HEART OF DARKNESS (Joseph Conrad) Summary them but that they should approach cautiously.

Shortly
after the steamer has taken on the firewood, it is
Plot Overview surrounded by a dense fog. When the fog clears, the ship
is attacked by an unseen band of natives, who fire arrows
Heart of Darkness centers around Marlow, an from the safety of the forest. The African helmsman is
introspective sailor, and his journey up the Congo River to killed before Marlow frightens the natives away with the
meet Kurtz, reputed to be an idealistic man of great ship’s steam whistle. Not long after, Marlow and his
abilities. Marlow takes a job as a riverboat captain with the companions arrive at Kurtz’s Inner Station, expecting to
Company, a Belgian concern organized to trade in the find him dead, but a half-crazed Russian trader, who meets
Congo. As he travels to Africa and then up the Congo, them as they come ashore, assures them that everything
Marlow encounters widespread inefficiency and brutality in is fine and informs them that he is the one who left the
the Company’s stations. The native inhabitants of the wood. The Russian claims that Kurtz has enlarged his mind
region have been forced into the Company’s service, and and cannot be subjected to the same moral judgments as
they suffer terribly from overwork and ill treatment at the normal people. Apparently, Kurtz has established himself
hands of the Company’s agents. The cruelty and squalor of as a god with the natives and has gone on brutal raids in
imperial enterprise contrasts sharply with the impassive the surrounding territory in search of ivory. The collection
and majestic jungle that surrounds the white man’s of severed heads adorning the fence posts around the
settlements, making them appear to be tiny islands amidst station attests to his “methods.” The pilgrims bring Kurtz
a vast darkness. out of the station-house on a stretcher, and a large group
of native warriors pours out of the forest and surrounds
Marlow arrives at the Central Station, run by the them. Kurtz speaks to them, and the natives disappear
general manager, an unwholesome, conspiratorial into the woods.
character. He finds that his steamship has been sunk and
spends several months waiting for parts to repair it. His The manager brings Kurtz, who is quite ill, aboard
interest in Kurtz grows during this period. The manager the steamer. A beautiful native woman, apparently Kurtz’s
and his favorite, the brickmaker, seem to fear Kurtz as a mistress, appears on the shore and stares out at the ship.
threat to their position. Kurtz is rumored to be ill, making The Russian implies that she is somehow involved with
the delays in repairing the ship all the more costly. Marlow Kurtz and has caused trouble before through her influence
eventually gets the parts he needs to repair his ship, and over him. The Russian reveals to Marlow, after swearing
he and the manager set out with a few agents (whom him to secrecy, that Kurtz had ordered the attack on the
Marlow calls pilgrims because of their strange habit of steamer to make them believe he was dead in order that
carrying long, wooden staves wherever they go) and a they might turn back and leave him to his plans. The
crew of cannibals on a long, difficult voyage up the river. Russian then leaves by canoe, fearing the displeasure of
The dense jungle and the oppressive silence make the manager. Kurtz disappears in the night, and Marlow
everyone aboard a little jumpy, and the occasional glimpse goes out in search of him, finding him crawling on all fours
of a native village or the sound of drums works the toward the native camp. Marlow stops him and convinces
pilgrims into a frenzy. him to return to the ship. They set off down the river the
next morning, but Kurtz’s health is failing fast.
Marlow and his crew come across a hut with stacked
firewood, together with a note saying that the wood is for
 Marlow listens to Kurtz talk while he pilots the ship, This train of thought reminds Marlow of his sole
and Kurtz entrusts Marlow with a packet of personal experience as a “fresh-water sailor,” when as a young man
documents, including an eloquent pamphlet on civilizing he captained a steamship going up the Congo River. He
the savages which ends with a scrawled message that recounts that he first got the idea when, after returning
says, “Exterminate all the brutes!” The steamer breaks from a six-year voyage through Asia, he came across a
down, and they have to stop for repairs. Kurtz dies, map of Africa in a London shop window, which
uttering his last words—“The horror! The horror!”—in the reinvigorated his childhood fantasies about the “blank
presence of the confused Marlow. Marlow falls ill soon after spaces” on the map.
and barely survives. Eventually he returns to Europe and
goes to see Kurtz’s Intended (his fiancée). She is still in Marlow recounts how he obtained a job with the
mourning, even though it has been over a year since Belgian “Company” that trades on the Congo River (the
Kurtz’s death, and she praises him as a paragon of virtue Congo was then a Belgian territory) through the influence
and achievement. She asks what his last words were, but of an aunt who had friends in the Company’s
Marlow cannot bring himself to shatter her illusions with administration. The Company was eager to send Marlow to
the truth. Instead, he tells her that Kurtz’s last word was Africa, because one of the Company’s steamer captains
her name. had recently been killed in a scuffle with the natives.

After he hears that he has gotten the job, Marlow

travels across the English Channel to a city that reminds
Part I him of a “whited sepulchre” (probably Brussels) to sign his
employment contract at the Company’s office. First,
At sundown, a pleasure ship called the Nellie lies however, he digresses to tell the story of his predecessor
anchored at the mouth of the Thames, waiting for the tide with the Company, Fresleven. Much later, after the events
to go out. Five men relax on the deck of the ship: the Marlow is about to recount, Marlow was sent to recover
Director of Companies, who is also the captain and host, Fresleven’s bones, which he found lying in the center of a
the Lawyer, the Accountant, Marlow, and the unnamed deserted African village. Despite his reputation as mild
Narrator. The five men, old friends held together by “the mannered, Fresleven was killed in a scuffle over some
bond of the sea,” are restless yet meditative, as if waiting hens: after striking the village chief, he was stabbed by
for something to happen. As darkness begins to fall, and the chief’s son. He was left there to die, and the
the scene becomes “less brilliant but more profound,” the superstitious natives immediately abandoned the village.
men recall the great men and ships that have set forth Marlow notes that he never did find out what became of
from the Thames on voyages of trade and exploration, the hens.
frequently never to return. Suddenly Marlow remarks that
this very spot was once “one of the dark places of the Arriving at the Company’s offices, Marlow finds two
earth.” He notes that when the Romans first came to sinister women there knitting black wool, one of whom
England, it was a great, savage wilderness to them. He admits him to a waiting room, where he looks at a map of
imagines what it must have been like for a young Roman Africa color-coded by colonial powers. A secretary takes
captain or soldier to come to a place so far from home and him into the inner office for a cursory meeting with the
lacking in comforts. head of the Company. Marlow signs his contract, and the
secretary takes him off to be checked over by a doctor.
The doctor takes measurements of his skull, remarking and pitiless folly.” Finally, Marlow comes to a grove of trees
that he unfortunately doesn’t get to see those men who and, to his horror, finds a group of dying native laborers.
make it back from Africa. More important, the doctor tells He offers a biscuit to one of them; seeing a bit of white
Marlow, “the changes take place inside.” The doctor is European yarn tied around his neck, he wonders at its
interested in learning anything that may give Belgians an meaning. He meets a nattily dressed white man, the
advantage in colonial situations. Company’s chief accountant (not to be confused with
Marlow’s friend the Accountant from the opening of the
With all formalities completed, Marlow stops off to book). Marlow spends ten days here waiting for a caravan
say goodbye to his aunt, who expresses her hope that he to the next station. One day, the chief accountant tells him
will aid in the civilization of savages during his service to that in the interior he will undoubtedly meet Mr. Kurtz, a
the Company, “weaning those ignorant millions from their first-class agent who sends in as much ivory as all the
horrid ways.” Well aware that the Company operates for others put together and is destined for advancement. He
profit and not for the good of humanity, and bothered by tells Marlow to let Kurtz know that everything is
his aunt’s naïveté, Marlow takes his leave of her. Before satisfactory at the Outer Station when he meets him. The
boarding the French steamer that is to take him to Africa, chief accountant is afraid to send a written message for
Marlow has a brief but strange feeling about his journey: fear it will be intercepted by undesirable elements at the
the feeling that he is setting off for the center of the earth. Central Station.
Marlow travels overland for two hundred miles with
a caravan of sixty men. He has one white companion who
The French steamer takes Marlow along the coast of falls ill and must be carried by the native bearers, who
Africa, stopping periodically to land soldiers and start to desert because of the added burden. After fifteen
customshouse officers. Marlow finds his idleness vexing, days they arrive at the dilapidated Central Station. Marlow
and the trip seems vaguely nightmarish to him. At one finds that the steamer he was to command has sunk. The
point, they come across a French man-of-war shelling an general manager of the Central Station had taken the boat
apparently uninhabited forested stretch of coast. They out two days before under the charge of a volunteer
finally arrive at the mouth of the Congo River, where skipper, and they had torn the bottom out on some rocks.
Marlow boards another steamship bound for a point thirty In light of what he later learns, Marlow suspects the
miles upriver. The captain of the ship, a young Swede, damage to the steamer may have been intentional, to
recognizes Marlow as a seaman and invites him on the keep him from reaching Kurtz. Marlow soon meets with the
bridge. The Swede criticizes the colonial officials and tells general manager, who strikes him as an altogether
Marlow about another Swede who recently hanged himself average man who leads by inspiring an odd uneasiness in
on his way into the interior. those around him and whose authority derives merely
Marlow disembarks at the Company’s station, which from his resistance to tropical disease. The manager tells
is in a terrible state of disrepair. He sees piles of decaying Marlow that he took the boat out in a hurry to relieve the
machinery and a cliff being blasted for no apparent inner stations, especially the one belonging to Kurtz, who
purpose. He also sees a group of black prisoners walking is rumored to be ill. He praises Kurtz as an exceptional
along in chains under the guard of another black man, who agent and takes note that Kurtz is talked about on the
wears a shoddy uniform and carries a rifle. He remarks coast.
that he had already known the “devils” of violence, greed,
and desire, but that in Africa he became acquainted with
the “flabby, pretending, weak-eyed devil of a rapacious
Part II continues up the river, the steamer struggling and
One evening, as Marlow lies on the deck of his threatening at every moment to give out completely.
wrecked steamer, the manager and his uncle appear Marlow ponders Kurtz constantly as they crawl along
within earshot and discuss Kurtz. The manager complains toward him.
that Kurtz has come to the Congo with plans to turn the
stations into beacons of civilization and moral By the evening of the second day after finding the
improvement, and that Kurtz wants to take over the hut, they arrive at a point eight miles from Kurtz’s station.
manager’s position. He recalls that about a year earlier Marlow wants to press on, but the manager tells him to
Kurtz sent down a huge load of ivory of the highest quality wait for daylight, as the waters are dangerous here. The
by canoe with his clerk, but that Kurtz himself had turned night is strangely still and silent, and dawn brings an
back to his station after coming 300 miles down the river. oppressive fog. The fog lifts suddenly and then falls again
The clerk, after turning over the ivory and a letter from just as abruptly. The men on the steamer hear a loud,
Kurtz instructing the manager to stop sending him desolate cry, followed by a clamor of savage voices, and
incompetent men, informs the manager that Kurtz has then silence again. They prepare for attack. The whites are
been very ill and has not completely recovered. badly shaken, but the African crewmen respond with quiet
alertness. The leader of the cannibals tells Marlow matter-
Continuing to converse with his uncle, the manager of-factly that his people want to eat the owners of the
mentions another man whom he finds troublesome, a voices in the fog. Marlow realizes that the cannibals must
wandering trader. The manager’s uncle tells him to go be terribly hungry, as they have not been allowed to go
ahead and have the trader hanged, because no one will ashore to trade for supplies, and their only food, a supply
challenge his authority here. The manager’s uncle also of rotting hippo meat, was long since thrown overboard by
suggests that the climate may take care of all of his the pilgrims.
difficulties for him, implying that Kurtz simply may die of
tropical disease. Marlow is alarmed by the apparent The manager authorizes Marlow to take every risk in
conspiracy between the two men and leaps to his feet, continuing on in the fog, but Marlow refuses to do so, as
revealing himself to them. They are visibly startled but they will surely ground the steamer if they proceed blindly.
move off without acknowledging his presence. Not long Marlow says he does not think the natives will attack,
after this incident, the Eldorado Expedition, led by the particularly since their cries have sounded more sorrowful
manager’s uncle, disappears into the wilderness. than warlike. After the fog lifts, at a spot a mile and a half
from the station, the natives attempt to repulse the
Fifty miles away from Kurtz’s Inner Station, the invaders. The steamer is in a narrow channel, moving
steamer sights a hut with a stack of firewood and a note along slowly next to a high bank overgrown with bushes,
that says, “Wood for you. Hurry up. Approach cautiously.” when suddenly the air fills with arrows. Marlow rushes
The signature is illegible, but it is clearly not Kurtz’s. Inside inside the pilot-house. When he leans out to close the
the hut, Marlow finds a battered old book on seamanship shutter on the window, he sees that the brush is swarming
with notes in the margin in what looks like code. The with natives. Suddenly, he notices a snag in the river a
manager concludes that the wood must have been left by short way ahead of the steamer.
the Russian trader, a man about whom Marlow has
overheard the manager complaining. After taking aboard The pilgrims open fire with rifles from below him,
the firewood that serves as the ship’s fuel, the party and the cloud of smoke they produce obscures his sight.
Marlow’s African helmsman leaves the wheel to open the Savage Customs. The report is eloquent and powerful, if
shutter and shoot out with a one-shot rifle, and then lacking in practical suggestions. It concludes, however,
stands at the open window yelling at the unseen assailants with a handwritten postscript: “Exterminate all the
on the shore. Marlow grabs the wheel and crowds the brutes!” Marlow suggests that this coda, the “exposition of
steamer close to the bank to avoid the snag. As he does [Kurtz’s] method,” is the result of Kurtz’s absorption into
so, the helmsman takes a spear in his side and falls on native life—that by the time he came to write this note he
Marlow’s feet. Marlow frightens the attackers away by had assumed a position of power with respect to the
sounding the steam whistle repeatedly, and they give off a natives and had been a participant in “unspeakable rites,”
prolonged cry of fear and despair. One of the pilgrims where sacrifices had been made in his name. At this point,
enters the pilot-house and is shocked to see the wounded Marlow also reveals that he feels he is responsible for the
helmsman. The two white men stand over him as he dies “care of [Kurtz’s] memory,” and that he has no choice but
quietly. Marlow makes the repulsed and indignant pilgrim to remember and continue to talk about the man.
steer while he changes his shoes and socks, which are
covered in the dead man’s blood. Marlow expects that At the time Marlow is telling his story, he is still
Kurtz is now dead as well, and he feels a terrible unsure whether Kurtz was worth the lives lost on his
disappointment at the thought. behalf; thus, at this point, he returns to his dead
helmsman and the journey up the river. Marlow blames the
One of Marlow’s listeners breaks into his narrative at helmsman’s death on the man’s own lack of restraint: had
this point to comment upon the absurdity of Marlow’s the helmsman not tried to fire at the men on the
behavior. Marlow laughs at the man, whose comfortable riverbank, he would not have been killed. Marlow drags
bourgeois existence has never brought him into contact the helmsman’s body out of the pilot-house and throws it
with anything the likes of Africa. He admits that his own overboard. The pilgrims are indignant that the man will not
behavior may have been ridiculous—he did, after all, throw receive a proper burial, and the cannibals seem to mourn
a pair of brand-new shoes overboard in response to the the loss of a potential meal. The pilgrims have concluded
helmsman’s death—but he notes that there is something Kurtz must be dead and the Inner Station destroyed, but
legitimate about his disappointment in thinking he will they are cheered at the crushing defeat they believe they
never be able to meet the man behind the legend of Kurtz. dealt their unseen attackers. Marlow remains skeptical and
sarcastically congratulates them on the amount of smoke
Marlow breaks into the narrative here to offer a they have managed to produce. Suddenly, the Inner
digression on Kurtz. He notes that Kurtz had a fiancée, his Station comes into view, somewhat decayed but still
Intended (as Kurtz called her), waiting for him in Europe. standing.
Marlow attaches no importance to Kurtz’s fiancée, since,
for him, women exist in an alternate fantasy world. What A white man, the Russian trader, beckons to them
Marlow does find significant about Kurtz’s Intended, from the shore. He wears a gaudy patchwork suit and
though, is the air of possession Kurtz assumed when babbles incessantly. He is aware they have been attacked
speaking about her: indeed, Kurtz spoke of everything— but tells them that everything will now be okay. The
ivory, the Inner Station, the river—as being innately his. It manager and the pilgrims go up the hill to retrieve Kurtz,
is this sense of dark mastery that disturbs Marlow most. while the Russian boards the ship to converse with Marlow.
Marlow also mentions a report Kurtz has written at the He tells Marlow that the natives mean no harm (although
request of the International Society for the Suppression of he is less than convincing on this point), and he confirms
Marlow’s theory that the ship’s whistle is the best means The Russian apologetically explains that these are the
of defense, since it will scare the natives off. He gives a heads of rebels, an explanation that makes Marlow laugh
brief account of himself: he has been a merchant seaman out loud. The Russian makes a point of telling Marlow that
and was outfitted by a Dutch trading house to go into the he has had no medicine or supplies with which to treat
African interior. Marlow gives him the book on seamanship Kurtz; he also asserts that Kurtz has been shamefully
that had been left with the firewood, and the trader is very abandoned by the Company.
happy to have it back. As it turns out, what Marlow had
thought were encoded notes are simply notes written in At that moment, the pilgrims emerge from the
Russian. The Russian trader tells Marlow that he has had station-house with Kurtz on an improvised stretcher, and a
trouble restraining the natives, and he suggests that the group of natives rushes out of the forest with a piercing
steamer was attacked because the natives do not want cry. Kurtz speaks to the natives, and the natives withdraw
Kurtz to leave. The Russian also offers yet another and allow the party to pass. The manager and the pilgrims
enigmatic picture of Kurtz. According to the trader, one lay Kurtz in one of the ship’s cabins and give him his mail,
does not talk to Kurtz but listens to him. The trader credits which they have brought from the Central Station.
Kurtz for having “enlarged his mind.” Someone has written to Kurtz about Marlow, and Kurtz
tells him that he is “glad” to see him. The manager enters
Part III the cabin to speak with Kurtz, and Marlow withdraws to
the steamer’s deck. From here he sees two natives
The Russian trader begs Marlow to take Kurtz away standing near the river with impressive headdresses and
quickly. He recounts for Marlow his initial meeting with spears, and a beautiful native woman draped in ornaments
Kurtz, telling him that Kurtz and the trader spent a night pacing gracefully along the shore. She stops and stares
camped in the forest together, during which Kurtz out at the steamer for a while and then moves away into
discoursed on a broad range of topics. The trader again the forest. Marlow notes that she must be wearing several
asserts that listening to Kurtz has greatly enlarged his elephant tusks’ worth of ornaments. The Russian implies
mind. His connection to Kurtz, however, has gone through that she is Kurtz’s mistress, and states that she has
periods of rise and decline. He nursed Kurtz through two caused him trouble through her influence over Kurtz. He
illnesses but sometimes would not see him for long adds that he would have tried to shoot her if she had tried
periods of time, during which Kurtz was out raiding the to come aboard. The trader’s comments are interrupted by
countryside for ivory with a native tribe he had gotten to the sound of Kurtz yelling at the manager inside the cabin.
follow him. Although Kurtz has behaved erratically and Kurtz accuses the men of coming for the ivory rather than
once even threatened to shoot the trader over a small to help him, and he threatens the manager for interfering
stash of ivory, the trader nevertheless insists that Kurtz with his plans.
cannot be judged as one would judge a normal man. He
has tried to get Kurtz to return to civilization several times. The manager comes out and takes Marlow aside,
The Russian tells Marlow that Kurtz is extremely ill now. As telling him that they have done everything possible for
he listens to the trader, Marlow idly looks through his Kurtz, but that his unsound methods have closed the
binoculars and sees that what he had originally taken for district off to the Company for the time being. He says he
ornamental balls on the tops of fence posts in the station plans on reporting Kurtz’s “complete want of judgment” to
compound are actually severed heads turned to face the the Company’s directors. Thoroughly disgusted by the
station house. He is repelled but not particularly surprised. manager’s hypocritical condemnation of Kurtz, Marlow
tells the manager that he thinks Kurtz is a “remarkable out to the natives. Kurtz bemoans the failure of his grand
man.” With this statement, Marlow permanently alienates schemes, and Marlow reassures him that he is thought a
himself from the manager and the rest of the Company success in Europe. Sensing the other man’s vulnerability,
functionaries. Like Kurtz, Marlow is now classified among Marlow tells Kurtz he will be lost if he continues on. Kurtz’s
the “unsound.” As the manager walks off, the Russian resolution falters, and Marlow helps him back to the ship.
approaches again, to confide in Marlow that Kurtz ordered
the attack on the steamer, hoping that the manager would The steamer departs the next day at noon, and the
assume he was dead and turn back. After the Russian asks natives appear on the shore to watch it go. Three men
Marlow to protect Kurtz’s reputation, Marlow tells the painted with red earth and wearing horned headdresses
Russian that the manager has spoken of having the wave charms and shout incantations at the ship as it
Russian hanged. The trader is not surprised and, after steams away. Marlow places Kurtz in the pilot-house to get
hitting Marlow up for tobacco, gun cartridges, and shoes, some air, and Kurtz watches through the open window as
leaves in a canoe with some native paddlers. his mistress rushes down to the shore and calls out to him.
The crowd responds to her cry with an uproar of its own.
Remembering the Russian trader’s warning, Marlow Marlow sounds the whistle as he sees the pilgrims get out
gets up in the middle of the night and goes out to look their rifles, and the crowd scatters, to the pilgrims’ dismay.
around for any sign of trouble. From the deck of the Only the woman remains standing on the shore as the
steamer, he sees one of the pilgrims with a group of the pilgrims open fire, and Marlow’s view is obscured by
cannibals keeping guard over the ivory, and he sees the smoke.
fires of the natives’ camp in the forest. He hears a drum
and a steady chanting, which lulls him into a brief sleep. A The current speeds the steamer’s progress back
sudden outburst of yells wakes him, but the loud noise toward civilization. The manager, certain that Kurtz will
immediately subsides into a rhythmic chanting once again. soon be dead, is pleased to have things in hand; he
Marlow glances into Kurtz’s cabin only to find that Kurtz is condescendingly ignores Marlow, who is now clearly of the
gone. He is unnerved, but he does not raise an alarm, and “unsound” but harmless party. The pilgrims are disdainful,
instead decides to leave the ship to search for Kurtz and Marlow, for the most part, is left alone with Kurtz. As
himself. he had done with the Russian trader, Kurtz takes
advantage of his captive audience to hold forth on a
He finds a trail in the grass and realizes that Kurtz variety of subjects. Marlow is alternately impressed and
must be crawling on all fours. Marlow runs along the trail disappointed. Kurtz’s philosophical musings are
after him; Kurtz hears him coming and rises to his feet. interspersed with grandiose and childish plans for fame
They are now close to the fires of the native camp, and and fortune.
Marlow realizes the danger of his situation, as Kurtz could
easily call out to the natives and have him killed. Kurtz The steamer breaks down, and repairs take some
tells him to go away and hide, and Marlow looks over and time. Marlow is slowly becoming ill, and the work is hard
sees the imposing figure of a native sorcerer silhouetted on him. Kurtz seems troubled, probably because the delay
against the fire. Marlow asks Kurtz if he knows what he is has made him realize that he probably will not make it
doing, and Kurtz replies emphatically that he does. Despite back to Europe alive. Worried that the manager will gain
his physical advantage over the invalid, Marlow feels control of his “legacy,” Kurtz gives Marlow a bundle of
impotent, and threatens to strangle Kurtz if he should call papers for safekeeping. Kurtz’s ramblings become more
abstract and more rhetorical as his condition worsens. appears and takes the pamphlet for publication. This man
Marlow believes he is reciting portions of articles he has believes Kurtz’s true skills were in popular or extremist
written for the newspapers: Kurtz thinks it his “duty” to politics.
disseminate his ideas. Finally, one night, Kurtz admits to
Marlow that he is “waiting for death.” As Marlow Finally, Marlow is left with only a few letters and a
approaches, Kurtz seems to be receiving some profound picture of Kurtz’s Intended. Marlow goes to see her without
knowledge or vision, and the look on his face forces really knowing why. Kurtz’s memory comes flooding back
Marlow to stop and stare. Kurtz cries out—“The horror! The to him as he stands on her doorstep. He finds the Intended
horror!”—and Marlow flees, not wanting to watch the man still in mourning, though it has been over a year since
die. He joins the manager in the dining hall, which is Kurtz’s death. He gives her the packet, and she asks if he
suddenly overrun by flies. A moment later, a servant knew Kurtz well. He replies that he knew him as well as it
comes in to tell them, “Mistah Kurtz—he dead.” is possible for one man to know another.

The pilgrims bury Kurtz the next day. Marlow His presence fulfills her need for a sympathetic ear,
succumbs to illness and nearly dies himself. He suffers and she continually praises Kurtz. Her sentimentality
greatly, but the worst thing about his near-death begins to anger Marlow, but he holds back his annoyance
experience is his realization that in the end he would have until it gives way to pity. She says she will mourn Kurtz
“nothing to say.” Kurtz, he realizes, was remarkable forever, and asks Marlow to repeat his last words to give
because he “had something to say. He said it.” Marlow her something upon which to sustain herself. Marlow lies
remembers little about the time of his illness. Once he has and tells her that Kurtz’s last word was her name. She
recovered sufficiently, he leaves Africa and returns to responds that she was certain that this was the case.
Brussels. Marlow ends his story here, and the narrator looks off into
the dark sky, which makes the waterway seem “to lead
Marlow barely survives his illness. Eventually he into the heart of an immense darkness.”
returns to the “sepulchral city,” Brussels. He resents the
people there for their petty self-importance and smug Although both Marlow and the Intended construct idealized
complacency. His aunt nurses him back to health, but his
versions of Kurtz to make sense out of their respective worlds, in the end,
disorder is more emotional than physical. A bespectacled
Marlow’s version of Kurtz is upheld as the more profound one. Marlow
representative of the Company comes to retrieve the
emphasizes his disgust at the complacency of the people he meets in
packet of papers Kurtz entrusted to Marlow, but Marlow
will give him only the pamphlet on the “Suppression of Brussels in order to validate his own store of worldly experience.
Savage Customs,” with the postscript (the handwritten Marlow’s narrative implies that his version of Kurtz, as well as his
“Exterminate all the brutes!”) torn off. The man threatens accounts of Africa and imperialism, are inherently better and truer than
legal action to obtain the rest of the packet’s contents. other people’s because of what he has experienced. This notion is based
Another man, calling himself Kurtz’s cousin, appears and on traditional ideas of heroism, involving quests and trials in the pursuit
takes some letters to the family. The cousin tells him that of knowledge. In fact, by seeming to legitimize activities like imperialism
Kurtz had been a great musician, although he does not for their experiential value for white men—in other words, by making it
elaborate further. Marlow and the cousin ponder Kurtz’s appear that Africa is the key to philosophical truth—the ending of Heart
myriad talents and decide that he is best described as a of Darkness introduces a much greater horror than any Marlow has
“universal genius.” A journalist colleague of Kurtz’s encountered in the Congo. Are the evils of colonialism excusable in the
name of “truth” or knowledge, even if they are not justifiable in the
name of wealth? This paradox accounts at least partially for the novella’s
frame story. Marlow recounts his experiences to his friends because
doing so establishes an implicit comparison. The other men aboard
the Nellie are the kind of men who benefit economically from
imperialism, while Marlow has benefited mainly experientially. While
Marlow’s “truth” may be more profound than that of his friends or
Kurtz’s Intended, it may not justify the cost of its own acquisition.