"Heart of Darkness" has been considered for most of this century as a literary classic, and also as a powerful indictment of the evils of imperialism.

It reflects the savage repressions carried out in the Congo by the Belgians in one of the largest acts of genocide committed up to that time.

Conrad's narrator encounters at the end of the story a man named Kurtz, dying, insane, and guilty of unspeakable atrocities.