Quotes from Heart of Darkness

The offing was barred by a black bank of clouds, and the tranquil waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth flowed sombre under an overcast sky—seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.

Exterminate all the brutes!

And this also has been one of the dark places of the earth.

The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much.

Mistah Kurtz—he dead.

We live as we dream — alone.

We live, as we dream—alone.

Going up that river was like traveling back to the earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on the earth and the big trees were kings.

It was written I should be loyal to the nightmare of my choice.

Droll thing life is—that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic for a futile purpose. The most you can hope from it is some knowledge of yourself—that comes too late—a crop of unextinguishable regrets.

The fascination of the abomination—you know, imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate.

The mind of man is capable of anything—because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future.

There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies—which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world—what I want to forget.

I don't like work—no man does—but I like what is in the work—the chance to find yourself.

He had something to say. He said it.