Heart of Darkness
Read Heart of Darkness online, or download the free EPUB (works on Kindle too) or PDF.
Edition from Project Gutenberg. Public-domain rules differ by country, so check yours before downloading.
- First published
- 1899
- Pages
- 63Digital editionReference edition
- Reading time
- About 1.5 hours3 half-hour sittings
- Language
- English
- Reading difficulty
- 7 of 10
A little about the story
On a boat on the Thames, the sailor Marlow tells his friends about a journey he once made up the Congo River for an ivory-trading company. He hears more and more about Kurtz, a brilliant agent deep in the interior, and becomes obsessed with meeting him.
What he finds is horror: the brutality of colonial exploitation and a man who has lost all restraint. Joseph Conrad’s short novel is one of the most debated books of the 20th century, both for its power and for its portrayal of Africa.
Is it for you?
You’ll enjoy it if you like
- short, powerful classics
- journeys into the unknown
- books that still spark debate
Maybe not if its portrayal of Africans would trouble you.
Things You May Not Know About Heart of Darkness
- Based on Conrad’s journey. Conrad captained a river steamer in the Congo Free State in 1890.
- The horror! Kurtz’s dying words are among the most quoted lines in literature.
- Apocalypse Now. Francis Ford Coppola moved the story to the Vietnam War in his 1979 film.
- A famous critique. Chinua Achebe criticised its portrayal of Africans in a 1975 lecture.
About this edition
Read the Project Gutenberg source record for edition details. The Freebookia PDF has 63 pages. The EPUB adjusts to your reading settings.
Get “Heart of Darkness”
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