Heart of Darkness

“We live as we dream - alone. While the dream disappears, the life continues painfully.“

“We live as we dream - alone. While the dream disappears, the life continues painfully.“
Heart of Darkness tells a story within a story. The novella begins with a group of passengers aboard a boat floating on the River Thames. One of them, Charlie Marlow, relates to his fellow seafarers an experience of his that took place on another river altogether – the Congo River in Africa. Marlow’s story begins in what he calls the “sepulchral city,” somewhere in Europe. There “the Company” – an unnamed organization running a colonial enterprise in the Belgian Congo – appoints him captain of a river steamer. He sets out for Africa optimistic of what he will find. But his expectations are quickly soured: from the moment he arrives, he is exposed to the evil of imperialism, witnessing the violence it inflicts upon the African people it exploits.

Heart of Darkness examines the horrors of Western colonialism, depicting it as a phenomenon that tarnishes not only the lands and peoples it exploits but also those in the West who advance it.