I see women in HoD as the repositories of male ideology.
However, I'd like to say firstly that, somehow judging Conrad for portraying females as innocent or ignorant people, is misguided. The historical context in which he wrote the novel must be taken into account. He could not have created a Sarah Palin type character (this text was written just after the 2008 election) as women like that didn't exist yet. Judging from the way he went against the grain in his day, if he were alive and writing today, I'm sure he would have championed women's rights.
Secondly, the setting and events of the novel were (and to some extent, still are, a male dominated one) and therefore he can be commended in that he found a way to include women characters at all. A 19th century naval captain sailing up the Congo river - where would I have put a woman into that kind of background? - probably as a cliched damsel in distress! That's why no one reads my books.
In order to answer why they are there, think about who they are. Who are the women in HoD? Obviously there are the old knitters, there is the Intended (interesting name, was it just coincidence that he named her that?), the savage woman, the woman in the portrait and the aunt. You can rest assured they are there for a reason and that reason is not as 'eye candy' or to humiliate the females of our species.
They all represent, in particular the Intended, the woman in the portrait and the savage beauty, the ideals of the men who fill the pages. That said, the women in HOD are most certainly superficial characters who do little to push the story forward. Yet I don't see them as being meant as 'individuals', they are meant to represent the ideals which are the driving force of the male characters' actions. I suppose you could say they are all metaphors.
The Intended is just that, the way things were intended to be. She represents fairness, civility, accountability etc. The way things are intended to be, but sadly aren't. Thus she must be protected and remain ignorant, or what's the point? Don't look at her as a woman, but as (sorry but I have to say it again), an ideal. That's why she is protected and kept ignorant. If she knows the way things really are, the ideal that we strive for falters. She represents, as an ideal not as a person, the reason why Marlow simply does not carry on where Kurtz stopped. If that which the female characters represent ceases to be, what then becomes the point of restraint? We may as well all of us start making human sacrifices on a whim.
As an alternative to understand this, watch Copolla's film Apocalypse Now. There is a scene where, amongst all the chaos of war in the jungle, three Playboy playmates are flown in to dance for the troops. What do these women represent? The same thing really. They represent America, freedom of expression etc. they represent 'back home', Sunday barbecues with your buddies talking baseball and pin-up girls whilst the wives are doing the dishes. The three playmates are not characters, they are the repositories of the ideals for which the troops are fighting and they too are kept ignorant about the realities of war. That's the way it has to be, it is what upholds the ideal. It doesn't matter if that ideal is comendable, fact is it exists. If what those women mean ceases to exist, why would those young soldiers give their lives in battle next day?
"They live in a world of their own, and there had never been anything like it, and never can be. It is too beautiful altogether and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset."
Apply this quote, not to women but to ideologies and idealists. Apply it to Marxist Communism on paper (a beautiful dream) and then the Russian reality that Stalin set up. Apply it to the American Dream, where everyone can win, but having a winner necessarily sets up the existence of a loser. Ideologies are all beautiful and all go to pieces when the dark heart of man touches them.
Notice in the film that the three playmates are also protected - they perform on some kind of wharf or jetty where neither the troops can get to them, nor they the troops. Imagine if they were to come into contact with the reality of the soldiers' lives, maybe 'servicing' them as prostitutes. The illusion of an 'ideal back home' would be shattered. The men would be raping their own ideal and consequently their reason for dying in the jungle. The base instincts of the soldiers watching the show proves to be just that, to rape and possess (as was the base instinct of the colonisers with regards to Africa as a continent), but for the structure to remain in place, the women must remain aloof, untouchable and distant.
And there you have the lie that is 'hated' and 'detested'.
Notice also that they, the playmates, seem ignorant as to the reality of war, the darker actions man is capable of. When the soldiers start jumping in the water, swimming across to them, they seem confused and don't know how to react. They are ignorant of this dark reality, and must remain so.
That is how I see women in HoD. The repositories of male ideals. Ideals which cannot by definition, be a day to day reality, they have to be as real and yet as untouchable as dreams.
So although the Intended and the Playmates are the repositories of different ideals created in different eras, their function in the respective narratives is very similar.
With over a hundred (or close to forty) years' retrospective hindsight, we could say both the book and the film portray women in a chauvenistic way. And by today's standards that is true. However, we could also say that they were not really meant to be characters portraying or representing the female species. Instead they represent something men strive after, something which is part of their world but is not OF them, something which by definition, they can never truly possess. That could be said both of ideals and (from the point of view of a heterosexual male) women.
Sorry if I babbled on, this is my first post. Sorry also that I digressed a little and dribbled on about the film. Just seemed an easier way to make my point.
