Heart of Darkness

"And farther west on the upper reaches of place of the monstrous town was still marked ominously on the sky, a brooding gloom in sunshine, a lurid glare under the stars." pg. 6
17 October, 2007
The city the men are looking at is said to be a big, ominous, gloomy town. The town is said to be a lurid blare under the stars. The town could be some kind of port town that has various problems, which make it seem gloomy, such as crime.

"It was just a 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." pg. 9
17 October, 2007
Marlow is talking aobut the imperialism ocurring in Africa duing that time period. The European conquerers just took things and killed the people who got in their way without really seeing what they were doing. They were doing it blindly, Marlow states that such behavior is usual for those who "tackle the darkness".

"And as I looked at the map of it in a shop-window, it fascinated me as a snake would a bird-a silly little bird." pg. 11
18 October 2007
Conrad uses a similie to express how influenced Marlow was of the map. The map was a snake luring it's prey, Marlow, to it like he was a helpless bird.

"Therefore he whacked the old nigger mercilessly, whild a big crowd of his people watched him, thunderstruck, till some man-I was told the chief's son-in desperation at hearing the old chap yell, made a tentative jab with a spear at the white man-and of course it went quite easy between the shoulder-blades." pg. 13
18 October 2007
The captain was killed our of desperation. The chief's son tried to protect his father from the captain and in the process killed the captain. The captain was white and thought that he had some kind of power over the natives and started beating the chief over a minuscule detail. After his death, the natives cleared our of the village because they were scared of what the whit man might do in retalliation.

"She talked about 'weaning those ignorant millions from their horried ways,' till upon my word, she made me quite uncomfortable." pg. 19
19 October 2007
Marlow's aunt is talking about many imperialistic views. She feels the natives are savage and that they need to be civilized and kept away from their horrid ways.

"There was a touch of insanity in the procedding, a sense of lugubrious drollery in the sight; and it was not dissipated by somebody on board assuring me earnestly there was a camp of natives-he called them enemies!" pg. 21
19 October 2007
The crew views the natives as enemies, even though they are the ones who are invading their home country. They believe they are right and just, which is a shared belief among imperialists.

"These moribund shpaes were free as air-and nearly as thin." pg. 27
20 October 2007
The natives are being used as slaves and are being forced to work. Many of them are dying from starvation and disease, but the white imperialists do not care.

"When one has got to make correct entries, one comes to hate those savages-hate them to the death." pg. 30
20 October 2007
The chief dispises the natives for varoiuse reasons, like many people do. The natives are being treated cruelly, so it is easy to understand why they would try to run away from the imperialists.

"Perhaps there was nothing within him." pg. 35
22 October 2007
The manager kept his secrets becuase he had no will to express them. Marlow states that he might be empty inside, which would make him emotionless.

"A nigger was being beaten nearby." pg. 38
22 October 2007
The imperialists would beat them natives for crimes they probably had nothing to do with. They probably know that they had nothing to do with it too, but they have to put the blame on someone.

"There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies-which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world-what I want to forget." pg. 44
23 October 2007
Marlow seems to be an honest person, and he views lies as part of death. His outlook on things helps him see the problems the European conquerers are causing in Africa.

"No man-you apprehend me?-no man here bears a charmed life." pg. 47
23 October 2007
He views all life in Africa as being worthless. He is stating that no matter who you bring him, he could never have a charmed life.

"Going up that river was like travelling back to the earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on the earth and the big trees were kings." pg. 55
24 October 2007
Marlow is viewing Africa as being primitive, he talks about it being like the beginnings of the world.

"We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of darkness." pg. 58
24 October 2007
Marlow is calling Africa the heart of darkness. He blindly believes what the other europeans have said about Africa and sees it as a primitive land.

"The mind of man is capable of anything-because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future." pg. 60
25 October 2007
Conrad is stating that man can pretty man much think up anything, he states that it can recall the past and come up with ideas for the future.

"When the sun rose there was white fog, very warm and clammy, and more blinding than the night." pg. 65
25 October 2007
Marlow was hoping to be able to navigate through the river, but it is now less visible due to the fog. This could be a foreshadow to some kind of future event, something could happen to the boat.

"I would just as soon have expected restraint from a hyena prowling amongst the corpses of a battlefield." pg. 70
26 October 2007
Marlow is calling the people animals, comparing them to hyena's.

"Unexpected, wild, and violent as they had been, they had given me an irresistable impression of sorrow." pg. 72
26 October 2007
Marlow sees that although the people of Africa are violent and wild, they are saddened over something. They give off an impression of sorrow, probably from the invasion of the white man into their home.

"Only in the very last moment, as though in response to some sign we could not see, to some whisper we could not hear, he frowned heavily, and that frown gave his black death mask an inconceivably sombre, brooding, and menacing expression." pg. 78
27 October 2007
Marlow noticed that the man who died did not say anything while dying, but frowned heavily over something. He calls it a black death mask, which was sombre.

"I was cut to the quick at the idea of having lost inestimable privilege of listening to the gifted Mr. Kurtz." pg. 80
27 October 2007
Marlow views Mr. Kurtz as some kind of symbolic inspirator even though he has never met the man before. He is believing the words of the others.

"I take it, no feel ever made a bargain for his sould wth the devil; the fool is too much of a fool, or the devil too much of a devil-I don't know which." pg. 83
29 October 2007
Marlow is stating that someone who gives his soul to the devil is either to foolish to bargain for it or the devil is too evil to accept any bargains.

"He began with the argument that we whites, from the point of development we had arrived at, must necessarily appear to them [savages] in the nature of supernatural beings-we approach them with the might as of a deity, and so on, and so on." pg. 84
29 October 2007
Mr. Kurtz views the "savages" as being lower than them and that the whites have some kind of divinity over them.

"He declared he would shut me unless I gave him the ivory and then cleared out of the country, because he could do so, and had a fancy for it, and there was nothing on earth to prevent him killing whom he jolly well pleased." pg. 95
30 October 2007
Even though Kurtz threatned to kill the Russian, he refused to leave Kurtz. He stated the Kurtz had some gift that attracted people to him.

"The woods were unmoved, like a mask-heavy, like the closed door of a prison-they looked with their air of hidden knowledge, of patient expectation, of unapproachable silence. " pg. 96
30 October 2007
Conrad is showing the forest to be like some kind of prision with many hidden secrets andknowledge hidden in it.

"There had been enemies, criminals, workers-and these were rebels." pg. 99
31 October 2007
The africans are being called pretty much anything, depending on what they were doing.

"And from right to left along the lighted shore moved a wild and gorgeous apparition of a woman" pg. 102
31 October 2007
This woman is a sort of contrast to the forest and all the other surroundings, she is the foil to all the men around her.

"He informed me, lowering his voice, that it was Kurtz who had ordered the attack to be made on the steamer." pg. 107
1 November 2007
Kurtz wanted the company to stay away so that he can find the ivory for himself. He did not want the company to take him away.

"This clearly was not a case for fisticuffs, even apart from the very natural aversion I had to beat that Shadow-this wandering and tormented thing." pg. 111
1 November 2007
Kurtz had been consumed by the forest and his greed. The heart of darkness had turned him into a tromented shadow.