a15haddad

That's somewhat ironically coincidental. Just last week I was discussing this quote with my friend. But in the end, rebellion shouldn't exist just to "transform slaves into human beings." That makes it into a sort of drug. Sure, it may have a righteous idea driving it, but that is simply a farce if you do it for the good feeling. A rebellion must be selfless and done for the good of the whole.

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"I cannot fiddle, but I can make a great state of a small city." -Themistocles

"Conrad transcended all the rules. There have been, perhaps, greater novelists, but I believe that he was incomparably the greatest artist who ever wrote a novel." -H.L. Mencken

mbolton29@mac.com

I can never understand why people like Heart of Darkness, Conrad is the most boring author to ever put pen to paper.

Regardless, Apocalypese Now was still amazing.

J.S.S

I tried to read it but it became a mental strain so now it just sits on my shelf.

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Macabre Pulp!

archer88iv

Having read Achebe and Conrad, I'ma have to cast my vote with Conrad for "better read." Took a postcolonial lit course and--of course--spent a few years talking about the racial aspect of everything. But none of that really matters, because the next semester I had Heart of Darkness again in a short fiction course.

Question 1 for the final exam of the short fiction course was, I swear to God, "Kurtz."

That was it. Not even a damn question mark. Just the name "Kurtz." Argh.

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-J

TWariner

I read it a long time ago and it was a very impressive book. Very difficult for a young teenager to read, but I could tell it was very intelligent and one of those essential classics, so I pushed through it. It was a dark book. I'll have to reread it.

Garden of Kadesh

Heart of Darkness is my favorite novella. It's amazing how somebody can command words so well and not even think in that language.

I have the book with me now:

"I tried to break the spell - the heavy, mute spell of the wilderness - that seemed to draw him to its pitiless breast by the awakening of forgotten and brutal instincts, by the memory of gratified and monstrous passions."

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"Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them."

- Catch 22

Mishki

Wanted to show this thread a bit of love.

Maybe it's because I enjoyed Lord Jim so much more than Heart of Darkness, and because I followed Marlow's progress through three books, but I always found Marlow far more interesting as a character than Kurtz. But for some reason, no one got to me like Stein did. I think I've re-read Stein's chapters a dozen times in maybe three years.

Also, Stein talks like Yoda, and how can you not love that?

Matt3483

Conrad gives me headaches. I find it hard to believe that anyone actually enjoyed reading Heart of Darkness--maybe Conrad himself. I think the people who claim to have liked it are just pretentious.

Yoda talks like Stein. Stein did come first ...

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Garden of Kadesh

Well Matt, it certainly isn't a beach book.

I'll admit the plot is a little muddled due the slow narrative pace, but the long-winded descriptions that cause the torpidity are worth it. They are vivid and unique. Look at that sentence I posted above. That's totally Conrad.

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"Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them."

- Catch 22

Truth-Teller

Conrad is shit writing.

Malone

It bored me more than anything. I never finished Lord Jim either.

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There Is A Policeman Inside All Our Heads: He Must Be Destroyed


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Edgewise

Was it my reading of the book, or was there a huge unexplained gap between when Marlow arrives at Kurtz' post and when Kurtz dies?

I thought the book sucked.

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What would your good be doing if there were no evil, and what would the earth look like if shadows disappeared from it?
- Woland (Satan) in Bulgakov's "Master and Margarita"

Tom88

If I'm being honest I think his style was way over my head.

I appreciate his attention to detail, and respect how influential he was to his contemporaries, but I really couldn't get into it. A few here mention how subtle his style was, I didn't get that at all - I felt as though I was drowning in his convoluted droning.

Having said that, there were a few memorable moments. I haven't read it for some time, but I recall reading something and being somewhat gob-smacked at his thought-process. I also disagree with the "racist undertones", I guess that's a potential interpretation, but I think it was more an accurate depiction of the time, and the situation, rather than Conrad force-feeding his views on his audience.

Could be wrong though, lol.

lin

Two things stand out about this book, to me:

English was not Conrad's native language, he acquired it as an adult. Yet many consider him of the really fine prose stylists writin in English.

And--the Coppola film "Apocalypse Now" is, if not exactly an adaptation of the novel, at least a reworking of it into modern terms. In fact, the Brando character is named Kurtz.

I think that's an interesting sidelight on the book.

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