Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

A new edition of Heart of Darkness, the 1899 masterpiece by Polish-British novelist Joseph Conrad about a voyage up the Congo River into the Heart of Africa.

The story is narrated by Charles Marlow, recalling his obsessive quest to locate the ivory trader Kurtz, who has become ensconced deep in the jungle managing a remote outpost. As he ventures further and further down the Congo, Marlow finds himself and his surroundings become increasingly untethered.

Heart of Darkness has been widely re-published and translated into many languages. It provided the inspiration for Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 film Apocalypse Now. In 1998, the Modern Library ranked Heart of Darkness 67th on their list of the 100 best novels in English of the twentieth century. Literary critic Harold Bloom wrote that Heart of Darkness had been analysed more than any other work of literature that is studied in universities and colleges, which he attributed to Conrad’s “unique propensity for ambiguity.”

Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) was a Polish-British writer, regarded by many as one of the finest English-language novelists of the 20th century. An early modernist, his narrative style, anti-heroic characters, and focus on the psychological lives of his protagonists were extremely influential on other authors. Conrad’s experience as a Polish emigre to Great Britain also brought a unique perspective to his novels, often set on the outskirts of the British Empire with a focus on the costs of imperialism and colonialism. Among his most popular and influential works were Heart of Darkness (1899), Lord Jim (1900), Typhoon (1902), Nostromo (1904), The Secret Agent (1907), and Under Western Eyes (1911).