How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #16
[The harlequin]: "'We talked of everything,' he said, quite transported at the recollection. 'I forgot there was such a thing as sleep. The night did not seem to last an hour." (3.2)
The harlequin’s conversations with Kurtz were so engaging that time seemed to fly for them. Words have a way of warping time.
Quote #17
"The brown current ran swiftly out of the heart of darkness, bearing us down towards the sea with twice the speed of our upward progress; and Kurtz's life was running swiftly, too, ebbing, ebbing out of his heart into the sea of inexorable time." (3.36)
Going downstream on the Congo River, which we have by now equated with traveling through time, is much faster than moving upstream. Since Marlow and his crew are headed back towards civilized Europe, they feel as if they are traveling forward in time.
Quote #18
"All that had been Kurtz's had passed out of my hands: his soul, his body, his station, his plans, his ivory, his career. There remained only his memory and his Intended – and I wanted to give that up, too, to the past, in a way – to surrender personally all that remained of him with me to that oblivion which is the last word of our common fate." (3.50)
One of the reasons Marlow wants to get rid of Kurtz’s letters is so that he can put Kurtz and his whole journey behind him, so that he can resign it peacefully to the past.