I tried reading Heart of Darkness 3 times before I finally got more than 5 pages into it without giving up. You definitely need to be in the right head space to get through this dense dense story, but it's well worth it. Beautiful imagery and really gets into your brain for a while. I think I'll need to read it again soon. ( )

The introduction is really interesting. I did not know Joseph Conrad...a great "English" writer was really Polish. His name is really Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski. Wow, huh? That and he didn't really learn the English language until he was twenty. His books, well at least these two, have real moral and psychological undertones. I love that.

Heart of Darkness
Published in 1902, Heart of Darkness begins the story on a ship leaving London. Marlow, one of the English passengers on the ship tells a story of when he was a Captain of a boat in the Congo doing Ivory trading. He is given the task of going down the Congo River to retrieve a fellow ivory trader, Kurtz, who has quite the reputation in the region.

While the writing is very very wordy (the introduction even notes that), the imagery is very strong. He depicts the horrible conditions of the slaves in the area. And when he finally does meet Kurtz, the absolute lack of humanity in him is just...well plain scary. And that's when it gets sort of into the psychological aspect of the story. I mean Kurtz is a horrible trader who will do anything to get more ivory. I mean the guy has heads on stakes around his place. Just as a warning. But Kurtz has presence. Just pure evil genius. And Marlow actually starts to admire him. Not admire what he does or did but just the genius of it all. It really confronts that idea of the ability of everyone to be or do evil. Kind of like in World War II...how do regular people end up doing horrific things? Even the title of the story, Heart of Darkness is a psychological twist. Africa used to be called the "Dark Continent" but it's really about the darkness of the human heart.

The Secret Sharer
This short story, published in 1910, was a bit more straight forward than Heart of Darkness but still pretty good. The story is about a newbie Captain of a ship. He really hasn't gotten to know his crew or his ship. While he on watch during the night, he finds a naked man hanging onto the ladder of his ship in the water. He takes the man on board, hides him in his cabin, and learns his story. The man is named Leggatt and is from the ship, Sephora, which is nearby. During a horrible storm, Leggatt, in a fit of rage, killed a fellow shipmate because Leggatt thought the shipmate was being lax in his duties. He escaped punishment by diving in the water, feigning drowning and hiding.

So the Captain actually sides with this guy! He hides him, lies to his crew, and lies to the Sephora Captain. He even goes as far as to call this guy "his other self"...I mean he really identifies more with this murderer than with anyone else. Kind of crazy.

Conclusion:

I'll have to read more Joseph Conrad. I love the psychological/moral twist in these stories. They really make me ponder things long after I've read them. And I love that Joseph Conrad actually went to these places since he worked in the French and British Merchant Navies. It makes me wonder how much of his stories he took from real life...which is kind of scary. ( )

Wow. Apocalypse Now was so much more riveting. I actually gave up on this one about 20 pages shy of the end. I think the crazy guy dies at the end. I hope the steamboat sinks on the way back down the river. Paragraph breaks are your friend, Joseph Conrad. ( )

Heart of Darkness deals with Marlowe's commandant of the "Nellie", which is transporting ivory downriver on the Congo. The environment is dark and foreign. Marlowe is a civilized man amongst savagery. He contemplates society and the darkness that pervades his own country. He hears from the men who have found work in this strange land of an enlightened man--Kurtz--who turns out to be not at all what is expected. I won't ruin it for you.The Secret Sharer tells of an unamed Captain given a boat and crew of whom he is totally unfamiliar. During their journey the Captain secretly takes on a nude swimmer whom he finds in the water at night. He comes to understand the man's questionable past, yet he places himself in the man's place and becomes his aide. Both novellas are deemed to be autobiographical. Conrad's prose is able to capture our imaginations so that we share in his strange watery adventures. His musings are philosophical, entertaining, and amazingly apt. ( )

I will admit that its possible I didn't get this book, but I thought there was a large buildup and then a small payoff. Other things about this book were good the writing style was great and the story is engaging but when you finally meet Kurtz you expect something more than he is. ( )