Joseph Conrad 1857-1924. Conrad was born Josef Konrad Nalecz Korzeniowski

Joseph Conrad1857-1924


Conrad was born Josef Konrad Nalecz Korzeniowski



Orphaned at 12 years old, educated at Cracow and in Switzerland




Ran away to join the French Merchant Navy at 17

Joined the British Merchant Navy just before his 21st birthday






Conrad held a number of assignments as a seaman, and eventually a Captain, during an 18-year career in the British Merchant Navy







Conrad adopted British citizenship in 1886








In 1894 he decided to become a writer, and to write in English, rather than French or Polish








In 1894 he decided to become a writer, and to write in English, rather than French or Polish

Conrad is seen as a quintessentially “modern” writer

Conrad and ModernityConrad’s themes include critiques of the moral bankruptcy of modernity

as revealed in the excesses of capitalist greed and colonial exploitation



Conrad is not exactly a champion of the exploited, however; his theme is

more typically the degrading effect of greed and colonialism upon

Europeans





Europeans

Conrad’s novels, including Heart of Darkness, are structured around

mythical cores, especially the hero’s quest





Europeans



In this, they can be compared to Beowulf, Paradise Lost, and even,

perhaps, to Gulliver’s Travels





Europeans



In this, they can be compared to Beowulf, Paradise Lost, and even,

perhaps, to Gulliver’s Travels

In Heart of Darkness, Conrad’s hero, Marlow, is radically alienated from

his contemporary European society, but he doesn’t act to change it; this

sense of alienation and helplessness in the face of the moral decline is

also a characteristic feature of late modern fiction

Conrad and ModernityAlthough Conrad’s narratives clearly stem from his personal experiences,

they are not exactly “realist” or autobiographical



Conrad’s style is richly and complexly symbolic



Conrad’s style is richly and complexly symbolic

He makes his realistic narrative illuminate the moral and ethical

contradictions of modernity that are just coming into historical focus

during his lifetime

Conrad and Modernity

Citing the critic Ian Watt, Kevin Dettmar and Jenifer WIcke, editors of

Volume 2c of the Longman Anthology of British Literature, write:

[Conrad’s experimentation in works like Heart of Darkness] result

from [his] own personal experience, a personal experience of travel,

exile, and solitude that was a radical premonition of the conditions of

modernity.

(Longman Anthology, p. 2136)


According to Dettmar and Wicke, Conrad’s style is distinctively “visual”

in the way in which he represents shades of meaning through the visual

effects of his descriptions:

[In Heart of Darkness] events cast a visual glow and haze where

meaning can be found only in the most subtle shades and ambiguous

highlights of language. The reader must participate in the gradual,

and partial, process of accumulating meaning.

(Longman Anthology, p. 2137)


Dettmar and Wicke cite the following passage, explaining the story-telling

technique of Marlow, from Heart of Darkness:

The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning of

which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not

typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the

meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside,

enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a

haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that are sometimes

made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.

(Longman Anthology, p. 2137; p. 2142)

Heart of Darkness is a “framed” narrative—like Canterbury Tales, Utopia, and Gulliver’s Travels

Heart of Darkness


Heart of Darkness also invokes some of the conventions of travel writing, like Utopia and Gulliver’s Travels

Heart of Darkness



Heart of Darkness begins with a small group of friends—business

associates, the narrator of the introduction, a director of a company, an

accountant, a lawyer, and Marlow, the seaman—sitting on the deck of a

yacht, in the Thames, as the sun sets and fog thickens

Heart of Darkness







But the director seems to instill confidence; the narrator says “he

resembled a pilot” (p. 2141)

Heart of Darkness







But the director seems to instill confidence; the narrator says “he

resembled a pilot” (p. 2141)

Marlow is the only one of the group who “still follows the sea”; he is the

only one who is in touch with the places where the company makes its

money (p. 2142)

Heart of Darkness

The narrator thinks about all of the men and ships that have sailed out from the Thames into the ocean—”the great knights-errant of the sea”

(Longman Anthology, 2141)

Heart of Darkness


He mentions Sir Francis Drake, Captain of the Golden Hind, heroic “privateer” (or pirate) who attached Spanish ships returning from the Americas, stealing their gold and delivering a portion to Queen Elizabeth


Heart of Darkness



He mentions Sir John Franklin, captain of an expedition in search of the Northwest Passage in 1845—this was a failed mission, Franklin and his crew never returned


Heart of Darkness




Note the ambivalent character of these two examples—Drake is a hero, but also a thief; Franklin embarked upon a heroic mission, but the mission was a failure


Heart of Darkness




Note the ambivalent character of these two examples—Drake is a hero, but also a thief; Franklin embarked upon a heroic mission, but the mission was a failure

Conrad’s narrator seems to be setting a tone of regret and repentance about the driving force of adventure and conquest


Heart of Darkness

Heart of Darkness

As the narrator finishes setting the scene, Marlow suddenly speaks:

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


Marlow is referring to the experience of the Roman invaders, sent in A.D. 43 to take control of Britain, sailing up the Thames into what must have seemed like a wild, uncivilized place—cold, gray, dark—the opposite of the sun-drenched Mediterranean

“Imagine the feelings of a commander of a fine . . . trireme in the Mediterranean, ordered suddenly to the north; run overland across the Gauls in a hurry . . . . Imagine him here—the very end of the world, a sea the colour of lead, a sky the colour of smoke, a kind of ship about as rigid as a concertina—and going up this river with stores, or orders, or what yo like. Sandbanks, marshes, forests, savages—precious little to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing by Thames water to drink. . . . Here and there a military camp lost in a wilderness, like a needle in a bundle of hay—cold, fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death,--deth skuli\king in the air, in the water, in the bush. . . .

Land in a swamp, march through the woods, and in some inland post feel the savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him,--all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There’s no initiation either into such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the aboniation—you know. Imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate.” (Longman Anthology, 2141)

Heart of Darkness

Documents

Joseph Conrad 1857-1924. Conrad was born Josef Konrad Nalecz Korzeniowski