Heart of Darkness
by Joseph Conrad · first published 1899
40% recommend54% neutral6% critical
Why HN recommends it
Short novella with lyrical prose and dense themes of colonialism, exploitation and the power of language; recommended as a quick, rewarding literary read and as the source behind Apocalypse Now.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Heart of Darkness (1899) is a novella by Polish-English novelist Joseph Conrad, about a voyage up the Congo River into the Congo Free State, in the heart of Africa, by the story's narrator Charles Marlow. Marlow tells his story to friends aboard a boat anchored on the River Thames. Joseph Conrad is one of the greatest English writers, and Heart of Darkness is considered his best. His readers are brought to face our psychological selves to answer, ‘Who is the true savage?’. Originally published in 1902, Heart of Darkness remains one of this century’s most enduring works of fiction. Written sev
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…they're nearly 100% "fluent English speakers". In fact this applies to many if not all languages. As a curiosity, two of the most lyric works of literature ever written in the English language - Lolita and Heart of Darkness - were written by Vladmir Nabokov and Joseph Conrad, one Russian and the other a Polish immigrant to the US that had terrible foreign English accents.
on “Adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as children: study” ↗…yesterday") T.S. Eliot: "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock", "Return of the Magi", "Hollow men" Ernest Hemmingway: A Clean Well-Lighted Place Herman Melville: Bartleby, the Scrivener Joseph Conrad: Heart of Darkness and The Secret Agent Gustave Flaubert: Madame Bovary George Orwell: Any and all of the essays, but especially "Shooting an elephant" and "A hanging" Stendahl: Red and Black James Joyce: A Portrait…
on “Becoming "well read"” ↗…http://jakeseliger.com/2010/03/22/influential-books-on-me-th.... * The Lord of the Rings, for its combination of story, interior drama, and (underrated) political economy. * Blindsight by Peter Watts. * Heart of Darkness by Conrad, who seems more prophetic all the time.
on “Ask HN: What are the most thought-provoking books that you have read?” ↗…of MacBeth. The rise and fall of two shogunate families, and an analysis of the tragic flaws of character that brought their fall about. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo. Small Gods - Terry Pratchett. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad. The Guide - R. K. Narayan. Evidence - Mary Oliver. All of Us - The Collected Poetry of Raymond Carver. Silence - Shusaku Endo. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald. The Wind-Up…
on “Ask HN: What books have made the biggest impact on your mental models?” ↗…disappointment at whichever secret Santa gave him The Fountainhead at the office Christmas party (he was pretty left wing). The four I remember gifting were Asimov's entire Foundation series, Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, The Phantom Major by Virginia Cowles and See you in November by Peter Stiff.
on “Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?” ↗…from the initial setup is masterful. I'm honestly still shocked that Nostromo isn't the first book that people associate with Conrad, given that it's so much more beautiful and thematically-dense than Heart of Darkness or The Secret Agent. It's like if everyone thought Typee was Melville's best work.
on “Jane Austen shaped a vision of personal flourishing that still feels modern” ↗…Kaczynski proffered. Cuz like I'm not seeing it. BTW, if by the book you meant Conrad's The Secret Agent, no I didn't know the book. Conrad is a great writer but this isn't his best which to me would be Heart of Darkness. It's still worth a read, irrespective of Kaczynski.
See 'Heart of Darkness' by Joseph Conrad and that was written in 1899. The Belgian conquest of Congo remains one of the darkest periods of human history littered with crimes against humanity. Since this is so well known once…
on “U.S. companies banned from selling components to ZTE” ↗…advertisers who don't want to be affiliated with such a broad spectrum of content, again hurting Facebook's bottom line. Once again, an opportunity arises to roll out my favorite quote from Conrad's Heart of Darkness: "There had been a lot of such rot let loose in print and talk just about that time, and the excellent woman, living right in the rush of all that humbug, got carried off her feet. She talked about ‘weaning…
on “Abuse prevention is tradecraft” ↗The Feynman Lectures on Physics The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad A Latin/English dictionary for new company names
on “Ask YC: What would you put on a hacker's bookshelf?” ↗…reason why these books are taught in school over say Dan Brown... they're damn good. Especially without the burden of school assessment. I think back to the books that I did read at school, like Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Fitzgerald's Gatsby, and I can instantly see the quality in those works. Same goes for "classics" I've read in recent years, like Marquez, Camus, Frank Herbert, Huxley, etc. That said, there have…
on “Anne Trubek on Why We Shouldn’t Still Be Learning Catcher in the Rye” ↗"Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad. Apocalypse Now was based on this book. Fairly short and very good.
on “Ask HN: Good literature for a technical guy” ↗…the sentences stay in your memory long after you've read them, and you see that pithy phrases can carry a world of experience behind them. Another great sentence - "We live as we dream - alone" [Conrad, Heart of Darkness] Literature may be considered boring because it takes patience to appreciate, but I think it is neither primitive nor plain. If some programming reaches the level of art, as in a clever hack, maybe we…
on “Google discloses its diversity record, and it’s not good” ↗…home. Be it classics, political theory, maybe something light and scientific? Generally, whatever doesn't require additional materials. Here are some titles of that kind I enjoyed. Anabasis by Xenophon Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad Antifragile by Nassim Taleb Learned Optimism by Martin Seligman The Son also Rises by Gregory Clark
on “Ask HN: What should I save for offline reading during 5 weeks without Internet?” ↗Well, I would strongly agree with the Kapuściński recommendation, but while we're going off-topic with great Polish writers, let me suggest that readers re-visit Joseph Conrad. Re-reading Heart of Darkness as an adult was a totally different experience from the forced read of it as a child. I also really enjoyed Conrad's Nostromo, a true masterpiece.
on “The Future According to Stanisław Lem” ↗