All 7 Uses of
comprehend
in
Heart of Darkness
- He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable.†
Chpt 1
- In the empty immensity of earth, sky, and water, there she was, incomprehensible, firing into a continent.†
Chpt 1
- The steamer toiled along slowly on the edge of a black and incomprehensible frenzy.†
Chpt 2
- We were cut off from the comprehension of our surroundings; we glided past like phantoms, wondering and secretly appalled, as sane men would be before an enthusiastic outbreak in a madhouse.†
Chpt 2
- Yes, it was ugly enough; but if you were man enough you would admit to yourself that there was in you just the faintest trace of a response to the terrible frankness of that noise, a dim suspicion of there being a meaning in it which you—you so remote from the night of first ages—could comprehend.†
Chpt 2
- Their bearing, which was simply the bearing of commonplace individuals going about their business in the assurance of perfect safety, was offensive to me like the outrageous flauntings of folly in the face of a danger it is unable to comprehend.†
Chpt 3
- the murmurs of wild crowds, the faint ring of incomprehensible words cried from afar, the whisper of a voice speaking from beyond the threshold of an eternal darkness.
Chpt 3 *incomprehensible = not understandablestandard prefix: The prefix "in-" in incomprehensible means not and reverses the meaning of comprehensible. This is the same pattern you see in words like invisible, incomplete, and insecure.
Definition:
-
(comprehend) to understand something -- especially to understand it completely