This Deconstruction Of Imperial Discourse Is Itself Reflected In The Form.

This deconstruction of Imperial discourse is itself reflected in the form. As Said suggests, the nature of Conrad's structure, with its rigid, inorganic artificiality mirrors the paucity of the central cultural motifs. The definite binary nature of the discourse is twinned with the bisection of the form into two parts; depicting the descent of the main characters' psychologies.
We can see, then that whereas Mary Shelley's Frankenstein does indeed contain notions of binary logic and logocentricity, it also seeks to break down its own discourses by allowing the supplement to have a voice. The monster is itself, in many ways a brisure, a hinge, for notions of civilization and savagery, presence and absence, even life and death. The fluid, organic form of the novel clearly reflects not only this but the social and political flux that was present at the early part of the nineteenth century.
The form of Conrad's tale reflects the rigidity of the late Victorian sensibility; no longer is the suppressed other given a voice and a platform, no longer are there doubts as to the ethical nature of the project in question. As Edward Said and others have stated, the colonial position was as much a construction of strong and distinct socio-political boundaries for Great Britain and Europe as anything else. Whether or not Conrad sought to reflect it consciously in a narrative, there is a direct link between the form and the content.
What can we now say of the nature of this shift? As we have seen, there was a change certainly between the use of form in the early part of the nineteenth century and the latter part. Shelley's structure is looser, freer, even to some extent postmodern reflective of what Derrida in Structure, Sign and Play (2004) calls bricolage; the adoption of tools at hand. However, as I have shown, colonial readings of the novel are still possible, it still contains images and leitmotifs that could be considered commensurate with the Orientalist notions of Said, notions that come fully to fruition in Conrad's story.
The nature of this shift, then, could be classed as evolutionary rather than either continuous or revolutionary. The seeds of the Imperial discourse are clearly present in Mary Shelley's novel with its images of vague non-specific othering and supplement formation. Whether concerned with race, gender or class Frankenstein seems to be a novel concerned with the formation of social monsters, monsters that in Conrad's story have evolved into recognizable racial groups.

It is easy to see how this ideological shift permeates the very structures used by each author and the difference in form between Shelley and Conrad is mirrored in a myriad of other comparisons in English literature.