I was surprised when I read heart of darkness, that, for me at least, the final gut-punch of the tale isn’t a dying man thinking of the horror he had wrought and seen, but the protagonist getting back to the man’s wife and lying to her, telling her his last thoughts were of her. It isnt something that would have worked for Apocalypse Now, but I didn’t expect such a short novel to hide a completely different ending mood. I still think about it, years later.