What is the role of society in the process of self-realization as presented in Heart of Darkness and The Awakening? The role that society plays in Heart of Darkness and The Awakening are strikingly different. In the former novel, a concise idea is presented stipulating what it means to be a realized person, while in the latter we find many examples, each contrasting the other, of realized people. Conrad's realization holds society in its center, …showed first 75 words of 898 total…

…showed last 75 words of 898 total…societal roles, in particular that of motherhood, by committing suicide. While reading Heart of Darkness and The Awakening, the reader becomes aware of multiple ways that the society at large affects our notion of self and what it means to realize this self. The ideas that lie in both novels are generally regarded as truisms amongst all cultures: That of not living a lie and that one human should not dominate over another.