system, to see the "bad" person as aberrant—but this will not do. As many critics have pointed out, Kurtz is "hollow:" in many he is the reflection of other people's desires or projections. The moral dilemma then becomes: who is responsible for this man? How do we undo a system that he exposes as evil that yet makes life so much more comfortable for those far away in Europe? Today we can see imperialism as evil: a cognate for our times might be the evils of a carbon-based energy system that makes life comfortable to many but at what price?

Marlow can see the evil, but he can't deny that Kurtz was also other things than a greedy madman. He painted, so was an artist, and in some ways Marlow also admires him for his grandeur in refusing to put up a facade to hide what he really was.

At the end of the novel, Marlow refuses to tell Kurtz's fiancee the reality of what life was like in the Congo or Kurtz's true last words. Instead, he tells her Kurtz's last words were her name. He justifies this to the reader by stating that he can't live if there are no people in the world (women) who believe the illusion that imperialism—and hence European civilization— is good. This brings up another moral question: who, in the end, is worse: Kurtz, who exposes the insane greed and cruelty of the European system or Marlow, who covers it up and hence enables it?

The book holds a somewhat pessimistic view of human nature. It suggests that, despite surface appearances, human nature remains overwhelmingly subject to instinctual passions, emotions, and appetites – that essentially, it remains primitive. These primitive impulses are fully awakened in people like Kurtz in the midst of Africa, the so-called Dark Continent. In the general discourse of the age in which this novella was written, Africa was viewed very much as a hotbed of primitivism and savagery. However, it is the morally corrupt, materialistic, greedy Europeans who rush to plunder Africa's people and its natural resources that are seen as being the worst of all in this story.

Marlow issues a sobering reminder at the very start of the book that London, the heart of one of the supposedly most modern and advanced civilisations, is not necessarily as refined as it seems, or certainly has not been in the past:

'And this also,' said Marlow suddenly, 'has been one of the dark places of the earth.'

Therefore London, and not Africa, is the first place to be linked with the idea of darkness, and the suggestion of darkness returns at the end of the novel, overspreading the Thames. The behaviour of the Europeans in Africa certainly seems to confirm the idea that they are really no more civilised than the natives whom they oppress.

The book gives a picture of human nature as being as vast and deep as any continent. This is apparent, for example, when Marlow finds himself responding to the primitive dancing and singing among the natives. He feels the primitive tug in himself, because, as he says:

The mind of man is capable of anything - because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future.

In other words, human nature is seen to be all encompassing. It can take in at least the veneer of civilised sophistication while still retaining primal impulses. Sober, relatively well-balanced individuals like Marlow can become aware of this duality without giving way to extreme emotions, but such an awareness is seen to have a terrible effect on a person like Kurtz, who is creative, passionate, idealistic – in a word, unstable.

Interestingly, the novella also hints at a contrary view to this idea of human nature as being wide and deep, in the depiction of the general manager and the brickmaker. These characters appear to be empty vessels, devoid of any real feeling. Marlow speculates, for instance, that the reason the manager is never ill is because ‘there was nothing in him’, and the brickmaker is memorably described as being ‘papier-mache’:

 It seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my finger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.

This man, then, seems to be composed of no real substance at all. The degenerate darkness inside Kurtz is terrifying, but the sheer emptiness which is seen to inhabit the manager and the brickmaker is maybe even more chilling.

Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" explores the moral quandaries encountered by protagonist Charlie Marlow, who has left the safe confines of civilized Europe for a trip through Africa's rough-and-tumble ivory trade. Serving as a steamboat captain on the Congo, Marlow's been tasked by his company with retrieving a fellow employee named Kurtz, along with all the ivory Kurtz has collected so far.

Early on, Marlow identifies European civilization, along with its knowledge and ideas, as a sort of "lightness"—a positive attribute that he uses to define what is most human about us. Conversely, he identifies the lack of such civilization, including the harsh African landscape and its savage citizenry, as a kind of "darkness"—something imperialism and colonialism are meant to rectify. Even the way mother nature is portrayed supports this view as he proceeds further up the Congo into dense, dark vegetation, which appears symbolic of his view toward the locals.

However, Marlow's views begin to change as he glimpses the evilness generated by civilized society's lust for ivory. This is best embodied in the Kurtz character, a product of European civilization who has been corrupted by greed, seduced by power, and ultimately transformed into a thief and a murderer. In essence, Kurtz has become the savage, causing Marlow to reassess his views on "lightness" and "darkness." The imperialistic greed and brutality of Europe slowly come to represent darkness, while the natural wonders and honest reality of Africa come to represent light.

There is a strong question of what it means to be human throughout. While the main character's original notions of humanity were based on the alleged benefits of imperialism itself—knowledge and modernity and technological advancement—relegating the African natives to a sort of sub-human status, that very idea later comes into question when it becomes apparent imperialism itself has turned Kurtz into the type of sub-human savage that was once ascribed only to the local population.

Kurtz has gained success through his immoral behavior, which only begets further immoral behavior. The theme is reminiscent of Lord Acton's late nineteenth-century observation that "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Kurtz's descent into savagery has left him unable to tell the difference between right and wrong. It’s not simply Kurtz’s relentless quest for further material wealth that makes us question his humanity, but his brutal, bloodthirsty methods that show an utter lack of regard for others. His greed ultimately results in pure moral abandonment, showing that all men have both a "light" and a "dark" side and that we are defined not by where we live, but what we do once we’re there.

Heart of Darkness is primarily concerned with morality as related to British colonialism and the ideas about civilization that were its foundations. In his novella, Joseph Conrad explores the paradoxes of colonialism as an exploitative system that was based on ideals of moral uplift but seemed doomed instead to drag down the people who became involved in it. While the European colonizers tried to instill Christian values in the African people they colonized, the economic demands of capitalist resource extraction created an exploitative system that benefitted a few people at the top, not the masses, regardless of their religious beliefs.

Especially through the character of Kurtz, Conrad focuses on breaches of morality more than on the ways it was upheld. He implies that maintaining a strict moral code was extremely difficult, if not impossible, for ordinary men to follow. Kurtz’s violations of the moral code apparently included killing many Africans and striking terror into the hearts of many more. Kurtz’s moral failure goes beyond the sins of greed and murder, however; he seems to have wanted to be worshipped, thus usurping the role of a deity, not just a ruler or king. This character serves as the embodiment of the shortcomings of European Christians in general, rather than representing a singular exception to their moral rectitude.