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Question 17 • $2526: sem 1: 1001410: English 4 HONORS: NEW

Which excerpt is historical evidence that supports Achebe’s claim about why Heart of Darkness is popular despite its racist elements?

Answer

“Travelers with closed minds can tell us little except about themselves. But even those not blinkered, like Conrad, with xenophobia, can be astonishingly blind.”

“A few weeks later I received two very touching letters from high school children in Yonkers, New York, who —bless their teacher—had just read Things Fall Apart.”

“For did not that erudite British historian and Regius Professor at Oxford, Hugh Trevor Roper, also pronounce that African history did not exist?”

“We were wanderers on a prehistoric earth, on an earth that wore the aspect of an unknown planet. We could have fancied ourselves the first of men taking possession of an accursed inheritance.”

Explanation

Trevor Roper’s claim that African history “did not exist” is historical evidence of racist attitudes among influential Europeans. Those attitudes help explain why Heart of Darkness could remain popular: its portrayal of Africa as lacking history or civilization affirmed views its audience already held. Choice D is a passage from Conrad’s story, not historical evidence about the attitudes that contributed to its popularity.

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