Imagery In Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness

Here Marlow has become the narrator to tell his story. He uses imagery to highlight this stately building which he was about to enter. a paragraph before he went into detail about the house he made a reference to a “white sepulchre”; a reference to to empty streets and boulevards, big houses tightly shut, and a disquieting sense of turpitude. In this quote Marlow places himself standing at the far end of the road looking down and seeing nothing but grandeur houses lined up. Just looking at the first few descriptions Marlow says “innumerable windows” which would most likely symbolize a sense of isolation. He then continues with “dead silence” which would give way to believe that there is very little life happing throughout the street
and/or house. But within the same sentence Marlow describes the sprouting grass in between the rocks, this may be a slight contrast because “sprouting” gives a sense of life, new begging, the opposite of death. Then “ponderously ajar” gives the added feeling of a lonely/ deserted place that almost has no purpose. There is a slight shift after he tells us how he got through the door and mention the “ungarnished staircase”, he had just described these house to be stately and grandeur but then to have an “ungarnished staircase” doesn't seem to fit in well with the other descriptions.