Reading the Heart of Darkness is like maneuvering one’s way through the dead of night wearing a pair of sunglasses. Readers are overwhelmed by the opacity of Conrad’s writing as he renders the conception of ‘reality’ almost impossible. What makes Conrad’s writing so impenetrable is his use of paradox. Conrad purposefully uses paradoxes on the pages of his book to portray a world that is governed by savagery, where logic and scruples are reduced to nothing.

Conrad presents the readers with a myriad of unintuitive paradoxical situations and forces the readers to transcend the ordinary experience. Marlow rehashes his voyage; “There is no joy in the brilliance of sunshine. The long stretches of water way ran on, into the gloom of overshadowed distances” (94). Immediately, the visual paradox hits one right in the face; the brilliance of sunshine contrasts with the gloom of overshadowed distances. The brilliance of light, in this savage land does not inspire joy in the viewers’ eyes. Sunshine does not represent the warm, cuddly sense of security as one would expect, but a brooding, feeling of listless daze. Hence, Conrad the unintuitive features of light to reinforce the ‘alien’ nature of the land in which Marlow finds himself in. Light is sharply contrasted to the waterway heading up the “gloom of overshadowed distances.” Now, it seems Conrad is foreshadowing the fate of Marlow by describing his path submerged in gloom and despair. But, what he also does is shatter the notion of ‘voyage’ in the readers’ minds. This obviously is not the hopeful, spirited journey infused with idealistic dreams of gold and jewelry, images most likely evoked by the word “voyage.” Rather, it is a dispirited, gloomy, desolate journey through the waters of an unknown land. Conrad, through these paradoxical situations establishes that this is a world far different from our own, “in another existence perhaps” (95).

Marlow’s experiences are in no way normal. He describes the environment of the land saying it is “in the shape of an unrestful noisy dream . . .And this stillness of life did not in the least resemble a peace” (95).

Conrad creates another paradox, this time with sound. Marlow describes his journey in a form of an ‘unrestful, noisy dream,’ which evokes the chaos, the mayhem of a nightmare. Yet, the ‘stillness of life’ is what Marlow finds himself in. Conrad reinforces the nonintuitive; the images of quiet life, of plants trees and ware are described as being “unrestful” and not bearing any semblance to “peace.” Marlow’s journey brings the readers to a strange land where logical thinking and perception become distorted. Conrad’s paradoxes clearly portray a world that is impenetrable to the ordinary ‘civilized mind.’ It is a world of intense savagery and chaos.

Conrad forces his readers to wade helplessly in his pool of paradoxes and contradictions. He evokes the images and sounds of things that do not make sense.

(Quotation marks are writers – any spelling issues are mine.)

The European conquerors exploited the world of those with “slightly flatter noses” in order to fulfill their greed and epic dreams (170). Conrad incorporates diction and syntax in page 70 of Heart of Darkness to emphasize his point about the brutality of imperialism. Shameful and bitter, the meaning that Conrad tries to portray through Marlow is the brutal truth of the European colonialism in Africa.

Through the use of syntax, Conrad maximizes the effect of his tone and statement in page 70 of Heart of Darkness. “They were no colonists” and “[t]hey were conquerors” is a repetition that appears in the beginning of the passage (70). Through this use of straight forward repetition, Conrad emphasizes the theme on brutality of the European imperialism. These concrete, straight forward statements portray the strong tone of Conrad and his powerful statement regarding how the conquerors went to Africa to achieve their own self-interests, not for the better being of the savages. His tone in the repetition maximizes the effects of his statement on the inhumane, brutal imperialism that he thinks of as unrighteous. The declarative statements along with the looser, short sentences later on such as “it was just robbery with violence,” “men going at it blind,” “what redeems it is the idea only” adds content to the straightforward statements that were introduced in the beginning. The compound-complex sentence at the end, “An idea at the back of it; not a sentimental pretence but an idea; and an unselfish belief in the idea – something you can set up, and bow down before, and offer a sacrifice to,” slows down the fast pace of the sentences to make the readers think deeply for a second (70). The complexity of the sentence wonders the readers on what he really means and realizes after some thought that the last sentence emphasizes how the European conquerors started out with an unselfish belief in the idea of imperialism, but ended up acting only to fulfill their own greed and ambition through “robbery” and “violence” (70). Isolation also contributes to the emphasis. Isolation of statements such as “The conquest of the Earth” or “when you have it” gives emphasis on the characteristics of imperialism(70). The syntax used in the passage in pg 70, such as repetition, isolation, sentence structure, and so forth, help give emphasis to the theme of brutality of the European imperialism by providing straight forward statements or by slowing down the reader to understand a greater implication.

Diction is also well used in this passage to emphasize the theme on the brutality of European imperialism. Words such as “robber”, violence”, “aggravated murder”, “blind”, give great emphasis to the strong tone of Conrad regarding his explanation of the brutality of the colonists.

Use of diction such as “men give at it blind” emphasizes the colonists’ ignorance of the brutality (70). Conrad’s choice of diction and the placement of strong words such as “brute force” clearly supports his motif and theme of portraying the Europeanexploit of the Africans statements such as taking the world of “those who have slightly flatter noses than ourselves” portray the absurdity of the reason to exploit of the Africans just because they are different (70).

Conrad uses syntax and diction in an excellent way to support and emphasize his opinion and statement on the universal theme, brutality of the European colonists, of the book. Without the efficient use of syntax that emphasizes ideas and provide more thoughts to the readers or without the use of diction, HOD ~~~~~ have been as great.

(Long paragraph, may be a new para at Isolation)

--- A good beginning

Conrad exemplifies his focus on imperialism within the novel through his usage of words and sounds. ThroughoutHeart of Darkness, the obvious tension between the ‘colonist’ and the natives brings unforced problems during Marlow’s journey in the first paragraph of page 111. Marlow describes a scene in which he and his ~ ~ crew members are on the ship and they hear loud cries of the Natives from a distance. Due to the appearance of the white people in their land, the natives struggle to fight back to the incoming powers. Conrad describes the noise heard as “a cry, a very loud cry” that “soared slowly in the opaque air” (111). The first thought that would come up when hearing the “very cloud cry” would most likely be something urgent and quick. However, Conrad goes a completely different direction by saying that the sound travels slowly. In this text, the Natives are eager and are in a urgent situation to keep Marlow and his men away from their area. Despite their “complaining clamour,” the sound is reaching Marlow gradually through the opaque air (111). . . .