Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad

I feel that I am out of my depth with this book. I'm not sure exactly what Conrad was intending. On a surface level it may be some commentary about imperialism but I doubt that was where he wanted the reader to stop. The title itself encourages us to go beyond the physical darkness that is in the heart of the Congo. Kurtz is obviously the key. We find a man that seems to have the propensity toward extremism who finds himself in a place where the encouragement of social custom and morality is removed and what is found in Kurtz is an evil within himself that takes full possession. Actually we see the evil building from the shores of Africa inward with the utter disregard for human life. Kurtz seems to be the pinnacle of what the release of man's primal nature can look like, and it's not pretty.

"The horror, the horror!"

The Book Group Book by Ellen Slezak

Dana says: Found this for a buck at the Friends of the Pima County Library sale. How timely! The book consists of about 25 essays written by people who are in book clubs all over the country and then several reading lists from these groups. I was shocked to find out that most of the people who are involved in book clubs are women and even more shocked to find out that most of the book clubs (at least the ones represented in this book) read women authors exclusively or feminist writers only. To borrow a phrase from the 80s- gag me with a spoon! Even though I think this way of reading is stupid I plowed through the book in a few days and did glean a few good ideas out of it for my own book club.