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Literature & Fiction |
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Heart of Darkness
written by Joseph Conrad
Studio : Prestwick House Inc.
by Prestwick House Inc.
Publisher : Prestwick House Inc.
Released : 2004-09
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours and eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25.
EAN : 9781580495752
Avg. Customer Rating: (based on 16 reviews)
Our Price : $3.99
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Product Description |
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Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness was first published in 1899 in serial form in London’s Blackwood’s Magazine. Loosely based on Conrad’s firsthand experience of rescuing a company agent from a remote station in the heart of the Congo, the novel is considered a literary bridge between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. With its modern literary approach to questions such as the ambiguous nature of good and evil, the novel foreshadows many of the themes and techniques that define modern literature. This Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Edition includes a glossary and reader’s notes to help the modern reader contend with Conrad’s complex approach to the human condition. |
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Make sure you have the right expectations |
I was a little disappointed in the Heart of Darkness. I think mostly because I was looking for a horror story, and this story definitely was not it.
The story is supposed to be disturbing. I told Otty that I did not find the tale to be unsettling and he reminded me that I need to remember when it was written. I am usually good at putting myself in the context of when the story was written, which this one was written in the late 1800's. I think my problem with the story is that yes, the heart of darkness was a destination, but it was the people that made it so. The greed and desperation of man is what the heart of darkness truly contained. I believe I am unimpressed with this book because man has not changed in the last 100 years. Man is still just as greedy today and he was then, if not more so. Now, the deeds of men (the darkness of men) are normal practice. Maybe I am just terribly jaded.
I did not find inspiration from Joseph Conrad's prose either. For the most part, I felt that his writing was somewhat flat and unimaginative. I did however; thoroughly enjoy what is called Conrad's "delayed decoding." Ian Watt describes this as "the verbal equivalent of the impressionist painter's attempt to render visual sensation directly...present[ing] a sense impression and...withhold[ing] naming it or explaining its meaning until later."
Though I was not thrilled with the book, I am still glad that I read it. The Heart of Darkness is one of the classic literature pieces that being able to say you have read is always respectable.
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a literary statement on colonial engagement |
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This is not an easy read. But I would read it just for the pleasure of language use. literary beauty it has. before the theoretical thinking on colonialism, turning native or fieldwork, this is a very early but sophisticated engagement in a novel form.... |
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Most Overated Book of all Time |
I know that scholars are going to disagree with me but Conrad's narrative alternates between exasperatingly long stories of inconsequential matters and skimming over consequential matters. For instance, we are given page after page of Marlowe waiting for his rivets and then, all of a sudden, he is underway with no explanation of how the repairs got done or when the rivets finally arrived. Kurtz himself is just a tiny part of the narrative. We really dont learn about the inner Kurtz. More time is spent with his grieving fiance than is spent with him. " The horror, the horror" , has for some reason become a famous line in literature , much like, " We'll always have Paris, has become in the cinema.
I read this book in college, years ago and thought it was boring at that time. I ordered it for my Kindle, thinking the mature me would appreciate the book but I was still disappointed.
Some of the description is excellent and it is a good look at colonial Africa at the time, so the book was not a total loss but a disappointment nevertheless.
It reads very much like a novel translated from another language into English. Of course, we know that Conrad, although born in Poland, was perfect in English but the writing somehow seems awkward.
My Kindle has been perfect for re reading the classics but this one fell quite short. |
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The Horror! The Over-Analyzed Horror! |
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Classics of western literature tend to take on an air of infallibility, with billions of English professors offering interpretations that become better known than the work itself. The baggage-free reader of "Heart of Darkness" will find that Conrad used a lot of vague allegory and symbolism that lent a haunting and disturbing feel to the story. But Conrad's symbolism is sometimes so diffuse that a cynical reader may find that the English professors are seeing what they want to see, and that the story might be a little too short and stunted to truly inspire a century of over-analytical aggrandizement. Conrad was surely commenting on the dangers faced by European colonialists in Africa and their tendencies toward cruelty and megalomania. But since he focused more on the travails faced by Marlow the boatman rather than Kurtz the mad colonial demagogue, the reader may be annoyed at both Conrad for leaving many loose ends, and at the interpreters for making vast claims about groundbreaking commentary on history and European society. If you're suspicious of academic interpretations, you'll probably find that this story, while certainly delivering some haunting lessons, may not have accomplished everything you've heard about. [~doomsdayer520~] |
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Disturbing |
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This is a hard book to like, but I think it is very possible to appreciate, and frankly I loved it. It's dark, but the descriptions are beautiful and truly make this book work; they are what drives this terrifying and psychological plot. |
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