After Harry’s thorn scratch becomes gangrenous, the infection moves slowly up his leg. Immobilizing him and weakening his physical and mental state, the steady yet painless progress of the gangrene—which ultimately kills Harry—mirrors the steady yet almost imperceptible deterioration of his life as a writer. Although gangrene is killing him, Harry notes this manner of dying is easy compared with others he has seen, the only discomfort being his inability to move around by himself. In a similar manner, despite seeming innocuous, too much comfort in his life has undermined and prevented his success as a writer: “each day of not writing, of comfort…softened his will to work so that, finally, he did no work at all.” Harry’s talent and passion gradually died after a life of comfort ensnared him, much as he will eventually pass away under the painless clutches of his gangrene infection.
Gangrene Quotes in The Snows of Kilimanjaro
So now it was all over, he thought. So now he would never have a chance to finish it. So this was the way it ended, in a bickering over a drink.
And just then it occurred to him that he was going to die. It came with a rush; not as a rush of water nor of wind; but of a sudden evil-smelling emptiness and the odd thing was that the hyena slipped lightly along the edge of it.
Gangrene Symbol Timeline in The Snows of Kilimanjaro
