Ask questions, suggest ideas, float theories…

This post is for you to use (or not use) as you see fit. Try out your ideas for your essay Thursday, or ask questions of your classmates. You can even ask questions of me. If I see them, I'll be sure to respond.

I hope you all do very well.

See you then.

J.D.

Related Themes: Eyes, Kinship, Enemies, Restraint

The themes listed above arise in Part 1, but really find their definition in Part 2, as Conrad's technique of pairing, juxtaposition, repetition and embellishment really gathers cumulative force. The alert reader who puts the incidents, comments, descriptions together—who is willing to backtrack when something she or he reads reminds him or her of something a page or twenty pages before—that reader attains far more enlightenment than the straight ahead sort who simply follows the line of narrative like a string from page one to the end.

With this in mind, post what you found and what you think as groups. We'll discuss your comments on Monday.

And…

I asked at the end of class for your theories on the incident of the white fog that halts the progress of the steamer and immediately precedes the attack. Please tack those on to the end of your comments. They too will be food for discussion come Monday.

Regards,

J.D.

Research Marlow's clear-eyed view of Kurtz

For class tomorrow, scour Part II for Marlow's appraisals of Kurtz's activities, behavior and character. Remember that we are reading about his experiences as he recounts them years later aboard the Nellie at dusk. He is a different person from the young man who encountered the enigmatic "high demon."

Come with your book marked, & paragraphs noted on a separate sheet of paper. The quality of our discussion and our discoveries depends on your preparation. I think a half hour of your time will suffice to make a good list (provided, of course, that you've read and are familiar with Part II).

See you Fourth!

J.D.

Identify the links between Marlow & Kurtz

As I said in class Wednesday, this is a blog in which your group posts its findings. Make the entry as complete as you can, and sign everyone's name at the bottom. Should be very interesting…

To re-cap, here's the prompt from class:

Heart of Darkness is not Kurtz’s story, but Marlow’s. In your group discussion, work to develop a better understanding of our enigmatic narrator. Start by re-reading his account of his job interview in the “Sepulchral City” (also the conversation with his aunt).

Note this later statement:

Part 1 ¶ 62

I would not have gone so far as to fight for Kurtz, but I went for him near enough to a lie. You know I hate, detest, and can’t bear a lie, not because I am straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appalls me. There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies—which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world—what I want to forget. It makes me miserable and sick, like biting something rotten would do.

What lie does Marlow tell for Kurtz, and why does he tell it? How does Marlow become entangled in a lie when he signs on as a steamboat captain in the Congo?

What is the nature of his attachment toward—loyalty for—Kurtz? Just a preference for hot-running devils?

Can you find any clue to the effects—physical & spiritual—of Marlow's experience in the Congo in Narrator One’s description of him?

Two kinds of devils

Read ¶ 38 of Part 1. For this blog, consider Marlow’s curious statement about devils.

You know I am not particularly tender; I’ve had to strike and to fend off. I’ve had to resist and to attack sometimes—that’s only one way of resisting—without counting the exact cost, according to the demands of such sort of life as I had blundered into. I’ve seen the devil of violence, and the devil of greed, and the devil of hot desire; but, by all the stars! these were strong, lusty, red-eyed devils, that swayed and drove men—men, I tell you. But as I stood on this hillside, I foresaw that in the blinding sunshine of that land I would become acquainted with a flabby, pretending, weak-eyed devil of a rapacious and pitiless folly. How insidious he could be, too, I was only to find out several months later and a thousand miles farther.

What sort of man or men fit this description of a “flabby, pretending, weak-eyed devil of a rapacious and pitiless folly”? Are there examples of them in Part 1? If so, who and why? Why does Marlow prefer the “strong, lusty, red-eyed devils, that swayed and drove men” over this breed? Are there any examples of the strong & lusty sort to be found in Part 1, or anywhere else for that matter? Who, if any—and why?

• • • • • • • • • •

That's the blog assignment. For Monday's conversation in class, think also about these topics and note the appropriate passages in your text:

Think also about these:

• The continuing contrasts of dark & light
• Contrast between the representatives of “civilization” and the "enemies" who work for them and receive punishment from them. With whom does Marlow chiefly empathize, even if his comprehension is imperfect?
• Contrast between the representatives of “civilization” and the wilderness that surround them, opposed to the relation that the natives carry on with the same wilderness.
• Atmosphere: a nebulous yet distinct product of diction, phrasing and description. In this work it is especially powerful.
• Striking pairs. Examples—Marlow’s ¶13 with the 1^st narrator’s ¶ 6. The torch becomes the “idea; and an unselfish belief in the idea…” OR Two black hens, ¶21 and the two “Fates” ¶23 & 25
• Irony that borders on humor. (Maybe Conrad doesn't get enough credit for his sense of humor). Examples—The death of Fresleven, ¶21. “The supernatural being had not been touched after he fell.” OR The old doctor who measures heads ¶27 OR ¶51 The drunken officer “looking after the upkeep of the road…” though, Marlow says, “Can’t say I saw any road or any upkeep, unless the body of a middle-aged negro, with a bullet-hole in the forehead, upon which I absolutely stumbled three miles farther on, may be considered as a permanent improvement.”

The haze in the glow

From Part 1, ¶ 9:

The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside, enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.

From Part 1, ¶ 14:

We looked on, waiting patiently—there was nothing else to do till the end of the flood; but it was only after a long silence, when he said, in a hesitating voice, “I suppose you fellows remember I did once turn fresh-water sailor for a bit,” that we knew we were fated, before the ebb began to run, to hear about one of Marlow’s inconclusive experiences.

In the narrator’s indirect way (Marlow’s experiences are “inconclusive,” the meaning of his yarn is “not inside” but “outside”) he—with the author—is warning his audience about the tale Marlow will relate.

[And if you're confused, note that an unnamed narrator starts our tale, then turns it over to Marlow for most of the duration.]

What do his warnings lead us to expect, and not to expect, from the tale Marlow tells? Can we assign exact meaning and interpretation to utterances like, "The horror! The horror!"?

Remember—your response to this is one paragraph, tops!