Heart of Darkness

By Joseph Conrad and Mint Editions

The Heart of Darkness is a powerful examination of the savage nature of western imperialism in the late 1890s. With stunning relevance to the politics and tribulations of today’s society, Joseph Conrad’s celebrated novel is just as important today as when it was initially published.

The story follows a young man named Charles Marlow. Soon after Marlow joins the Company as captain of a riverboat for a Belgian group organized to trade with the Congo, he uncovers is a fate worse than any life he could have imagined in London. Throughout the journey, Captain Marlow cannot turn away from the stark injustices and atrocious crimes being committed by the company he works for. Reflecting many of the experiences Conrad himself endured, The Heart of Darkness spares no mercy when retelling the many atrocities committed by imperial commanders; because of this, the story has long been considered required reading for all those seeking to better understand the true nature of colonialism. Told from the gaze of an employee privy to the conquest of the colonialist venture, Marlow’s experiences are considered exemplary of the brutal nature of human exploitation.

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Mint Editions
• Release date: Apr 7, 2020
• ISBN: 9781513263748

Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) was a Polish-British writer, regarded as one of the greatest novelists in the English language. Though he was not fluent in English until the age of twenty, Conrad mastered the language and was known for his exceptional command of stylistic prose. Inspiring a reoccurring nautical setting, Conrad’s literary work was heavily influenced by his experience as a ship’s apprentice. Conrad’s style and practice of creating anti-heroic protagonists is admired and often imitated by other authors and artists, immortalizing his innovation and genius.

Book preview

Chapter 1

The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a flutter of the sails, and was at rest. The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for it was to come to and wait for the turn of the tide.

The sea-reach of the Thames stretched before us like the beginning of an interminable waterway. In the offing the sea and the sky were welded together without a joint, and in the luminous space the tanned sails of the barges drifting up with the tide seemed to stand still in red clusters of canvas sharply peaked, with gleams of varnished sprits. A haze rested on the low shores that ran out to sea in vanishing flatness. The air was dark above Gravesend, and farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brooding motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town on earth.

The Director of Companies was our captain and our host. We four affectionately watched his back as he stood in the bows looking to seaward. On the whole river there was nothing that looked half so nautical. He resembled a pilot, which to a seaman is trustworthiness personified. It was difficult to realize his work was not out there in the luminous estuary, but behind him, within the brooding gloom.

Between us there was, as I have already said somewhere, the bond of the sea. Besides holding our hearts together through long periods of separation, it had the effect of making us tolerant of each other’s yarns—and even convictions. The Lawyer—the best of old fellows—had, because of his many years and many virtues, the only cushion on deck, and was lying on the only rug. The Accountant had brought out already a box of dominoes, and was toying architecturally with the bones. Marlow sat cross-legged right aft, leaning against the mizzen-mast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and, with his arms dropped, the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol. The director, satisfied the anchor had good hold, made his way aft and sat down amongst us. We exchanged a few words lazily. Afterwards there was silence on board the yacht. For some reason or other we did not begin that game of dominoes. We felt meditative, and fit for nothing but placid staring. The day was ending in a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance. The water shone pacifically; the sky, without a speck, was a benign immensity of unstained light; the very mist on the Essex marsh was like a gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from the wooded rises inland, and draping the low shores in diaphanous folds. Only the gloom to the west, brooding over the upper reaches, became more sombre every minute, as if angered by the approach of the sun.

And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall, the sun sank low, and from glowing white changed to a dull red without rays and without heat, as if about to go out suddenly, stricken to death by the touch of that gloom brooding over a crowd of men.

Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity became less brilliant but more profound. The old river in its broad reach rested unruffled at the decline of day, after ages of good service done to the race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil dignity of a waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth. We looked at the venerable stream not in the vivid flush of a short day that comes and departs for ever, but in the august light of abiding memories. And indeed nothing is easier for a man who has, as the phrase goes, followed the sea with reverence and affection, than to evoke the great spirit of the past upon the lower reaches of the Thames. The tidal current runs to and fro in its unceasing service, crowded with memories of men and ships it had borne to the rest of home or to the battles of the sea. It had known and served all the men of whom the nation is proud, from Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights all, titled and untitled—the great knights-errant of the sea. It had borne all the ships whose names are like jewels flashing in the night of time, from the Golden Hind returning with her rotund flanks full of treasure, to be visited by the Queen’s Highness and thus pass out of the gigantic tale, to the Erebus and Terror, bound on other conquests—and that never returned. It had known the ships and the men. They had sailed from Deptford, from Greenwich, from Erith—the adventurers and the settlers; kings’ ships and the ships of men on ‘Change; captains, admirals, the dark interlopers of the Eastern trade, and the commissioned generals of East India fleets. Hunters for gold or pursuers of fame, they all had gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a spark from the sacred fire. What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unknown earth! … The dreams of men, the seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.

The sun set; the dusk fell on the stream, and lights began to appear along the shore. The Chapman light-house, a three-legged thing erect on a mud-flat, shone strongly. Lights of ships moved in the fairway—a great stir of lights going up and going down. And farther west on the upper reaches the place of the monstrous town was still marked ominously on the sky, a brooding gloom in sunshine, a lurid glare under the stars.

And this also, said Marlow suddenly, has been one of the dark places of the earth.

He was the only man of us who still followed the sea. The worst that could be said of him was that he did not represent his class. He was a seaman, but he was a wanderer, too, while most seamen lead, if one may so express it, a sedentary life. Their minds are of the stay-at-home order, and their home is always with them—the ship; and so is their country—the sea. One ship is very much like another, and the sea is always the same. In the immutability of their surroundings the foreign shores, the foreign faces, the changing immensity of life, glide past, veiled not by a sense of mystery but by a slightly disdainful ignorance; for there is nothing mysterious to a seaman unless it be the sea itself, which is the mistress of his existence and as inscrutable as Destiny. For the rest, after his hours of work, a casual stroll or a casual spree on shore suffices to unfold for him the secret of a whole continent, and generally he finds the secret not worth knowing. The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside, enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.

His remark did not seem at all surprising. It was just like Marlow. It was accepted in silence. No one took the trouble to grunt even; and presently he said, very slow—I was thinking of very old times, when the Romans first came here, nineteen hundred years ago—the other day.… Light came out of this river since—you say Knights? Yes; but it is like a running blaze on a plain, like a flash of lightning in the clouds. We live in the flicker—may it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling! But darkness was here yesterday. Imagine the feelings of a commander of a fine—what d’ye call ’em?—trireme in the Mediterranean, ordered suddenly to the north; run overland across the Gauls in a hurry; put in charge of one of these craft the legionaries—a wonderful lot of handy men they must have been, too—used to build, apparently by the hundred, in a month or two, if we may believe what we read. Imagine him here—the very end of the world, a sea the colour of lead, a sky the colour of smoke, a kind of ship about as rigid as a concertina—and going up this river with stores, or orders, or what you like. Sand-banks, marshes, forests, savages,—precious little to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing but Thames water to drink. No Falernian wine here, no going ashore. Here and there a military camp lost in a wilderness, like a needle in a bundle of hay—cold, fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death—death skulking in the air, in the water, in the bush. They must have been dying like flies here. Oh, yes—he did it. Did it very well, too, no doubt, and without thinking much about it either, except afterwards to brag of what he had gone through in his time, perhaps. They were men enough to face the darkness. And perhaps he was cheered by keeping his eye on a chance of promotion to the fleet at Ravenna by and by, if he had good friends in Rome and survived the awful climate. Or think of a decent young citizen in a toga—perhaps too much dice, you know—coming out here in the train of some prefect, or tax-gatherer, or trader even, to mend his fortunes. Land in a swamp, march through the woods, and in some inland post feel the savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him—all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There’s no initiation either into such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the abomination—you know, imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate.

He paused.

Mind, he began again, lifting one arm from the elbow, the palm of the hand outwards, so that, with his legs folded before him, he had the pose of a Buddha preaching in European clothes and without a lotus-flower—"Mind, none of us would feel exactly like this. What saves us is efficiency—the devotion to efficiency. But these chaps were not much account, really. They were no colonists; their administration was merely a squeeze, and nothing more, I suspect. They were conquerors, and for that you want only brute force—nothing to boast of, when you have it, since your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others. They grabbed what they could get for the sake of what was to be got. It was just robbery with violence, aggravated murder on a great scale, and men going at it blind—as is very proper for those who tackle a darkness. The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when

Reviews for Heart of Darkness

[thewestwing-864351 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Having just read a history of the belgian Congo I think I appreciated this book far more than I would have if I didn't know the full history of the subject dealt with in the book. As I could identify characters and situations within the book I was able to relate to it more.

[charrlygirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In an effort to class up the joint, I listened to this audio book performed by Kenneth Branagh.

I say performed, because it wasn't just a plain reading of the story. He added depth to the observations and took what I might have found to be a boring story and breathed life into it.

I enjoyed this quite a bit and would recommend this audio version to anyone interested in this classic tale.

[pilgrimjess · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

“Your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others.”I remember reading this book many years ago when I realised that one of my favourite all-time books, Thomas Kenneally's "The Playmaker", had taken it's inspiration from it and I remember it having a powerful affect on me. Re-reading years later it still has that same affect.Most readers will know the story centres around Marlow and his journey up the Congo River where he meets Kurtz, an agent for the Belgian Government in Africa. Marlow is beguiled with the image of the River Congo and dreams of travelling up it. To fulfil this ambition he takes a job as a riverboat captain with a Belgian concern organized to trade in the Congo. On his travels Marlow encounters widespread inefficiency and brutality. The native inhabitants of the region suffer terribly from overwork and ill treatment at the hands of their European overseers. The cruelty and squalor of imperial enterprise contrasts sharply with the majestic jungle that surrounds the white man’s settlements, making them appear to be tiny islands amidst a vast darkness.This novella explores the issues surrounding imperialism. On his journey Marlow encounters scenes of torture, cruelty, and slavery. The men who work for the Company describe what they do as “trade,” and their treatment of native Africans is part of a benevolent project of “civilization.” In contrast Kurtz admits that he takes ivory by force nor does not hide the fact that he rules through violence and intimidation. His perverse honesty leads to his downfall, as his success threatens to expose the evil practices behind European activity in Africa. Africans in this book are mostly objects: Marlow himself refers to his helmsman as a piece of machinery so is not totally blameless on this point. However, the brutal honesty shown by Kurtz as compared with the hypocrisy shown by the other Europeans leads Marlow and thus the reader to begin to sympathize with Kurtz and view the Company with suspicion. The insanity that Kurtz is obviously suffering from is explicit and easy to see whereas that of the European Governments, whilst no doubt there, is much more implicit. In this book therefore, madness is linked to absolute power. Up country Kurtz has no authority to whom he answers to other himself and this comes to over-whelm him whereas it is more of a collective madness shown by the other Europeans.As such this book then becomes an exploration of hypocrisy, ambiguity, and moral confusion in as much Marlow is forced to align himself with either the hypocritical and malicious colonial bureaucracy or the openly tyrannical Kurtz. To try and describe either alternative as the lesser of two evils seems to be absolute madness.This is not some rip-roaring read and at times it is hard going but it does challenge some very uncomfortable truths and as such deserves to be regarded rightly as a true classic.

[bookomaniac-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Uiteraard een klassieker, maar desondanks zeer intrigerend. Sterk accent op stemming en sfeerschepping: duister, mysterieus.Maar stilistisch meestal grote omhaal van woorden en daardoor niet helemaal geslaagd.Te lezen als ultieme explorie van het innerlijk van de mens in extreme omstandigheden

[geraldlange · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Damn good catalyst.

[santhony_35 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Like most people, I was familiar with Heart of Darkness, both as an acclaimed work of literature and as the inspiration for the remarkable movie Apocolypse Now. For some reason, I recently decided to make an attempt at reading it, despite my concern that it was written at a level beyond my capacity to understand. Upon receipt of the volume from Amazon, I was initially under the impression that I had mistakenly ordered the Cliff's Notes version of the work. I had no idea that the book was essentially a short story, easily readable in 2-3 hours. Even more surprising, was the ease with which I was able to follow and understand the story, though admittedly written in a slightly dense prose. Perhaps this was due to having seen Apocolypse Now and being familiar with the broad outline of the story and having read other works of history on the Belgian Congo. In any event, it was a decent story, filled with some beautifully descriptive language and imagery. I must say, however, that I was not bowled over. Steamship Captain pilots a ragged boat up the Congo, accompanied by colonial agents and support staff (cannibals and other natives) in an attempt to relieve a long stranded station agent (Kurtz) who has "gone native" and become the insane source of worship for the local natives. If you've seen Apocolypse Now, you know the story, just replace the Mekong with the Congo. I go back to my first paragraph in which I related a concern over my ability to understand what is considered a classic work of literature. I fully understood it, but was perhaps not qualified to fully appreciate it.

[m.belljackson · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Jeremiah 17:9 sums up Marlow's message in Heart of Darkness: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.Who can know it?"Though the book is less gruesome and terrifying than Apocalypse Now,it has a stronger reach for an imagination."...the sea-reach of the Thames..." > ah, how Joseph Conrad lulls us in.If not for the title, we'd feel nice and cozy, sipping our holiday tea by the fireplace. Marlow again tells the story, sounding not as chipperas he did in LORD JIM, leading readers to "...the very end of the world...."There's still the author's trademark racist descriptions of "blacks" andcannibals do not fare as well as in Moby-Dick. No wonder Conrad described Melville as "romantic."Where Melville gives us Cannibal Light,Conrad serves up Cannibals-with-a-Hint.Thanks to both of them for sparring us more.The story feels unfinished without knowing the reasons for the behavior of Kurtz and his descent into madness. Did his base desires and actions propel him or was The Horror in his mind?

[sasham-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the second time I've started this book. I tried to read it in my late teens but could not deal with the brutality toward the Africans by the Europeans. I'm not sure that the "darkness" Conrad refers to is the same "darkness" I see in the book. For me this is about the attitude and actions of the colonists / company men toward the native tribes' people. But I get the feeling that Conrad's contemporary readers (at time of publication) would have been more horrified at the way Kurtz "went native" so to speak.
One paragraph did really stand out for me and in it Conrad says (paraphrase)who would we be if we didn't have the judgement of our neighbours / friends / family / society around us; if we were completely free of all expectations and only had our own morality to guide us? How many people obey the rules for fear of what society would do to them if who they really are were to show?
The darkness that will stay in my head is the wholesale destruction of a native society for greed and profit - a destruction that continues today in that area of the world.

[solitaryfossil · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I finished Joseph Conrad’s novella, “Heart of Darkness” this morning. I’m really a bit Ho-hum about it, can’t really recommend it.

[laura.w.douglas · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My favorite book!

[shirleybell · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed the claustrophic, intense feel of the narrative (reminded me somewhat of Frankenstein) although I am not at all sure I fully understood what was happening, all of the time. One day I will re-read this, and I am almost certain to give it 4 stars next time.

[lord_boris-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The longest 100 pages I have ever read. After several abandonments over the years I managed to discipline myself to stick with it. Allegorical and dense prose, dealing with imperialism, exploitation, racism and moral corruption. However, not much actually happens to a handful of characters none of whom I could readily empathise or care for. It was a struggle. That said, having finished it several days ago the story and fundamental imagery has stuck with me. Initially gave this 2 stars but upped it to 3 as there is something about this book that is quite haunting and it probably deserves another read and a better understanding.

[p_s_patrick · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is short novel (~100 pages), following an adventure up the Congo to the deepest darkest part of Africa. It is set in the 19th Century when the continent was relatively unknown to European explorers. The main character Marlow is from London, and he narrates his adventure, starting from the time when he decides he wants to explore the continent (being interested in maps from a young age), through his finding a job as a steamboat pilot, and the ensuing voyage. The company employing him has set up stations along the river, with the object of trading and obtaining ivory from the natives. The adventure reaches its finale after he finds the final station and realises what has been going on there.Though this obviously deals with colonialism and imperialism, what is perhaps a more dominant theme is the banality of evil, and the psychology of being in an extreme and often alien environment. Conrad, despite English not being his native language, writes in a finer literary style than many of his contemporary English language novelists of adventure. Indeed, his use of English here being subtly non-native provides some quite expressive and poetic turns of phrase, which in a sense heighten the exotic atmosphere and the sense of strangeness. This is very easy reading, and highly recommendable due to both its depth and its compactness.

[booksfordinner · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Odd that I've never read this before. Yes, yes, good and evil, light and dark, the souls of man, etc. Brilliant and visionary, but all a bit ponderous for me. Also, the guy who narrates this audio book edition, Scot Brick, he's American evidently and puts on a fairly awful English accent for the entire book. Tedious. Four stars if not for Mr. Brick.

[a.j.b.-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Heart of Darkness is an unusually well-written tale; and (of course) Conrad is a true word-smith. The characters' psychological depths are extraordinary, although the adventure spoken of could have been more exciting.

[mikalina_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

"He was alone - his soul was mad - being alone in the wilderness""She talked as thirsty men drink".Conrad shows us that in the heart of darkness you find both the man that does not believe in mankind, the self-made man, the man that acts like everyone is an island to himself, the man that treats words as separate beings, as if his utterances is of no concequence to his act, his behaviour, and the tale of the woman who builds a life around an illusion of the unquestionable good, of the trust in words, the belief in the un-falling man. (the knitting aunt / Kurt´s fiance).Humanity cannot be built or sustained on neither.Conrad´s pen goes like a dissecting knife to the heart at hand, both sharp, precise and delicate. The rhytm of the language is mesmerizing (Conrad-Branagh is a formidable match), moving the whole experience close to a Homerian tale.

[frozenplums · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I have never hated a book more. It was just. Awful. Plain and simple. I've never encountered a less accessible text where nothing happens. One star is generous.

[kathleen586 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This classic book is very intriguing and well-written. Kenneth Branagh's phenomenal narration made this one of the best audiobooks I have ever listened to (thus the five-star review). The book itself would probably get 4 stars, despite its unfortunate racist overtones.

[vivl_6 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Extraordinarily good. I expected many things of Heart of Darkness but I didn't expect the odd flash of humour (black though it may be) and the immense readability of this enthralling tale. To be honest I was a bit nervous, not generally taking to allegorical works. This swept me along with the genius of the narrative--I was as enthralled as Marlowe's ship-mates, and could hear every word falling from his lips in the darkness of the Themes estuary. Just over 110-years-old, the writing remains fresh and engaging. More fulsome review to come, when I have the book to hand.Something to note is that this edition comes with copious footnotes (plus Conrad's 'Congo Diary'). While it was tiring to look things up all the time, I think that added a lot to my reading experience. My housemate doesn't remember his copy of Heart of Darkness, when he studied it a decade of so ago, having those notes. It may be worth seeking out an edition that does.

[meredy_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Six-word review: Not sure what I just read.Extended review:Most likely it was very good. But enigmatic, or so they say. Not that I'd know; maybe it's just me. I've read some fairly tough stuff in my reading career, but this one made me feel like a borderline idiot.I followed the narrative, or thought I did--a frame tale with one Marlow being the narrator of the adventure and all his remarks being written down by his unnamed listener. I couldn't make out the reason for the use of this device in this instance. What would have been lost--what would even have been different--if the putative narrator had penned a first-person account of his experiences going upriver into the African jungle to find Mr. Kurtz? Why deliver it all as if second-hand? I don't see it.As for the narrative itself, I am not accustomed to having any difficulty with nineteenth-century prose, American or British or even (translated) Russian, no matter how quirky, rambling, vocabulous, or convoluted. The half-crazed internal monologues of Poe's characters and Dostoevsky's haven't slowed me down. I can handle the archaic styles of George Eliot and Walter Scott and Nathaniel Hawthorne, not to mention poetry of earlier centuries. There's nothing in Conrad's diction or syntax that I can't understand. I've read plenty of literature that goes for mood and atmosphere and allegorical meaning without actually having anything resembling what we'd think of as a plot.And yet I'm holding my copy of Heart of Darkness, open to the two-thirds mark, where I'm rereading passages for the third or fourth time and asking: What is this really saying? What am I missing? What's going on?Is it a ghost story? Are we supposed to take references to Kurtz's disinterred remains and his skeletal appearance as meaning what they seem to mean? I could make some sense of that, but the commentaries I've looked up don't seem to bear me out. I must have read it wrong.Swallowing my pride, I've just been reduced to reading the entire SparkNotes summary and analysis, which are damned near as long as the book itself, and received very little enlightenment. Yes, that's definitely the novella I just read. Now I'm wondering what the story is about and what the SparkNotes are about, if they're not just about the evils of European colonization of so-called primitive societies and the looting of their treasures.One thing I'll testify that it isn't is a character study. To me it seems to conceal more than it reveals, pointing with gestures and symbols and geographical landmarks to the places where disclosures of information ought to be but aren't. Is that the point? Is that the horror at the core? Is that why Eliot chose a line from this story as the epigraph to his poem "The Hollow Men"?I concede defeat. I'll take my lumps for being too lowbrow for Conrad. But what I'd like to know is, what in the world was my high school English teacher thinking when he assigned it to a room full of sixteen- and seventeen-year-old American kids? I was reading Dostoevsky on my own then, for pleasure, but I didn't make anything of this. Fifty years later, I still don't.

[ecataldi-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was expecting a little more out of this. Overall, I felt it was a little lackluster. I needed more meat to the story, it lacked...... something that I can't quite verbalize. Heart of Darkness describes one captain's journey up the Congo River into the "heart of Africa." It's dark, brooding, and ominous; nothing goes according to plan. The narrator upon arriving at his African destination; has a strange fascination with a man named Kurtz, an English brute with odd ways who is no longer in control of all his faculties. Marlow, the captain, is in awe at the darkness that lurks in the jungle and in men's hearts. Sigh. I'm not doing a very good job describing it because I couldn't really get into it.

[vikz.richards · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A beautifully, descriptive work. The descriptions of place are outstanding. The slow pace of the work mirrors the leisurely, lazy flow of the river and the slow lives of the characters. The darkness that inhabits the place and the human soul is always at the heart of this work. But, it didn't have the emotional pull on me. Therefore its a three for this book.

[ajbraithwaite_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This classic book has been sitting on my ereader for ages as something I felt I ought to have read. I picked it up this week in a gap between library books. One of the reasons I hadn't read it before was that I was worried it would be graphically violent - knowing how brutal the colonial regime in the Congo was.In fact the violence in the book is much less vividly described than I expected; the horrors are more psychological than physical in nature and there's a lot of heavy symbolism about darkness and light and the nature of the colonial enterprise and the heavy toll it took on all concerned.

[hearthewindsing · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It was a breathtaking read. There are few books which make such a powerful impression as 'Heart of darkness' does. Written more than a century ago, the book and its undying theme hold just as much significance even today. Intense and compelling, it looks into the darkest recesses of human nature. Conrad takes the reader through a horrific tale in a very gripping voice.

I couldn't say enough about Conrad's mastery of prose. Not a single word is out of place. Among several things, I liked Marlow expressing his difficulty in sharing his experiences with his listeners and his comments on insignificance of some of the dialogue exchanged aloud between him and Kurtz. The bond between the two was much deeper. Whatever words he uses to describe them, no one can really understand in full measure what he had been through. In Marlow's words:

". . . No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one’s existence--that which makes its truth, its meaning--its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream--alone. . . ."

This was the first time I read this book which doesn't seem enough to fathom its profound meaning and all the symbolism. It deserves multiple reads.

[hobbitprincess · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Inspired by the Great American Read list, I thought I would give this novella a try. I'd not read it in any of my English classes. I found the book interesting but disturbing in places. I had to consider the time in which it was written. There isn't a lot of political correctness in here. Marlow, the narrator, is given the job of piloting a boat up the Congo. He reflects on what he sees, his frustrations with the journey, and the man he finally meets in the end.

[antao-3 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

There's nothing wrong with a bit of baggy. And certainly there's little or nothing 19th century without that touch of cellulite. And that's mostly where all the masterpieces live. No waste. But no bounty either. Conrad's prose is too parsimonious for anything to get very close to masterpiece status. I like him fine but he was a writer who tied his boots too tight almost on purpose. He wrote better about the sea than anything else and yet did relatively little of it. You're right (in a tiny, limited sense) in that the strangely neglected “The Secret Agent” is probably his best - full of surprises and real pleasures - does “Greenwich” like no one ever did. But to call it a masterpiece is to seriously abuse the term. Hush my moderation, it is to take the term out the back with a baseball bat and go all Joe Pesci on its ass. His prose is the diametric opposite of gorgeous (saying so makes me sound like a Banville-admirer). His prose was bullied at school and has been keen to avoid trouble ever since. I can understand that but it don't bring me no grandeur nor frisson.I'm a big fan of “Notre Dame de Paris” (I've read it English, Portuguese and German). But obviously I’m singing its praises to avoid the lurking presence of “Les Mis”. Because it gloriously proves my point about baggy masterpieces. “Les Mis” was pissed on at the time for its vulgarity and indiscipline. This is the stuff that makes a masterpiece. “Notre Dame de Paris” is a pretty little thing, but it's a run-up, a stretching exercise before the real thing. Hugo was a looper (try “Les Travailleurs de la Mer”). He spent the spectacular, once-in-a-lifetime Commune moment eating zoo animals and banging fans. This makes him lots and lots of things. Unbaggy is not amongst them. “Les Mis” changed everything. “Notre Dame de Paris” was a cartoon waiting to happen.I'm not a fan of everything books-wise. And I also don't want to scatter the masterpiece medals too liberally. Though I admire some people’s generosity and enthusiasm. I'm just worried it's going to end up with J.K. Rowling as Nobel Laureate (she wouldn't be the worst). The sentiment is almost the opposite of masterpiece though. But then I'm a big fan of cowardice, so I'm bound to say that. The thing about Conrad? No funnies. Not once. Not ever. Even by accident. That's the Beckett kiss of death. I rest my case. Cry at your leisure. Don't forget, I'm a Conrad fan.And I wouldn't dream of hurting someone, but look me right in the eye and tell me “Les Mis” is not baggy. Remember the chapter about the joys of human shit? Not even the tiniest bit discursive, that one? Really?

[coach_of_alva · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I read this thirty-five years and didn’t get much out of it. After hearing Branagh’s reading, I think what I missed was not the obvious message, but the art. There is nothing like a great actor giving a great reading to bring a great work of literature to life.

[firewild · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book has been recommended to me by a friend and was sitting on my to read list for years. When I saw that most of its reviews are either 5 star or 1 star I was intrigued. The book did not disappoint. Beautiful, evocative, mesmerizing, horrifying, revolting, it describes an abyss of a human soul. A story within a story, narrator's description sets the stage and his story takes you away into then disappearing and now non-existent primal world thus forcing you to see the events through his lenses.

[marthaearly · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I read this book in high school and appreciated it, but made no personal connection. Interesting story, but no plans to pick it up ever again.

[kristelh_15 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Hypocrisy of imperialism. A good companion read to Things Fall Apart and The Poisonwood Bible. Tells the the story of Marlow, a sailor who describes his journey up the Congo River to meet Kurtz. Mans journey to discover the darkness in his own hearts. (Foster) Inspired by a trip Conrad took up the Congo in 1890. Major conflict; their images of themselves as civilized and the temptation to abandon morality when out of European society. Kurtz has completely abandoned European morals and norms. Also recommend King Leopold's Ghost.