Conrad and Masculinity

Masculinity, ‘Woman’ and Truth 149
The philosophical keynote to this element in the story is set by the
statement (which seems to belong to the language-teacher as narrator):
‘A man’s real life is that accorded to him in the thoughts of other
men by reason of respect or natural love’ (14). ‘Man’ and ‘men’ here
are ambiguous in the way that they so often are in English before the
later twentieth century: they might be generic (meaning people) or
gender specific (meaning just men). The effect is generally to imply
that the latter is the privileged instance of the former: that is to say,
women are not necessarily excluded from such formulae, but often the
masculine instance is taken as the important or indicative one. There
is another measure here, though, of the difference between ‘Heart of
Darkness’ and Under Western Eyes. The real life of Marlow and Kurtz
most assuredly does not lie in the thoughts of the Intended. In ‘Heart
of Darkness’ women’s knowledge is not valued. In Under Western Eyes
Natalia’s ‘respect’ and (potential) ‘natural love’ are indeed important
to Razumov, while Sophia and Tekla are also characters whose understanding
and love count for something.
These key scenes between Razumov and Mikulin establish misunderstanding
as a theme, as well as instigating its role as the mode of
communication and interaction between the characters. Razumov is
misunderstood by his fellow students, his silence interpreted as
unshakeable integrity. He goes on to be misunderstood by Natalia
Haldin and the revolutionaries in Geneva, where the veiled confessions
which he cannot help making are systematically misinterpreted
so as to protect him and conceal his guilt. Most crucially as regards the
narrative structure, Razumov is misunderstood (though in a rather
different manner) by the language-teacher, the narrator on the next
diegetic level. The teacher repeatedly stresses his own inability to
comprehend the Russian temperament and Razumov’s nature and
motives in particular. For example, he professes himself unable to
understand why Razumov wrote his diary, his textual confession:
It would be idle to inquire why Mr. Razumov has left this record
behind him. It is inconceivable that he should have wished any
human eye to see it ... What sort of peace Kirylo Sidorovitch
Razumov expected to find in the writing up of his record it passeth
my understanding to guess.
(4–5)
Why, one might in turn wonder, does the language-teacher write his
own narrative? He stresses his inability to understand his material, his