Whilst leafing through the initial pages of “Colonization Sucks- the Book” a certain thing kept appearing to periodically me similarly to this troublesome cold sore that after that one night in Vegas. And that was that Joseph Conrad is absolutely unequivocally obsessed with darkness. Now I know this is no profound revelation seeing as how Ms. J-Dawg (remember not formal) told us darkness was a huge symbol in the book. But it seems essentially ever sentence is either darkness this, darkness that, darkness hit me with a waffle ball bat. Now while I may complain about the darkness in a fashion similar to that small petulant Bulgarian child, but it does accomplish its goal of framing a world of eternal shadows and malevolent mystery. Also another thing I was noticing was how the darkness seemed to create a meditative atmosphere for our lovable hero Charles Marlow. The darkness appeared to make him at peace with his past but causes him to feel rather ambivalent toward his future. As I pressed forward I decided to start paying attention to the way in which the people were talking to each other in a very casual relaxed manner. And I noticed at some points that the characters were seemingly too relaxed to even be able speak properly.
But while darkness is all fine and dandy there is another thing my mushy rotted useless brain thought might be important to remember for some reason. And that would have to be Marlow’s treatment of dames in the tiny portion of the book I read. I find that he is kind of an [expletive deleted]hole toward women and sees them as inferior.
Shelby, Thanks for sticking up for the girls in the book! Keep this attitude in mind, especially when we get toward the end. I also think your exploration of the importance of darkness is important. I like how you say that Marlow feels ambivalent. Keep on looking for ambivalencies and ambiguities in the diction!
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