Heart of Darkness
Heart of Darkness (1899) is a novella by Polish-English novelist Joseph Conrad about a narrated voyage up the Congo River into the Congo Free State in the so-called "heart of Africa". Charles Marlow, the narrator, tells his story to friends aboard a boat anchored on the River Thames. This setting provides the frame for Marlow's story of his obsession with the ivory trader Kurtz, which enables Conrad to create a parallel between what Conrad calls "the greatest town on earth", London, and Africa as places of darkness.
Edmund Musgrave Barttelot
Barttelot has been portrayed as a source for Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's novel "Heart of Darkness". Jerry Allen considered him the principal historical source, though Harold Bloom argued that there was no single source, and the many of Kurtz's actions were more likely to be based on Barttelot's contemporary Tippu Tib. Hochschild also considers him a likely source, since he "went mad, began hitting, whipping, and killing people, and was finally murdered", but also thinks that other participants in the expedition and contemporary figures contributed to the character.