Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time • Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read Introduction by Caryl Phillips Commentary by H. L. Mencken, E. M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, Bertrand Russell, Lionel Trilling, Chinua Achebe, and Philip Gourevitch Originally published in 1902, Heart of Darkness remains one of this century’s most enduring works of fiction. Written several years after Joseph Conrad’s grueling sojourn in the Belgian Congo, the novel is a complex meditation on colonialism, evil, and the thin line between civilization and barbarity. This edition contains selections from Conrad’s Congo Diary of 1890—the first notes, in effect, for the novel, which was composed at the end of that decade. Virginia Woolf wrote of Conrad: “His books are full of moments of vision. They light up a whole character in a flash. . . . He could not write badly, one feels, to save his life.”

A group of white men journeys up the Congo River to invade the jungles of the Belgian Congo, in an effort to rob the natives of their irovy.

Introduction -- The Congo diary, 1890 -- Up-river book, 1890 -- The sisters, 1895-96 -- Letter to the New York times Saturday book review, 1901 -- The books of my childhood, 1902 -- On the North Sea outrage, 1904 -- My best story and why I think so, 1906 -- The silence of the sea, 1909 -- A set of six, 1915 -- From the preface to "Youth" and "Gaspar Ruiz," 1920 -- Cablegram to the Committee for the Polish government loan, Washington, 1920 -- Foreword to Corsican and Irish landscapes, 1921 -- The first thing I remember, 1921 -- A Hugh Walpole anthology introductory note, 1922 -- Foreword to J.G. Sutherland: At sea with Joseph Conrad, 1922 -- Proust as creator, 1923 -- Foreword to A.J. Dawson: Britain's life-boats, 1923.--Draft of speech to be made at the Life-boat institution at the ninety-ninth meeting, 1923 -- Speech at the Lifeboat institution, 1923 -- Warrington Dawson: Adventure in the night, 1924 -- Preface to The nature of a crime, 1924 -- The nature of a crime, 1924 -- Biographical bibliography (p.152-158).

Fiction has power to portray historical truth. This book presents Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness to students and general readers as an insightful guide to the history of Europe and Africa in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The phrase "heart of darkness" has become a term commonly used to conjure an ominous sense of hidden or deeply rooted evil. How did these words become so evocative? The answer lies in the richness and acute insight of Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad's story based on his 1890 journey on the Congo River. Conrad's novella illustrates many crucial themes of European and world history through the last two centuries: civilization; exploration; colonialism and imperialism; race and conflict based on race; trade and globalization; commercial exploitation; and the impact of changing technology, especially for communication and transport. Heart of Darkness deserves to be studied today for its value as social and cultural history. In this edition, Conrad's story is shown to reveal important truths not only about Europe and Africa a century ago, but also about the historical forces that shape the world we live in now. Featuring the texts of both Heart of Darkness and Conrad's autobiographical Congo Diary along with more than 200 annotations, this book enables readers to appreciate the connections between Conrad's writing and its historical context. Introductory essays explain how Conrad was uniquely positioned to chronicle history, provide critical background information on how Europeans partitioned Africa and created the Congo Free State, and describe how the ivory and rubber trades brutalized the natives. Readers will learn how Conrad contributed to European awareness of the atrocities committed and understand how the story's literary qualities form an essential part of its historical meaning. The numerous illustrations and maps depicting the historical Congo Free State provide a visual element to the story of Heart of Darkness—a fictionalized tale that can be interpreted as history and that can help us interpret today's postcolonial, globalized world.

Marlow, a seaman and wanderer, recounts his physical and psychological journey in search of the infamous ivory trader Kurtz. Traveling up river to the heart of the African continent, he gradually becomes obsessed by this enigmatic, wraith-like figure. A haunting and hugely influential Modernist masterpiece, Heart of Darkness explores the limits of human experience as well as the nightmarish realities of imperialism. Part of a major series of new editions of Conrad's most famous works in Penguin Classics, this Enriched eBook contains Conrad's Congo Diary. Enriched eBook Features Editor Timothy S. Hayes provides the following specially commissioned features for this Enriched eBook Classic: * Filmography * Telling Africa’s Story Today: Recent Films About Africa * Contemporary Reviews of Heart of Darkness * Further Reading * Character Sketches * Diagram of a Typical Congo Steamer, ca. 1890 * Images of the Congo * Enriched eBook Notes The enriched eBook format invites readers to go beyond the pages of these beloved works and gain more insight into the life and times of an author and the period in which the book was originally written for a rich reading experience.

Heart Of Darkness. The story of the civilized, enlightened Mr. Kurtz who embarks on a harrowing "night journey" into the savage heart of Africa, only to find his dark and evil soul. The Secret Sharer. The saga of a young, inexperienced skipper forced to decide the fate of a fugitive sailor who killed a man in self-defense. As he faces his first moral test the skipper discovers a terrifying truth -- and comes face to face with the secret itself. Heart Of Darkness and The Secret Sharer draw on actual events and people that Conrad met or heard about during his many far-flung travels. In portraying men whose incredible journeys on land and at sea are also symbolic voyages into their own mysterious depths, these two masterful works give credence to Conrad's acclaim as a major psychological writer.