Heart of Darkness Vocabulary

Abject – utterly hopeless, miserable, humiliating

Altruistic – unselfish and concerned for the welfare of others; caring

Ascetic – one who leads a life of self denial; humorless, grim, sparse, simple

August – dignified, splendid, novel, revered

Capered – playfully leapt; jumped and frolicked, especially in a mischievous way

Cipher – code; letters are substituted with symbols according to a key

Countenance – facial expression

Craven – cowardly, fearful

Declivity – piece of land that slopes down at an angle

Delusion – false belief, especially in the face of strong evidence to contrary

Deplorable – unacceptable and worthy of condemnation; wretched due to poverty or neglect

Diaphanous – transparent or insubstantial

Disinterred – dug up, exposed, unearthed

Dissipated – overindulgent in pleasure, immoral in excess; gradually faded away

Drollery – slightly odd or quirky humor

Effaced – rubbed out; obliterated; erased; behave humbly and respectably

Evanescent – fleeting; disappearing after only a short time

Farcical – absurd, mixed-up, comically confused

Gabardine – smooth twill fabric; durable and lightweight, man-made

Gait – manner of walking

Harlequin – comic buffoon- like character, colorful; fanciful

Hovel – a miserable dwelling, hut or shack

Immutability – unchanging nature; not developing or evolving; stubbornly permanent

Imperturbably – without being made uneasy or irritated; calm; not agitated

Implacable – stubborn, unable to be persuaded or moved

Indissolubly – cannot be undone, broken or dissolved; permanent

Inextricable – unable to be solved, extracted, freed, or removed

Interminable – seemingly endless, long, boring, frustrating

Intrepidity – characteristic of being fearless and persistent, especially in pursuit of object; courage

Languid – without vigor or energy; listless and indifferent

Lugubrious – extremely mournful, sad, gloomy

Lurid – horrifying and shocking in graphic nature

Malevolently – with malice, anger, and evil intent

Mangroves – tropical evergreen trees of tidal coasts (near river mouths)

Mephistopheles – one of 7 devils in the Faust legend, one who Faust sold his soul

Moribund – dying or nearly dead

Motley – composed of a variety of materials or types

Pate – skull, scalp, top of head

Pestiferous – bringing; bearing disease

Placidity – calmness, lack of agitation

Postscriptum – P.S. at the bottom of a letter; an additional note

Precarious – uncertain, unstable, dangerous, risky

Prevaricator – one who does not tell whole truth or who answers directly

Privation – lack of necessities, deprivation

Propitiatory – designed to appease and win favor

Rapacious – greedy and grasping; using unscrupulous means to gin desired end

Recrudescence – recurring nature, breaking out or becoming active again after dormant period

Rudimentary – basic, without luxuries or sophistication

Scow – slat bottomed vessels such as rowboats, sailboats, barges, ferries, and rafts

Sedentary – sitting idle

Sententiously – in a way that is offensive as a result of being moralizing and condescending

Sepulcher – a vault or building used for burial of dead bodies

Somnambulist – sleepwalker, one who is out of touch with reality

Tenebrous – loosely connected

Tepid – lukewarm, unenthusiastic

Trenchant – directly and deliberately hurtful, intending to cause pain and or death

Truckle – wheeled bed, often kept beneath another for convenient storage

Uncongenial – unfriendly and unwelcome

Uncouth – ill mannered and rude

Wanton – sexually indiscriminate; without restraint or inhibition

Worsted – smooth woolen cloth that would be very warm; highly manufactured material