Postmodernist Literary Theory

Postmodernist theory is all about breaking away from the conventions of the times, not trusting usual areas of knowledge, breaking out of established structures of writing, and seeing that there are many truths and ways for language to be interpreted. Looking at the book through this lens, immediately the multiple narrators (5 in all) are signs of a untraditional story-telling style of a singular narrator. Also, we notice in the telling of the story that every member of the Price family has a narrating voice except Nathan, the Reverend and preacher. This changes the overview of the family in that we only see his actions through his family member's eyes--and therefore we get a biased report, as they speak from their feelings and after punishments such as The Verse. Language is played with by giving us narrative from the perspectives of an adult, teenagers, and a young child, which all invite different levels of maturity, grammar, and bias.

The subject matter of The Poisonwood Bible is of an evangelical Baptist trying to bring religion and overall structure and savior to the Africans in the Congolese town he travels to. This fights (and up to this point, loses) with the unstructured lives of the Congolese people, and in this way embodies the postmodernist spirit with the survival of the lack of structure. The style of the novel also lacks structure, with no numbered chapters and periods of the book which span an afternoon and others which span a month given equal time. Nathan omits from his memory all the instances of his wife trying and succeeding in reaching out to the Congolese, perhaps to feel more important in comparison and independent, and this skews the truth of their respective capabilities.

Apocalypse Now vs. Heart of Darkness

The major difference that makes a large impact on the story is the fact that in the Congo, the object of being there--and through that--why Mr. Kurtz was there, was that it was for material and financial gain, while it wasn't in Vietnam, which is the setting of Apocalypse Now. The reason that the U.S went to war in Vietnam was to ensure that the communist South didn't change the North into communists, as a proxy war in the larger Cold War with The Soviet Union. So the war was for philosophical and politic reasons, not to plunder the natural resources of the Vietnamese. Because Mr. Kurtz was, while unconventional and at odds with the government that he worked for in both book and movie, bringing very large quantities of profitable Ivory in for the 'government' ran by King Leopold, they had some relative value for him. He was making them very rich, it was just that he was unconventional, and apparently spoiling the region for some time to come. So, in Heart of Darkness, Mr. Kurtz had some intrinsic value monetarily for Leopold, and therefore some worth himself. It changes his worth and therefore the reasons for all happenings to set the story in Vietnam where he was not providing a revenue source, but rather just holding an outpost. It makes him less valuable and therefore causes the leadership to order his execution. It also changes the motivations that led to his brutality with Vietnamese life. In Apocalypse Now, he murders for power, because he can, and because it is wartime. In Heart of Darkness, Mr. Kurtz murders for intimidation (to collect Ivory easier) and because he can. To note, in Apocalypse Now Kurtz does have value in recognizing key enemy agents, but this isn't recognized by the leadership. Also, because Mr. Kurtz was sending back a chain of Ivory back at all times, the leadership could still feel a connection, and some modicum of control over what he did. This, however was not the case in Apocalypse Now because all the leadership in charge of the Vietnam war could do was read the reports on the chaos and assassinations carried out by Kurtz, and so they (rightfully) felt helplessly out of touch and control.