Heart of Darkness: Secondary Student Edition

In 1889, Joseph Conrad journeyed to Colonial Africa to assume command of a Congo River steamboat. There he discovered the dark nature of European exploitation of the peoples and natural resources of a continent, as well as the darkness and dangers of nature itself. HEART OF DARKNESS is a dramatization of Conrad’s experiences and discoveries. Narrated in the vocabulary of Conrad’s storyteller Marlow, the author expresses the horrors of a system he has grown to despise. Just as forcefully, he reveals the darkness that participation in such a system can visit upon the human soul. This edition is designed for secondary classrooms. While the text is unabridged, the author’s lengthy paragraphs (confusing for some younger readers) are broken into appropriate but more readable lengths. Instructional emphasis for this volume is “vocabulary in context.” Heart of Darkness is a novel that is easy to read but rich in language. Conrad divided his novel into three sections. Within each section of this edition, specific vocabulary words are identified and defined. A review of the vocabulary words, along with their usage in the text follows the end of the section.