Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad

This book represents a turning point in my personal and professional aspirations. The object itself is nothing special, a tattered paperback edition purchased used from my university's bookstore. I was assigned this book in a World Civilizations course in 2003 during my second semester in college. Despite the fact that my disorganized and inarticulate professor never actually got around to discussing it, I devoured Conrad’s dark tale of exploration into the unknown, barbaric, and primal reaches of the Congo river, especially since the story is made more profound upon its narrator, Marlowe's, return to civilization and recounting of his tale. At the time I enjoyed the novel but I was not fully aware of how it would propel me into the vast unknown of literary study until I returned to it in a British Literature course during my own journey abroad in London in 2004 (see entry #19 and #20). I have since come to consider Heart of Darkness to be one of the most dense and fascinating pieces of literature in the English language.

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New York: Penguin, 1995.