Imperialism and colonialism are recurrent themes throughout the entire text. Marlow and Kurtz are both parts of an imperial machine, helping to extract the wealth of a distant African country in the name of profit. The novel’s approach to these themes can be complicated. From their positions within the imperial context, both men struggle to find the points at which their involvement begins and ends. Marlow seems to veer between offering acute criticisms of the imperial structure and being entirely complicit in its actions. His journey along the river presents him with scenes of violence, torture, and slavery. This is entirely unilateral; Europeans beat, imprison, and force Africans into labor.

On one hand, by presenting these scenes in their full horror, the novel provides necessary examples ready for critique and rarely flinches from the violence endured by the enslaved. On the other hand, Marlow seems to agree with the majority of the Company’s ideologies; he simply disagrees with the praxis and the extremity. He works for the Company, he takes their money, and he achieved his position not through skill and hard work but through nepotism.