Heart of Darkness
Impressionism – Marlow
“forthwith a change came over the waters and the serenity became less brilliant but more
profound.”
“the place of the monstrous town was still marked ominously on the sky”
“The earth seemed unearthly”
“the current was more rapid now, the steamer seemed at her last gasp, the stern-wheel flopped
languidly”
“The tranquil waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth flowed somber under an
overcast sky – seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.”
Line between good and evil is blurred
“He (Kurtz) was a universal genius”
“The dangers in Europe…”
“I am grateful to them…they did not each other before my face”
“The offing was barred…of an immense darkness”
“I would not tell her, it would have been too dark”
“And outside, the silent wilderness surrounding this cleared speck on the earth struck me as
something great and invincible, like evil or truth, waiting patiently for the passing away of this
fantastic invasion.”(20)
“After all, this was the expression of some sort of belief, it had candor, it has the appalling face
of a glimpsed truth—the strange commingling of desire and hate.” (65)
“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’s a taint of death, a flavor of mortality in lies—which is
exactly what I hate and detest in the world—what I want to forget.” (23)
“Did he live his life again in every detail of desire, temptation, and surrender during that supreme
moment of complete knowledge?” (64)
“They howled and leaped and spun, and made horrid faces” (about the natives)
Women are naïve to the world
“She walked with measured steps, draped in striped and fringed cloths, treading the Earth
proudly with a slight jingle and a flash of barbarous ornaments”
“They – the women I mean – are out of it – should be out of it. We must help them to stay in that
beautiful world of their own.”
“It’s queer how out of touch with truth women are. They live in a world of their own, and there
has never been anything like it, and never can be, it is too beautiful altogether, and if they were
to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset.”
“I could not tell her. It would have been too dark.”
“the last word he pronounced was – your name.”
“Yes, I am proud to know I understood him better than anyone on earth—he told me so himself.”
(69)
Imperialism impact of Man
“Exterminate all the brutes”
“When one has got to make correct entries, one comes to hate those savages – hate them to
death”
“In a very few hours, I served on a city that always makes me think of a white sepulcher.
Prejudice no doubt.”
“I offered him the repost on the ‘Suppression of savage customs’, with the postscriptum torn off.
He took it up eagerly, but ended by sniffing at it with an air of contempt.”
**Other good ones are
“The horror! The horror!”
“Well, you know, that was the worst of it – this suspicion of their not being inhuman”
The Stranger
Power of self-realization
“Then, I don’t know why, but something inside me snapped.” (120)
“Everybody was privileged. There were only privileged people. The others would all be
condemned one day. And he would be condemned.” (121)
“Nothing, nothing mattered, and I knew why. So did he.” (121)
“As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope, for the first time, in that night alive
with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world.” (122)
“But I was sure about me…sure about my life and sure of the death I had waiting for me”.
“What did other people’s deaths or a mother’s love matter to me…”
“But I wasn’t being reasonable...”
“I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world”
“I had only to that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they
greet me cries of hate”
Divine entity or authority as society’s judge
“human justice was nothing and divine justice was everything”
“that’s all for today, Monsieur Antichrist”
“no man was so guilty that God would forgive him”
“every man I have ever known in your position has turned to him”
“then god can help you
Society’s oppression of the individual
“but all the long speeches, all the interminable days and hours that people had spent talking
about my soul, had left me with impression of a colorless swirling river that was making me
dizzy.”
“him telling me how glad he was that he’d been able to give the woman what she deserved”
“I had of being an odd man out, a kind of intruder”
“And I had the old impression of being watched by myself”
“He wasn’t even sure he was alive, because he was living like a dead man”
“Right then the cop slapped him.” (36)
“’He beat me up! He’s a pimp’” (36)
“Then he beats the dog and wears at it.” (27)
“When the dog wants to urinate, the old man won’t give him enough time.” (27)
Irrational Universe
“Asked me if I wanted to marry her. I said it didn’t make any difference to me and that we could
if she wanted to”
“It was then that I realized that you could either shoot or not shoot.”
“If you go slowly, you risk getting sunstroke. But if you go too fast, you work up a sweat and
then catch a chill inside the church.” (*I think this was the quote…I only wrote down the first 3
words on my paper)
“I had been right, I was still right. I have lived my life one way and I could just as well have
lived it another. I had done this and I hadn’t done that. I hadn’t done this and I have done
another. And so?” (121)
“When she laughed I wanted her again. A minute later she asked me if I loved her. I told her it
didn’t mean anything but that I didn’t think so.” (35)
“I said that people never changed their lives, that in any case one life was as good another and
that I wasn’t dissatisfied with mine here at all.” (41)
“My reflection seemed to remain serious even though I was trying to smile at it.” (81)
Focus on physical world
“I gritted my teeth, unclenched my fists in my trouser pockets, and strained every nerve in order
to overcome the fury.” (57)
“I explained to him, however, that my nature was such that my physical needs often got in the
way of my feelings.” (65)
“I had found it very hard to follow his reasoning, first because I was hot and there were big flies
in his office that kept landing on my face….” (68)
“Do you really love this earth as much as all that” (119)
Beloved
Loss of Identity/Identities
“schoolteacher changed me”
“But wasn’t no way I’d ever be Paul D again (living or dead)”
“This here Sethe is new”
“Now I can. I can sleep like the drowned”
“I am Beloved and she is mine”. (she referring to Sethe)
“Denver stood in the sun and couldn’t leave it” (244)
“So they were: Paul D Garner, Paul F Garner, Paul A Garner, Halle Suggs, Sixo, and the wild
man.” (11)
“They called me Joshua,” he said.” (232)
“You your best thing, Sethe. You are.”
Freedom
“Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another”
“they forgot her too – remembering seemed unwise”
“world beyond the edge of the porch”
“thirty mile woman got away with his blossoming seed”
“inaugurated her life in the wind as a woman”
Denver Transformation
“Hot, shy, now Denver was lonely”
“But Denver was shakin now and sobbing, so she could not speak. The tears she had not shed
for nine years welting her far too womanly breasts”
“Denver’s imagination produced its own hunger and its own food, which she badly needed
because loneliness wore her out”
“Denver had joined in the play, holding back a bit out of habit, even though it was the most fun
she had ever known”
“She did not know it then, but it was the word ‘baby’, said softly and with such kindness, that
inaugurated her life in the world as a woman”
Dehumanization of Slavery
“They could prowl at will, change from one mind to another, and even when they thought they
were behaving, it was a far cry from real humans did.” (244)
“The dollar value of his weight, his strength, his heart, his brain, his penis, and his future.”
(226)
“ White people can anyways…” (209)