Read the following passage from Heart of Darkness carefully. Then, in a well- organized essay, analyze how this description indicates the narrator's ambivalent
feelings about Kurtz and what he represents. You may want to consider such
literary elements as point of view, tone, diction, and paradoxes.
"Kurtz discoursed. A voice! a voice! It rang deep to the very last. It survived his strength to
hide in the magnificent folds of eloquence the barren darkness of his heart. Oh, he
struggled! he struggled! The wastes of his weary brain were haunted by shadowy images
now-images of wealth and fame revolving obsequiously round his unextinguishable gift of
noble and lofty expression. My Intended, my station, my career, my ideas-these were the
subjects for the occasional utterances of elevated sentiments. The shade of the original
Kurtz frequented the bedside of the hollow sham, whose fate it was to be buried presently
in the mould of primeval earth. But both the diabolic love and the unearthly hate of the
mysteries it had penetrated fought for the possession of that soul satiated with primitive
emotions, avid of lying fame, of sham distinction, of all the appearances of success and
power." (pages 238 - 239 in the 5th edition, 216 - 217 in the 6th edition, 218 - 219 in the
7th edition)