Joseph Conrad - Classic Literature Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was born Józef Teodor Naùæcz Konrad Korzeniowski on December 3, 1857 in Berdyczów, which was a part of Poland then occupied by Russia. He was born into a family of aristocrats that no longer had the estates it once owned, they had been confiscated by the Russians. Conrad’s father, Apollo Korzeniowski was a translator and his Polish and French translations were Conrad’s first exposure to English literature.
Apollo Korzeniowski was exiled to Siberia in 1861. Conrad’s mother was a victim of Tuberculosis. Upon his father’s death four years later, Conrad went to Switzerland to live with Tadeusz Bobrowski who was his maternal uncle. Conrad came into a sum of £ 1,600 upon the death of his uncle. Conrad quit his studies and joined the French merchant navy at the age of 17 years.
Conrad worked as an apprentice and between 1875 and 1878 he voyaged thrice to the West Indies. It was on these voyages that he met people on whom he modeled his characters. Notably, Dominic Cervoni on whose personality Conrad based his characters who sought adventure. Conrad also drew on his experiences for his writings, and his experiences included smuggling arms to Spain. In 1878, Conrad suffered a bullet wound, it is not clear if it was an attempted suicide or he was injured in a duel.
Conrad joined the British merchant navy in 1878, in order to avoid military service in Russia. Conrad remained in the British navy for 16 years. He obtained his certificate as a master mariner in 1886. Conrad had worked his way up through the ranks, from common seaman to first mate and finally to captaining his own ship, Otago.
Conrad traveled widely during his career as a seaman, he visited Australia, South America, the East Indies, and Congo, which provided the setting and content for his classic Heart of Darkness. Conrad had taken to writing during his long sea voyages. Conrad ended his career as a seaman in 1894 and devoted all his time to writing. He was 36 years of age when he settled in England. Conrad stayed at Kent, England for all his life and made trips to France, Poland, and the U.S.A.
Conrad had a writing style that employed rich prose and evoked powerful imagery of the moral conflicts in human life. Conrad’s best works are the sea adventures that he wrote. His writings are seen as the transition in English writing, from the classical styles of Charles Dickens to the modernist styles that were emerging then.
Conrad got married to Jessie George in 1896; the couple had two sons. Conrad viewed England as a country that respected the freedom of an individual. He accepted the verdict of the public on his writings even when it was not favorable, as was the case with a one-act play that he wrote. The play ran into trouble with the Censor of the Plays. Conrad regarded the existence of such a body as unnecessary, which he mentioned in his essay, The Censor of the Plays.
Conrad had to learn English; he did so before the age of 21. He became a naturalized British citizen in 1884. Almayer’s Folly was his first story, which was published in 1895. The novel explored the themes of European colonialism, which was to recur in his writings. It is the story of Kaspar Almayer, who comes to Borneo prospecting for gold and loses all that he holds dear, including his daughter, to his greed.
Nigger of the "Narcissus", which was published in 1897, is a story of a black sailor who is afflicted with tuberculosis. Conrad expertly narrates the effects of the presence of a dying sailor on the behaviors of the crew of the ship Narcissus. He captures the whole range of emotions from compassion to resentment and the tension that almost leads to mutiny on the ship.
Heart of Darkness, which along with Lord Jim is his most famous work, was published in 1902. Marlow, a character in the story narrates his experiences in Congo, where he works for a company that trades in ivory. The central character in the story is Kurtz, who is a man of genius torn by inner conflicts.
Conrad has presented the story at more than one level. Conrad writing the story, Marlow recounting his experiences in the tale and the scenes that happen in flashback. As a narrative technique, telling a story within a story has been used earlier too, most notably by Mary Shelly in Frankenstein.
Lord Jim was published in 1900. It was originally intended as a short story based on true events. However, Conrad developed it into a novel. The story is of Jim, who in an act of cowardice abandons his ship in a storm. The novel traces the manner in which he faces up to the feelings of guilt and his final act of redemption when he allows himself to be shot.
Conrad’s writings inspired several Hollywood films. Apocalypse Now, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, borrowed its idea from Heart of Darkness. The Sabotage was a screen adaptation of The Secret Agent. It was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Nostromo too was planned for filming by David Lean and Steven Spielberg but the project was shelved on Lean’s death in 1991. Several writers have acknowledged Conrad’s influence on their writings. These include, among others, Jean-Paul Sartre, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ernest Hemingway.
Conrad tried his hand at writing screenplays without much success. His screenplay, The Strange Man, was adapted from his short story GasparRuiz. The studio for which he wrote the script rejected it. Conrad did not quite understand the workings of the film business. He had sold the screen rights of his fiction in 1919. Early in his writing career, Conrad was encouraged to write by H.G Wells. He co-authored Inheritors and The nature of crime with Ford Madox Ford.
In the later years of his life, Conrad suffered from rheumatism. On August 3, 1924, he died of a heart attack. In the same year, he had declined to accept a knighthood. Conrad was buried in Canterbury.