Review of "Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness: A Casebook (Casebooks in Criticism)" on 'Goodreads'
2 stars
[a:Joseph Conrad|3345|Joseph Conrad|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1403814208p2/3345.jpg]'s [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900.SX50.jpg|2877220] is a terrible book that was foisted on high school and college students for decades and maybe it still is. I can't think of a more efficient way to crush any joy of reading that teachers would want their students to have than to make them read this. The writing is wordy and the story telling inept; things are introduced out of sequence as though Conrad is deliberately trying to rid it of any narrative elements that would make it at all compelling. The themes are now well known and have been better expressed by others. Except for a few hundred words, it's told as a flashback and every paragraph is preceded by a quote mark, giving it a sort of sub-voice that further distances the reader from the prose. Good luck finding a paragraph less than three-quarters of …
[a:Joseph Conrad|3345|Joseph Conrad|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1403814208p2/3345.jpg]'s [b:Heart of Darkness|4900|Heart of Darkness|Joseph Conrad|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1392799983l/4900.SX50.jpg|2877220] is a terrible book that was foisted on high school and college students for decades and maybe it still is. I can't think of a more efficient way to crush any joy of reading that teachers would want their students to have than to make them read this. The writing is wordy and the story telling inept; things are introduced out of sequence as though Conrad is deliberately trying to rid it of any narrative elements that would make it at all compelling. The themes are now well known and have been better expressed by others. Except for a few hundred words, it's told as a flashback and every paragraph is preceded by a quote mark, giving it a sort of sub-voice that further distances the reader from the prose. Good luck finding a paragraph less than three-quarters of a page long.
First published in 1902, Heart of Darkness is the kind of writing that makes you grateful for [a:Ernest Hemingway|1455|Ernest Hemingway|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1574217836p2/1455.jpg], whatever flaws you may attribute to him.