Heart of Darkness #1

Oh Heart Of Darkness. I’m just going to throw it out there and say, I'm not a fan of this book. It’s extremely difficult to read as I can’t seem to grasp the language, the changes in narration, and most importantly the plot very well. It’s a tough one to read if you don’t devote a long amount to time to, i.e. reading HOD in study hall doesn’t work for me personally. Hopefully sitting down this evening to reread all that we have been assigned will help.

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Over the first ten pages, the men aboard the Nellie sail down the river and Marlow tells a story. The journey they are about to embark upon is characterized as very deselect and adventurous by the narrator. There's a large fabrication of foreboding on the Nellie.

From that point forward, there were many references to darkness and light. The darkness and light symbolize heading from the known to the unknown with the journey. I thought it was very scrupulous to give the feeling of gloom, a word repeated at least fifty times, to represent the darkness and fear. The sense of it is like fog hanging over the men, which contributes to the building of mood and foreboding.

Symbolism and color seems to be very prevalent in HOD, and it should as it ties with the title of the book. Specifically, black and white are used to denote evil and good, as well as indicating purity and death. Take for instance when Marlow sees two women kitting black wool in the Company’s office. He describes the experience as, "…A dead silence, grass sprouting between the stones, imposing carriage archways right and left, immense double doors standing ponderously ajar…as arid as a desert, and opened the first door I came to. Two women, one fat and the other slim…knitting black wool” (p. 10). The women are made to seem as the gatekeepers of darkness. And it took me a little while to grasp this idea, but it makes sense: the women act as fate; they are spinning the wool like a yarn of life. Keep in mind though the wool was black, and so it seems they beckon the darkness.