Marlow’s narrative is a speaking voice like when he says you say knights? And who’s that grunting. The Frame Narrator’s is seems to have been written down. You also get the feeling that when Marlow is talking its as if he is trying to understand the meaning of the story for himself.
He is also a great story teller and uses delayed decoding by delaying and explaining incidents fully so that we experience them like he did this can be seen when his helmsman has been killed he believes that the helmsman had wrestled a cane from someone ashore but in fact you find out he died as Marlow says a pool full of blood lay very still he realises the helmsman has been struck by one of the natives and was dead.
Marlow knew this before he began his yarn and yet he waited until the time within the story when he found out which could give you the impression that it was the first time Marlow had ever told the story aloud. The first narrator’s view of the Thames suggests the nobility of Britain’s role in the colonisation of the world; the frame narrator shows explicit and implicit views on it. Explicitly you can see the Frame Narrator’s view when he says dreams of men, seeds of commonwealth, the germs of empires (page 32) you can see easily that what he is saying gives the impression the colonisation is great.
Implicitly you can see his views on Colonisation when he says about the river being unruffled (page 32), which means smooth and calm, and it may mean the Frame Narrator has no troubles with Colonisation as it runs smoothly and therefore effectively. Marlow’s view on the Thames is seen when he talks about the Romans went there to invade and says that the Thames was once a dark place. He talks about the decent young citizen in a toga (page 34) who can be compared to Kurtz I say this because the young citizen like Kurtz never had restraint and as the wilderness surrounded him he gave in like Kurtz on the Congo.
When Marlow arrives in Brussels he refers to the city as a whited sepulchre (page 37) a whited sepulchre implies death, and the phrase whited sepulchre was in the Bible by Jesus as he talks about the Pharisees and Sadducees being grand on the outside but completely the opposite on the inside, and this is what is said about Brussels which is something grand on the outside but something that contains horrors within. This makes the phrase appropriate for Brussels as what Marlow was going to Brussels for being the job down the Congo contained death and horrors, as we find out further on within the novel.
This also links in with Imperialism as that contains horrors, which is shown through the job down the Congo. Marlow’s view of the cruel and often foolish consequences of the trade established by colonialism can be seen in his description of the activities in his journey down the African Coast, where he says that some of the soldiers drowned in the surf but nobody seemed to care, this shows his view as he says that the steamer must go on even though some soldiers may have died in the process of the journey, this there fore means the trade must goes on.
Also when he says names that seemed to belong to some sordid farce acted in front of a sinister backcloth (page 41). This gives Marlow’s view as he says the trading places are part of something sordid which means disgusting and a farce this shows that he believes that the trade is a farce and as the trade is linked with the colonialism, he also thinks that’s a farce too.
He also says that there was a touch of insanity in the proceeding (page 42) this gives you his view as if he says the proceedings on the French steamer were insane then he must believe the same about colonialism too, he would think colonialism is insane due to him believing that the natives aren’t the only ones that need to be civilised people like Kurtz also need to be civilised as they are insane.
