And this also," said Marlow suddenly, "has been one of the dark places of the earth

I finished reading Heart of Darkness for the third time last week. I think I've finally reached a place in my reading where I can truly begin to understand and appreciate this piece. I heart irony after all. Well, it only took three times to START to understand this book. Seriously, it's pretty dense for a 77 page novella. My goal in life is to read this at least 5 times. However I have a feeling Miami alone might be able to help me reach that goal. It's been assigned on 3 different syllabi in 3 different courses. I've gotten a different reading of it every time. It took me a little while to understand the racism in the novella. It really put me off - especially reading it in a post-colonial perspective like I did last semester. I feel like I was able to get at the heart of it this time though. I read The Shadow Line this week, and I'm not quite as impressed. Maybe I'll understand it's "complexities" better after we discuss it in class but all the metaphors seem so straight forward. Anyway. 

Basically, as much as I've whined and groaned about having to read this so many times, in the end I would seriously recommend it to any English major or lover of deep and dense literature in general.