Introducing
Your new presentation assistant.
Refine, enhance, and tailor your content, source relevant images, and edit visuals quicker than ever before.
Trending searches
eerie, calm, serene
"brooding gloom" (1)
The scene of the Thames triggered Marlow's memory of the Congo
"And this has also been one of the dark places of earth" (3)
Parallel of England and Congo; foreshadow Marlow's story
Initial reactions to Africa
"Everyday the coast looked the same" (10)
"mounds of turned up earth by the shore . . . waste of excavations, or hanging to the declivity" (12)
P.O.V. - 3rd person omniscent narrative
Marlow going mad
Reality VS illusion
mental & physical exhaustion
not reliable anymore
witness?
sacrifice anything (morality) for personal gain
"black and incomprehensible. . . cursing us, praying to us, welcoming us . . . we glided past like phantoms" (32)
Helsman was "an improved species"(33)
"My Intended, my ivory, my station . . . everything belonged to him" (44)
all consumed by inhuman things
Helsman killed
Marlow lost direction
imperialism/colonialism
omnipotence
Mental/manic
"not inhuman" (32)
"gloom of overshadowed distances" (30)
away from reality, cannot see end goal, obsessed with finding Kurtz
power of nature/wilderness VS civilization
proximity
Congolese actually have human emotions... WHAT?
small like beetle
hunter becomes the hunted
helpless, insignificant
physically mentally
physical & mental
doctor
justify actions
passion
wild//nature, not European
nature + native = one entity
not entirely clear what goal is
anxious, dangerous, foreigners
only what he sees is understandable/known
Kurts: in isolation, "[turned] his back suddenly on the headquarters. . . towards the depths of the wilderness, towards his empty and desolate station" (28)
"as if Nature herself had tried to ward off intruders" (11)
Outsiders (like Marlow) not wanted.
"A lot of people, mostly black and naked, moved about like ants" (12)
Dehumanized - ants/insects
"I could see every rib, the joints of their limbes were like knots in a rope; each had an iron collar on his neck, and all were connected together with a chain"(12-13)
Suffering of natives, treated horribly, inhuman
Marlow encounters natives and chief accountant
VS.
Kurts
"remarkable""important""he will go far, very far" (16)
Devoted, driven
How? Why? At what cost?
"such an unexpected elegance of getup . . . high starched collar, white cuffs, a light alpaca jacket..." (15)
Marlow "I was becoming scientifically interesting"(17)
// doctor
changing on the spot, frustration
calm, but unsettling
"Camp, cook, sleep, strike camp, march"(17)
draining, repetitive, never ending
agitated by lack of rivets
frustrated by little things
"I don't know why we behave like lunatics" (26)
"air of plotting. . . desire to get appointed to a trading post where ivory was to be had. . . earn percentages" (21)
"a solitude, nobody, not a hut" (16)
Irony:
"my body was full only of chills" (21)
astonished, baffled by white men, not natives
"prodigy""emissary of pity, and science, and progress" (22) very important person
"interests of science . . . I never see them . . . the changes take place inside" (9)
"blank spcae of delightful mystery" (5)
"it didn't surprise me in the least to hear this [violence]" (6)
nothing out of the ordinary
"in the tropics one must before everything keep calm" (9)
Marlow's aunt believes in the propaganda against barbarians/savages
"everyone I met was full of it . . . overseas empire" "the company was run for profit" (7, 10)
Marlow gets job because of the death of another - foreboding, doom
pride, fame
mission to civilize
foreboding
"the snake (river) had charmed me" (6)
mind consumed with journey
"a fascination... tha goes to work upon him ... imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate" (4)
Idea of Congo consumed him, changed him forever
"strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others"(4)
"a glow brings out a haze ... misty halos ... sometimes are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine"(3)
mystery, relfect mood & tone
uncertainty, unclarity
"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"(3)
Less of solving mystery, more of learning
Brings people to new places, claim lands, "spread civilization", "glories of exploration.
Kurtz:
"remarkable" "very important" "as much ivory as all the others put together"
"he will go far, very far" (16)
How? Why? At what coast? Where?
of darkness
"universal genius"
Power
"amazing reality of its concealed life" "trying to tell you a dream" (23, 24)
- limits/boundaries of language
- truth vs rumors
firewood + book
a trace of reality/civilization