How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #25
"The woods were unmoved, like a mask—heavy, like the closed door of a prison - they looked with their air of hidden knowledge, of patient expectation, of unapproachable silence." (3.4)
Look, we get that Marlow is a little freaked about by all this nature, but we're starting to suspect that he's taking it too seriously. They're just trees. Right? Right??
Quote #26
"But the wilderness had found him [Kurtz] out early, and had taken on him a terrible vengeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude - and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating." (3.5)
Check out how Marlow describes the wilderness almost like Kurtz's lover—whispering to him, hanging out alone with him, being all sexy and "irresistibly fascinating." How could he pass that up?
Quote #27
"I noticed that the crowd of savages was vanishing without any perceptible movement of retreat, as if the forest that had ejected these beings so suddenly had drawn them in again as the breath is drawn in a long aspiration." (3.9)
The native Africans are merely an extension of the wilderness—a living, breathing wilderness that is drawing its minions back in as it inhales. Yikes.