is allowing society to believe Kurtz was something he was not. He even convinces himself that it is feasible that Kurtz could have been a great musician. Nevertheless, he believes it was more probable that Kurtz was “a painter who wrote for the paper” or “a journalist who could paint” (Conrad, 425). This shows that Marlow did not believe that Kurtz was a genius in anything, but rather a versatile individual who had a little talent in various tasks. Thereby, although Marlow does not exactly concur with the cousin’s vision of Kurtz, he does not taint his vision.