Marlow is a sailor, riverboat captain, and the narrator of Joseph Conrad's monumental novella, Heart of Darkness. Though there are many similarities between Marlow and Conrad himself, it would be a mistake to say that Marlow is an "illustration" of Conrad.
That's not say that similarities between Conrad and the fictional Marlow don't exist. For example, in the beginning of the novella, we learn Marlow has traveled to many distant locales, including Asia. Conrad also worked as a sailor as a young man, and he too traveled to many different places, including many locations in Asia. Additionally, Conrad's journeys eventually took him to the Belgian Congo, and so it's clear that Marlow's adventures in Africa are drawn from Conrad's real experiences.
Marlow, however, is not meant to be a personification of Conrad; rather, it's more accurate to say Conrad drew on real experiences to create a fictional character that has a few similarities to him. Marlow, however, is meant to transcend Conrad, and if he has any function, it is to display the corruption of the colonizing forces in the world. Indeed, from the moment that Marlow is compared to the Buddha in the opening pages of the novel, the character becomes a wise guru, one who insightfully recognizes the dark wildness lurking beneath the facade of civilized nations. As such, while Marlow shares some similarities with Conrad, he functions more as a personified critique of colonialism than as an autobiographical representation of the author.
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