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Summary: Heart of Darkness is Right
Review: As I began reading this book, I felt a little disturbed. The use of details that Conrad uses in the story are incredible. As Marlow talks to his shipmates in the story, the details he uses are intense. As he talks of his trip up the river, his friends on the ship tend not to be paying attention to him. This contributes to the difficulty of reading this book. Conrad had Marlow telling his story, and at the same time he switches back and forth from that to Marlow talking to his friends in the present. This makes the story very confusing. Conrad successfully showed how the colonization and imperialism was selfish and the colonizers were only tried to make a profit by obtaining ivory. The story itself wasnt too bad. It had a good plot and I liked the ending. It wrapped up a little fast I thought, but overall it was a good ending. If you liked the movie, Apocollapse Now, you will definitely enjoy this book, since the movie is based on this book.
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Summary: Good story, poorly written
Review: I really like the way "Heart of Darkness" depicts racism and colonialism in the Congo during the late 19th and early 20th century. "Heart of Darkness" shows how the majority of Europeans felt about the natives of the Congo, and how the Europeans treated those natives. Without meaning it, Conrad gives us a good history lesson about colonialism. One thing I disliked about the book is how it was written. I keep reading about how well written this book is but I don't see how it can be viewed as well written. Even though it's only around 70 pages long it could have been much shorter. In many parts of the book Conrad explains the scenery, and what Marlow is experiencing, a little too much. This does give you a good picture of what's going on, but it also makes you lose interest. You find yourself wondering when something is going to happen. If you like a compelling story with elaborate descriptions and really gets your mind spinning, then this is a perfect book for you. If you just want the compelling story without the unnecessary (in my mind) descriptions then you should try another book.
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Summary: Lost in the darkness
Review: If you like entertaining stories, you will hate this one. Conrad is continually dark and depressing. In many cases, he makes the story disturbing. The narrator (Marlow) rambles on about his venture into the Congo to unwilling listeners. Conrad uses so much ambiguous language it is almost difficult to grasp the story itself. The wording and language the novella uses, in a way, creates a feeling of confusion for the reader. The number of adjectives thrown into a sentence tends to take the readers attention away from the story. However, the plot is somewhat interesting, if you can get around the style of language used throughout the rest of the story. I am still a bit confused about how this book can be considered a "classic" even after reading it. Any underlying meaning or message was lost in the rambling paragraphs of this short novel. In essence, this novella is more for a reader with an acquired taste for 19th century literature.
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Summary: What is "the Heart of Darkness?"
Review: This novel is very different from the novels I have read in the past. It was a difficult read, and the reading was condensed into three chapters. The novel itself is full of struggles. The main character Marlow, has always had a strong desire to travel in order to "fill in the blanks" of the unknown. His main desire was to travel to Africa to the "snake-like" river, the Congo. He travels during the time of imperialism. When thinking about imperialism I always think about the negatives associated with it. Marlow however is idealistic about European control in Africa. He wants to believe that there is goodness in the white presence in Africa. Africa is often considered "The Dark Continent" so he thinks that imperialism is a good thing and that its purpose is to help and civilize the barbaric Africans. He also believes that Kurtz (who he has not met) represents the good of imperialists. Once Marlow arrives in Africa however, he realizes that the Europeans are selfish, materialistic, and brutal. Reality has kicked in that European imperialism in Africa is total greed and evil. Marlow still thinks that Kurtz symbolizes the idealistic and he therefore keeps his faith in humanity. The novel however ends realistically showing man's inhumanity. Marlow loses hope and he finally learns the truth about Kurtz. He comes to realize that Kurtz is insane, and greedy. Marlow also realizes that the only motive for imperialism is greed, evil, and triumph, and that there was never a pure motive. Marlow does not accept what he has learned as the truth. He wants to believe that their is goodness in mankind. This to me is ironic. Marlow does not speak well of the Africans. When he first gets to the Congo, his descriptions are of ill nature. Africa seems like a "dark" place. He shows feeling of superiority, being white and a male. The language used in this novel is very critical. It degrades both Africans and women. I also think it is ironic that Marlow does not think that women are capable of handling the truth, yet he himself does not want to accept truth and reality. He does not accept the truth about imperialism, Kurtz, and most importantly himself.
Although I found the novel to be a bit difficult, I enjoyed it. The complexity of the novel is what drew me into it. There are many issues and it is interesting for me to read about them from the point of view of the author who has been accused of being a racist. The struggles, and the actual story was fascinating to me in a mysterious way. I also really like the title chosen for this novel. It adds so much more to the story and to the imagination of the audience. When reading the novel I picked up so many different meanings of it. The title and the story itself can be interpreted in many different ways. The reality, imperialism, the explored river, the language, the feelings expressed, as well as the inhumanity and ignorance of man all work together to compose the story and the title.
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Summary: Heart of Darkness
Review: The book Heart of Darkness was a book about a man named Marlo who went on a journey down the Congo River in Africa. I found the storyline of the book to be very good. It was a great story about what happens along his way and the people he meets. It allows us to imagine what it was like at that time period in Africa. The writing style of the book, on the other hand, was difficult. Conrad wrote very in very large paragraphs, which bored me. It was confussing at some parts what he was talking about and what he meant by it. He would give you like five adjectives in one sentence. It was hard to have an image in my head of what it was like there. The beginning of the book was hard to follow at first but then I figured out was actually going on. It was a very distrubing book. It made you see and try to understand what things were like back then, which was that there was a lot of racism throughout his journey. Overall the book was just okay. It was that exciting to read and difficult to understand.
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Summary: Heart of Darkness written by Joseph Conrad
Review: The book Heart of Darkness written by Joseph Conrad is about a journey down to the Congo in search of a man by the name of Kurtz. This is an adventure story. Heart of Darkness was a denser reading then I am use to. The style of the book was different from the books I normally read and I think that may be why I had some trouble. The paragraphs are all really long and the author tries to throw a lot of ideas at the reader all at once. The book is written in flash backs and the main character seems to ramble on and on about things that could have been kept out of the book. There are a lot of symbols for the "darkness" in the story. There are many disturbing pictures created with the words one will read in this book. There are Cannibals and heads chopped off in this reading. One has to read very close to get the actual idea of what "darkness" means. It is a very intense reading. I did however like how the main character, Marlow, was so proud of his journey and how he followed his dreams and went out on this journey. This reading just takes a lot of patience and time to read so if one has both the time and the patience this could be a good adventure book.
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Summary: In litterae veritas
Review: Heart of Darkness is truth. It is the book in which you find yourself. You find the evil, the twisted, disgusting impurities of your psyche. The jungle, the beating, sweaty, humid jungle, is your soul, and you are lost in the darkness. Conrad deconstructs the human soul and the darkness within, and in the process writes the greatest novel in history
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Summary: dark, absorbing, powerful. do you dare?
Review: The final vision of Heart of Darkness is one of intoxicating, perhaps inevitable, destruction. Destruction that comes from too much truth. As Marlow returns to "civilization", he finds it shallow, fake, all its goodness based on a lie. Yet the truth is deadly-- the lie is necessary to survive-- and so the choice is difficult. Live the shallow lie and be happy, or face the intoxicating truth and risk destruction?This is the way I felt as I read this book. It is dark and intoxicating -- certainly not happy or "fun" to read. The narrative sweeps you along toward the Heart of Darkness as steadily, quietly, and unswervingly and the river carries Marlow there. You wonder if you should get out. You wonder if you even can. You are half-afraid about where it is taking you, but fascination far outweighs the fear. And when it's over, you're simply glad you've survived... and certain, completely certain, that it's changed you somehow, even if you don't exactly know how... Read it. It's an amazing book. You may not like it, but you won't regret it.
Rating: 
Summary: Darkening th Heart
Review: I think Heart of Darkness is a well developed novel. It's Congo River setting adds to the hardships that Marlow and his crew go through. Conrad's details to the characters and the setting give you a frim imagination of where they are, what they look like, and the activities they are going through.
However, the book is told in frame tale or a story inside a story which makes this novel a little hard to read.
I would highly reccomend this book to anyone who likes an adventure story. This novel has a lot of action and activity every page. It is a real attention grabber and is not so commonly know.
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Summary: another one of Marlows inconclusive tales
Review: To me the most intriguing aspect of Conrads fiction is his use of invented narrators because the invented narrator lends his stories a peculiar subjectivity. For Heart of Darkness he uses Marlow. By using Marlow to tell the tale Conrad can both relate his story and show the effect such a tale has on its teller. But Marlow is not the only teller as Conrad himself occupies a place outside the tale, an authorial space, and he is free to comment on both teller and tale from another vantage point altogether. I think this priveleged positioning is akin to the place of the audience in classic theatre. To Aristotle the great advantage of theatre was that the audience member could learn the lessons of the characters on stage without having to go through their experiences in the real world.
I think it is interesting that some professors teach this book as a cautionary tale using Kurtz as an example of what happens when one goes outside the ranks of (white)civilization. While others read Kurtz's story as an indictment of that civilization because Kurtz is just doing what other colonizers are doing but in a more extreme way. Kurtz has simply given up the pretense that the white man is bringing "civilization" to Africa. Kurtz's madness is one in the same with the madness that belies any such colonial endeavor. It is dehumanizing to both the colonizer and the colonized and that is perhaps the point that makes this a great tale.
Marlow remains puzzled by the whole thing to the very end. Africa has obviously gone to work on his imagination as the most powerful passages are his ruminations about the primal past he has journeyed into, but as well as journeying into the past he has journeyed into the "heart of darkness" which is not the same thing as the heart of Africa, but rather the heart of man. Conrad uses Marlow brilliantly to show how difficult it is to reconcile civilization with his profound knowledge of human nature. Marlows way of keeping things in balance is to tell the tale of Kurtz and other tales, as we are told that this is "another one of Marlows inconclusive tales".
By using the invented narrator as the main character Conrad is able to tell two stories at once, Kurtz's and Marlow's. The way Marlow tells the story is inconclusive for it is never clear just what makes one man stop short at the invisible and perhaps merely imaginary, though necessary, perimeters that we call civilization & another cross over them.
But it should not be overlooked that although Kurtz is an obvious example of colonialisms excesses, all those in the process of extracting ivory from central Africa were committing a violation upon the African people. The Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe has written an essay in which he calls Conrad a racist. I don't think that is true but Achebe in his books offers a valuable and contrasting vision of Africa remarkably different than the one in Conrads book. Achebe writes of the Igbo tribe which lived very near the region "Heart of Darkness" takes place in. In Things Fall Apart he describes the very peaceful Igbo tribe and how it was forever destroyed by the arrival of the white colonists.
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