Heart of Darkness is an 1899 novella by Polish-British novelist Joseph Conrad in which the sailor Charles Marlow tells his listeners the story of his assignment as steamer captain for a Belgian company in the African interior. The novel is widely regarded as a critique of European colonial rule in Africa, whilst also examining the themes of power dynamics and morality. Although Conrad does not name the river on which most of the narrative takes place, at the time of writing, the Congo Free State—the location of the large and economically important Congo River—was a private colony of Belgium's King Leopold II. Marlow is given a text by Kurtz, an ivory trader working on a trading station far up the river, who has "gone native" and is the object of Marlow's expedition.
Sir Henry Morton Stanley was a Welsh-American explorer, journalist, soldier, colonial administrator, author and politician who was famous for his exploration of Central Africa and his search for missionary and explorer David Livingstone. Besides his discovery of Livingstone, he is mainly known for his search for the sources of the Nile and Congo rivers, the work he undertook as an agent of King Leopold II of the Belgians which enabled the occupation of the Congo Basin region, and his command of the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition. He was knighted in 1897, and served in Parliament as a Liberal Unionist member for Lambeth North from 1895 to 1900.
Leopold II was the second King of the Belgians from 1865 to 1909, and the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free State from 1885 to 1908.
The Congo Free State, also known as the Independent State of the Congo, was a large state and absolute monarchy in Central Africa from 1885 to 1908. It was privately owned by King Leopold II, the constitutional monarch of the Kingdom of Belgium. In legal terms, the two separate countries were in a personal union. The Congo Free State was not a part of, nor did it belong to Belgium. Leopold was able to seize the region by convincing other European states at the Berlin Conference on Africa that he was involved in humanitarian and philanthropic work and would not tax trade. Via the International Association of the Congo, he was able to lay claim to most of the Congo Basin. On 29 May 1885, after the closure of the Berlin Conference, the king announced that he planned to name his possessions "the Congo Free State", an appellation which was not yet used at the Berlin Conference and which officially replaced "International Association of the Congo" on 1 August 1885. The Free State was privately controlled by Leopold from Brussels; he never visited it.
The Emin Pasha Relief Expedition of 1887 to 1889 was one of the last major European expeditions into the interior of Africa in the nineteenth century. Led by Henry Morton Stanley, its goal was ostensibly the relief of Emin Pasha, the besieged Egyptian governor of Equatoria, who was threatened by Mahdist forces.
King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa (1998) is a best-selling popular history book by Adam Hochschild that explores the exploitation of the Congo Free State by King Leopold II of Belgium between 1885 and 1908, as well as the large-scale atrocities committed during that period. The book, also a general biography of the private life of Leopold, succeeded in increasing public awareness of these crimes in recent decades.
Edmund Musgrave Barttelot was a British army officer, who became notorious after his allegedly brutal and deranged behaviour during his disastrous command of the rear column in the Congo during Henry Morton Stanley's Emin Pasha Relief Expedition. He has often been identified as one of the sources for the character of Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness.
Edmund Dene Morel was a French-born British journalist, author, pacifist and politician.
Léon Auguste Théophile Rom was a Belgian soldier and mid-ranking colonial official, military officer, and commercial agent in the Congo Free State. His reputation for brutality has led some to speculate that Rom served as an inspiration for the character of Mr. Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's 1899 novella Heart of Darkness.
Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American epic war film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The screenplay, co-written by Coppola, John Milius, and Michael Herr, is loosely inspired by the 1899 novella Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad, with the setting changed from late 19th-century Congo to the Vietnam War. The film follows a river journey from South Vietnam into Cambodia undertaken by Captain Willard, who is on a secret mission to assassinate Colonel Kurtz, a renegade Special Forces officer who is accused of murder and presumed insane. The ensemble cast also features Robert Duvall, Frederic Forrest, Albert Hall, Sam Bottoms, Laurence Fishburne, Dennis Hopper, and Harrison Ford.
Charles Marlow is a fictional English seaman and recurring character in the work of novelist Joseph Conrad.
Colonel Walter E. Kurtz, portrayed by Marlon Brando, is a fictional character and the main antagonist of Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 film Apocalypse Now. Colonel Kurtz is based on the character of a nineteenth-century ivory trader, also called Kurtz, from the 1899 novella Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad.
The International African Association was a front organization established by the guests at the Brussels Geographic Conference of 1876, an event hosted by King Leopold II of Belgium. The Association was used by King Leopold ostensibly to further his purportedly altruistic and humanitarian projects in the area of Central Africa, the area that was to become Leopold's privately controlled Congo Free State. King Leopold volunteered space in Brussels for the International African Association's headquarters, and there were to be national committees of the association set up in all the participating countries, as well as an international committee. Leopold was elected by acclamation as the international committee's first chairman, but said that he would serve for one year only so that the chairmanship could rotate among people from different countries.
Heart of Darkness is a chamber opera in one act by Tarik O'Regan, with an English-language libretto by artist Tom Phillips, based on the 1899 novella of the same name by Joseph Conrad. It was first performed in a co-production by Opera East and ROH2 at the Linbury Theatre of the Royal Opera House in London on 1 November 2011 directed by Edward Dick. In May, 2015, the opera received its North American premiere in a production by Opera Parallèle, presented by Z Space in San Francisco, California.
Heart of Darkness is a 1993 television film adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s famous 1899 novella written by Benedict Fitzgerald, directed by Nicolas Roeg, and starring Tim Roth, John Malkovich, Isaach De Bankolé and James Fox.
From 1885 to 1908, many atrocities were committed in the Congo Free State under the absolute rule of King Leopold II of Belgium. These atrocities were particularly associated with the labour policies, enforced by colonial administrators, used to collect natural rubber for export. Combined with epidemic disease, famine, and falling birth rates caused by these disruptions, the atrocities contributed to a sharp decline in the Congolese population. The magnitude of the population fall over the period is disputed, with modern estimates ranging from 1.5 million to 13 million. The atrocities have been variously referred to as the Rubber Terror and by some as the Congolese Genocide, though the latter characterization is disputed.
Willem Frans Van Kerckhoven, or Guillaume François van Kerckhoven was a Belgian soldier, explorer, colonial administrator who was active in the service of the International Association of the Congo and the subsequent Congo Free State. He is known for his extended expedition through the Uele River basin and onward towards the Nile, which was responsible for the deaths of over 1,800 people and established a Belgian presence in the region. Van Kerckhoven died in an accident before reaching the Nile.
"Heart of Darkness" was an American television play broadcast on November 6, 1958, as part of the CBS television series, Playhouse 90. It was the seventh episode of the third season of Playhouse 90. The play was adapted from Joseph Conrad's novella, Heart of Darkness.
Louis-AIbert-Marie-Joseph Haneuse was a Belgian soldier and colonial administrator.
James Sligo Jameson was a Scottish naturalist and traveller in Africa. He identified the black honey-buzzard in 1877. Jameson's antpecker, Jameson's firefinch, and Jameson's wattle-eye are named after him. However, he is most remembered for his role in causing a slave girl to be killed and eaten by cannibals.
