Heart of Darkness

[Anonymous No.7232161]

So just finished this book, and i liked it. Especially when supplemented with Apocalypse Now i feel it really highlights the piece and i loved the parallels just got a few questions.
>What is the significance with all the colors throughout the piece?
>What is the importance of the horror(never really got it in the movie either)?
>And Marlows lie what was that all about?
Also just a general discussion of the book would be nice.

[Anonymous No.7232405]

>>7232161
Bump
I read it and didn't really get it.

[Anonymous No.7232740]

>>7232161
>mood setter
>the horrors and the jungle changed them
>don't trust the jungle

/thread

you're all retarded

[Anonymous No.7232911]

>>7232740
Ah yes, novel response.

Fucking /lit/. Everybody on here acts a big game but can't actually discuss anything outside of like 3 novels. I want to add to this, but I read the damn thing when I was an angsty teen and hardly remember anything. Great topic op. Too bad it's not gonna get noticed.

[Anonymous No.7232921]

>>7232161
The use of color seemed to be used to give a great sense of place, which is important and used cleverly to later compare the Congo river to the Thames. The horror I think is Kurtz realization that he is not only no better than the savages but IS one. That's how I interpreted it anyway, I'm sure there are other ones better than mine. What lie of Marlows are you referring to? The one he told Kurtz wife?

[Anonymous No.7233002]

Any other books that give off the same dream like feeling?

[Anonymous No.7233090]

>>7233002

The end of Invisible Man when this like, African dude with a spear rides through the streets of NYC on a horse fucking shit up.

>>7232161

"The Horror" I thought was just like, the depths of human depravity. I feel like within the context of the setting, white colonists basically saw Africa and its peoples as this place to be raped and exploited.

For a modern example it's like if games like Just Cause, Mercenaries, Far Cry, etc. were for real and you suddenly woke up as the protagonist and realized that you just irreparably fucked up the lives and homes of thousands of people.

[Anonymous No.7233092]

>>7233002

You might also try Blood Meridian. There are some really beautifully written passages in there - google the quote "a legion of horribles" (one of the most famous sentences in the book) and see if that's something you'd be into.

[Anonymous No.7233118]

>>7232740
I thought that deep down human nature is horrific. The jungle showed that with certain civilized barriers taken down we (or at least Kurtz) are just as bad as savages.

[Anonymous No.7233170]

Dunno about the colors, it's been a while since I read it.
The whole horror thing was about how Kurtz became a monster and achieved unbelievable success compared to other ivory suppliers at the cost of his morality.
imho Marlows lie is morality, he couldn't just tell Miss Kurtz that her late husband was a monster.

[Anonymous No.7233191]

I agree with what is being said about the horror being the depths of human depravity, but i actually came here to say :DAMN, when Kurtz is reading The Hollow Men by T.S. Elliot in the film. Goosebumps right there.

And also when Marlow returns home in the book he says something about the day to day lives led in perfect security by the people back home offend him. I'd search the actual sentence, i have it underlined, but i borrowed my copy to a friend. That was a top moment as well.

[Anonymous No.7233197]

>>7232161
Remember that this was written during the golden age of anthropology, where skull measuring was actually taken serious, and blacks were scientifically lesser creatures, yet ''related'' to us. Also, imagine what tribes somewhere far down the Congo look like to a stuffy Brit (pic related, looks like a ceremonial thing, but you get the idea). These are people, but as the quote in >>7233170 says, it makes one wonder about their humanity. Kurtz gains control over these people, he becomes a leader, he is an utter savage. When Marlow comes home, he finds his wife, and sees that Kurtz was a ''successful'' man, he has a beautiful wife, and would never live like that in the civilized world. It's the surroundings that make the man. Ironically, the novel ends with the people on the ship sailing into the darkness again, into the English channel, facing Europe, which is an anti-colonialist statement in my interpretation, saying that we cause ''the darkness'' in these lands.

[Anonymous No.7233225]

>>7232161
thoroughgoing racist tbh fam

[Anonymous No.7233244]

>>7233197
>It's the surroundings that make the man
But Marlow never descends into the same darkness does he? Sure he has a massive crush on Kurtz but that's due to how Kurtz is a known prodigy of sorts

[Anonymous No.7233256]

>>7233244
That's because Marlow never has to delve into the world. He is simply making a tour, and witnessing it. Kurtz was on his own, left to his own devices for an extended period of time. Although maybe the fact that Marlow lied to Kurtz's wife shows that he was slowly ''transforming'' as well, as he seems to understand Kurtz, and doesn't expose him for the savage that he was. But I'd have to read the ending for that again.

[Anonymous No.7233349]

>>7233118
Yeah, I read it that way too. Kurtz had his veneer of civilisation stripped away by living in the jungle, and became pretty much a beast.

Marlow's lie was out of his own fear. He didn't want to acknowledge to himself, or to Kurtz' intended, that it was so easy for 'civilised' Europeans to become so savage.

As for the colours, don't particularly remember. I remember darkness/sunsets being a thing,ie on the Thames (pretty obvious darkness=savagery, light=civilisation imagery) but not specific colours.

[Anonymous No.7233384]

"The Horror" possible comes from Psalm 55 4-5 "My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me. Fearfullness and trembling are come upon me, and the horror hath overwhelmed me"

The Horror he feels though is possibly his self-reflection of the man he is and the things he has done and seen

[Anonymous No.7233514]

>>7233384
fuck off christfag

[Anonymous No.7234333]

>>7233514
fuck off, philistine.

[Anonymous No.7234458]

>>7232161
Marlow's lie reveals the impossibility of conveying the atrocities of the Congolese genocide to those who had not witnessed it. It was easier to perpetuate the propaganda of the day than to reveal the truth. If you really want to understand the novel read up on the Congo Free State.