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Youth / Heart of Darkness / The End of the Tether
Conrad's aim was by "the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel . . . before all, to make you see"
Heart of Darkness, his exploration of European colonialism in Africa and of elusive human values, embodies more profoundly than almost any other modern fiction the difficulty of 'seeing,' its relativity and shifting compromise. Portraying a young man's first sea-voyage to the East in Youth, an unenlightened maturity in Heart of Darkness, and the blind old age of Captain Whalley in The End of the Tether, the stories in this volume are united in their theme - the 'Ages of Man' - and in their scepticism. Conrad's vision has influenced twentieth-century writers and artists from T. S. Eliot to Jorge Luis Borges and Werner Herzog, and continues to draw critical fire. In his stimulating introduction John Lyon discusses the links between these three stories, the critiques of Chinua Achebe and Edward Said, and the ebb and flow of Conrad's magnificent narrative art.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Heart of Darkness, his exploration of European colonialism in Africa and of elusive human values, embodies more profoundly than almost any other modern fiction the difficulty of 'seeing,' its relativity and shifting compromise. Portraying a young man's first sea-voyage to the East in Youth, an unenlightened maturity in Heart of Darkness, and the blind old age of Captain Whalley in The End of the Tether, the stories in this volume are united in their theme - the 'Ages of Man' - and in their scepticism. Conrad's vision has influenced twentieth-century writers and artists from T. S. Eliot to Jorge Luis Borges and Werner Herzog, and continues to draw critical fire. In his stimulating introduction John Lyon discusses the links between these three stories, the critiques of Chinua Achebe and Edward Said, and the ebb and flow of Conrad's magnificent narrative art.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
384 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1924
82 people are currently reading
317 people want to read
About the author
Joseph Conrad
3,082 books4,847 followersJoseph Conrad was a Polish-British novelist and story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the English language and, although he did not speak English fluently until his twenties, he became a master prose stylist who brought a non-English sensibility into English literature. He wrote novels and stories, many in nautical settings, that depict crises of human individuality in the midst of what he saw as an indifferent, inscrutable, and amoral world.
Conrad is considered a literary impressionist by some and an early modernist by others, though his works also contain elements of 19th-century realism. His narrative style and anti-heroic characters, as in Lord Jim, for example, have influenced numerous authors. Many dramatic films have been adapted from and inspired by his works. Numerous writers and critics have commented that his fictional works, written largely in the first two decades of the 20th century, seem to have anticipated later world events.
Writing near the peak of the British Empire, Conrad drew on the national experiences of his native Poland—during nearly all his life, parceled out among three occupying empires—and on his own experiences in the French and British merchant navies, to create short stories and novels that reflect aspects of a European-dominated world—including imperialism and colonialism—and that profoundly explore the human psyche.
Conrad is considered a literary impressionist by some and an early modernist by others, though his works also contain elements of 19th-century realism. His narrative style and anti-heroic characters, as in Lord Jim, for example, have influenced numerous authors. Many dramatic films have been adapted from and inspired by his works. Numerous writers and critics have commented that his fictional works, written largely in the first two decades of the 20th century, seem to have anticipated later world events.
Writing near the peak of the British Empire, Conrad drew on the national experiences of his native Poland—during nearly all his life, parceled out among three occupying empires—and on his own experiences in the French and British merchant navies, to create short stories and novels that reflect aspects of a European-dominated world—including imperialism and colonialism—and that profoundly explore the human psyche.
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April 9, 2020I used to like listening to those radio programmes in which public figures, mostly men and usually politicians, gave their opinions on current affairs questions coming from an audience. The projected certainty was always striking. In my memory from time to time questions would come up about what the panel would do in the event of invasion and invariably the speakers would broadcast how certain they were that they would resist. It is the nature, I suppose, of a public figure to radiate a fixed and certain image even if it is that we have always been at war with Eurasia, luckily for us readers on the other side of the scales is Joseph Conrad: We don't know how we will react. We don't know how we will change. We look back and can only wonder at what we once were.
Youth
In Youth this is done by having Marlow narrate a story about his first voyage as second mate as a young man. His own youthful enthusiasm has become alien to him but oddly is paralleled by the elderly captain, who on his first command, and is as determined as the young man to reach their destination of Bangkok with a cargo of coal.
The curious thing about this lightening strikes multiple times story is that with a few minor changes it is a fictionalisation of his 1881 voyage as second mate on the barque Palestine.
In Falmouth the carpenters are waiting for the ship while finally in the East the crowd is watching (perhaps there are carpenters amongst them too). There is a sense of the seafarers as spectacle for the landlubbers, perhaps more broadly as being scrutinised, watched or perhaps being read by an audience. We are the crowd in the East reading something oddly distant from our own experiences.
Heart of Darkness
This story is also narrated by Marlow. He "sat cross-legged right aft, leaning against the mizzen-mast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and, with his arms dropped, the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol" (p38). In fact he resembles an idol of the Buddha (and not a prophet, a saint or some other religious figure) as Conrad makes clear (p41 & p123) and he is giving us a sermon on Enlightenment in the context of darkness. Darkness as the unexamined, feared, centre of the person, darkness as the lies unenlightened people prefer to live with, darkness as the stories told to hide the truth from view. Darkness obscures the City of London, darkness fills the room as Kurtz's intended wants to hear the last words that Kurtz never said to complete her idealised image of him. Darkness that fills a person who has nothing other than ego at their core.
Perhaps this is coincidental, but it is said that initially the Buddha did not want to teach thinking that no one could understand the Enlightenment he achieved and here in Brussels Marlow finds that the "people hurrying through the streets...could not possibly know the things I knew" and so "I had no particular desire to enlighten them" (p116). What saves the story from unrelenting bleakness is that Marlow does choose to give a sermon and we are part of the audience. We are experiencing Leopold II's Congo from an enlightened perspective. We can see the choice between the two nightmares without having to live in either. Without that distancing effect this would be a bleaker story by far.
In travelling into the Congo Marlow stresses how he was travelling back in time and since (speaking of London, the Essex and Kent marshes, the mouth of the Thames) "And this also,' said Marlow suddenly, 'has been one of the dark places of the earth" the Congo of the late nineteenth century is understood by Marlow to be like prehistoric Britain and by extension prehistoric anywhere. And with those words Polish born under Russian occupation Conrad has set us up to see Britain under the Romans as being like the Congo under the Belgians. To grasp that all empires are at best self-deluding and at worst outright lying about their activities and motivations, or perhaps this is narrow minded on my part, cognitive dissonance might be a nicer way to think of it. The incoming white man is repeating a universal drama. What Marlow witnesses and re-enacts has in his narrative happened before, explicitly in Roman Britain implicitly everywhere .
Prehistory doesn't have the same social furniture as modernity and like blind people in an unfamiliar space the colonists are lost, not spatially but morally. Fresleven "the gentlest, quietest creature that ever walked on two legs" ends up beating a chief with a stick (p43). Similar stories of people entirely decent in a particularly furnished room yet who behave astonishingly badly in very different circumstances may come easily to mind. A person is a fluid thing.
The nightmare chosen by the chief accountant is the banality of evil. He attempts to rebuild the familiar in the midst of the unfamiliar with "his collars, his vast cuffs, his brushed hair" but this appearance is only possible by teaching "one of the native women" to do his laundry even though (unsurprisingly) she has "a distaste for the work"(p54). Presumably this didn't involve chopping off one of her hands but given everything else we see in the story nothing else can be ruled out.
Kurtz on the other hand chooses pure ego. This finally becomes clear when Marlow returns to Brussels "He could get himself to believe anything - anything. He would have been a splendid leader of an extreme party." "What party?" I asked. "Any party," answered the other. (p117). Whether in Brussels or along the riverbanks of the Congo they are all in thrall to his ego.
The fine words of the noble societies in Brussels about the mission to save and to civilise degenerate into 'kill them all' by the time their speaker has reached the end of the Congo river. But it is the 'kill them all' spirit of the rawest exploitation that has funded the sepulchral buildings of Brussels in which those societies meet and discuss the moral importance of taking up the white man's burden purely for the benefit of those natives - whose fate, left to die by the side of the track, we see very nicely drawn for us. Equally the 'kill them all' is an inevitable reaction of thwarted desire against all those Luddites who don't adore the dream of the Crystal Palace. We might pause to see a symmetry between civilisation and destruction. By setting us up with the comparison between the civilising missions of Rome and Brussels we are left with a timescale for recovery from colonisation - fifteen hundred years from being conquered to striking out as raider traders and slightly longer from being colonised to becoming colonisers by also implicitly a cyclical model of history. First you are colonised, later you will become colonisers, in time your dominion will also end leaving you in turn open to be conquered by others.
This is a very physical story. There is a strong sense of how the narrator feels to be an intruder "They wanted no excuse for being there" Marlow says of some "black fellows" paddling a boat by the shore (p49). The very landscape rejects the incomers, the coast is formless, banks were unstable, water thickening into slime, mangrove swamps blocking up the outlets to the sea. A European warship shelling the jungle suggests the impotence and asymmetry of the conflict. With the technology of railways and paddle-boats, going upstream, against the flow, slowly but force-ably man's dominion is breaking nature's social union in the course of this story.
The physicality and Kurtz's egoism come together. Rising up from the ground he seems to have grown into this landscape and there is a fever of possession: my ivory, my river, my intended. The my intended coming across as viscously and violently possessive as all the rest adding to the irony of Marlow's eventual meeting with her.
Some of the ambiguity here may well be coming from Conrad the writer rather than Marlow the narrator. The writer was in exile from his native land to avoid living under the Russian dominion but in the Congo was employed by those coming in to dominate, during which time he came into contact with Roger Casement. There's a natural flow in both from their feelings for their native lands to opposition to the exploitation of the Congo.
The End of the Tether
Another story of how we flow with the tide, a captain brought to the end of his tether reacts differently to how he did in happier times.
There is a lot here in the background about time passing and the changing of the environment (socially, politically and economically) as sailing ships are pushed out of business by steam ships and lone operators by companies. Colonies develop, settlements grow from simplicity to complexity. Two of the lead characters and several in the background are in their places but out of their time. "These good times won't last for ever" (p252). The key is knowing when to stop, sell up or change and then to move on which our main characters with the exception of Mr Van Wyk are not able to do.
Nice point about race and attitudes. Captain Whalley asks "is he a white man" (p154) of the owner of the steam ship yet the four white men who officer it are a circus of people chasing unrealisable desires. The elderly Malay Serang who keeps the captain's watch perhaps suggests the reader's attitude: "He was not troubled by any intellectual mistrust of his senses. If his captain chose to stir the mud it was well. He had known in his life white men indulge in outbreaks equally strange. He was only genuinely interested to see what would come of it" (p172).
Youth
In Youth this is done by having Marlow narrate a story about his first voyage as second mate as a young man. His own youthful enthusiasm has become alien to him but oddly is paralleled by the elderly captain, who on his first command, and is as determined as the young man to reach their destination of Bangkok with a cargo of coal.
The curious thing about this lightening strikes multiple times story is that with a few minor changes it is a fictionalisation of his 1881 voyage as second mate on the barque Palestine.
In Falmouth the carpenters are waiting for the ship while finally in the East the crowd is watching (perhaps there are carpenters amongst them too). There is a sense of the seafarers as spectacle for the landlubbers, perhaps more broadly as being scrutinised, watched or perhaps being read by an audience. We are the crowd in the East reading something oddly distant from our own experiences.
Heart of Darkness
This story is also narrated by Marlow. He "sat cross-legged right aft, leaning against the mizzen-mast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and, with his arms dropped, the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol" (p38). In fact he resembles an idol of the Buddha (and not a prophet, a saint or some other religious figure) as Conrad makes clear (p41 & p123) and he is giving us a sermon on Enlightenment in the context of darkness. Darkness as the unexamined, feared, centre of the person, darkness as the lies unenlightened people prefer to live with, darkness as the stories told to hide the truth from view. Darkness obscures the City of London, darkness fills the room as Kurtz's intended wants to hear the last words that Kurtz never said to complete her idealised image of him. Darkness that fills a person who has nothing other than ego at their core.
Perhaps this is coincidental, but it is said that initially the Buddha did not want to teach thinking that no one could understand the Enlightenment he achieved and here in Brussels Marlow finds that the "people hurrying through the streets...could not possibly know the things I knew" and so "I had no particular desire to enlighten them" (p116). What saves the story from unrelenting bleakness is that Marlow does choose to give a sermon and we are part of the audience. We are experiencing Leopold II's Congo from an enlightened perspective. We can see the choice between the two nightmares without having to live in either. Without that distancing effect this would be a bleaker story by far.
In travelling into the Congo Marlow stresses how he was travelling back in time and since (speaking of London, the Essex and Kent marshes, the mouth of the Thames) "And this also,' said Marlow suddenly, 'has been one of the dark places of the earth" the Congo of the late nineteenth century is understood by Marlow to be like prehistoric Britain and by extension prehistoric anywhere. And with those words Polish born under Russian occupation Conrad has set us up to see Britain under the Romans as being like the Congo under the Belgians. To grasp that all empires are at best self-deluding and at worst outright lying about their activities and motivations, or perhaps this is narrow minded on my part, cognitive dissonance might be a nicer way to think of it. The incoming white man is repeating a universal drama. What Marlow witnesses and re-enacts has in his narrative happened before, explicitly in Roman Britain implicitly everywhere .
Prehistory doesn't have the same social furniture as modernity and like blind people in an unfamiliar space the colonists are lost, not spatially but morally. Fresleven "the gentlest, quietest creature that ever walked on two legs" ends up beating a chief with a stick (p43). Similar stories of people entirely decent in a particularly furnished room yet who behave astonishingly badly in very different circumstances may come easily to mind. A person is a fluid thing.
The nightmare chosen by the chief accountant is the banality of evil. He attempts to rebuild the familiar in the midst of the unfamiliar with "his collars, his vast cuffs, his brushed hair" but this appearance is only possible by teaching "one of the native women" to do his laundry even though (unsurprisingly) she has "a distaste for the work"(p54). Presumably this didn't involve chopping off one of her hands but given everything else we see in the story nothing else can be ruled out.
Kurtz on the other hand chooses pure ego. This finally becomes clear when Marlow returns to Brussels "He could get himself to believe anything - anything. He would have been a splendid leader of an extreme party." "What party?" I asked. "Any party," answered the other. (p117). Whether in Brussels or along the riverbanks of the Congo they are all in thrall to his ego.
The fine words of the noble societies in Brussels about the mission to save and to civilise degenerate into 'kill them all' by the time their speaker has reached the end of the Congo river. But it is the 'kill them all' spirit of the rawest exploitation that has funded the sepulchral buildings of Brussels in which those societies meet and discuss the moral importance of taking up the white man's burden purely for the benefit of those natives - whose fate, left to die by the side of the track, we see very nicely drawn for us. Equally the 'kill them all' is an inevitable reaction of thwarted desire against all those Luddites who don't adore the dream of the Crystal Palace. We might pause to see a symmetry between civilisation and destruction. By setting us up with the comparison between the civilising missions of Rome and Brussels we are left with a timescale for recovery from colonisation - fifteen hundred years from being conquered to striking out as raider traders and slightly longer from being colonised to becoming colonisers by also implicitly a cyclical model of history. First you are colonised, later you will become colonisers, in time your dominion will also end leaving you in turn open to be conquered by others.
This is a very physical story. There is a strong sense of how the narrator feels to be an intruder "They wanted no excuse for being there" Marlow says of some "black fellows" paddling a boat by the shore (p49). The very landscape rejects the incomers, the coast is formless, banks were unstable, water thickening into slime, mangrove swamps blocking up the outlets to the sea. A European warship shelling the jungle suggests the impotence and asymmetry of the conflict. With the technology of railways and paddle-boats, going upstream, against the flow, slowly but force-ably man's dominion is breaking nature's social union in the course of this story.
The physicality and Kurtz's egoism come together. Rising up from the ground he seems to have grown into this landscape and there is a fever of possession: my ivory, my river, my intended. The my intended coming across as viscously and violently possessive as all the rest adding to the irony of Marlow's eventual meeting with her.
Some of the ambiguity here may well be coming from Conrad the writer rather than Marlow the narrator. The writer was in exile from his native land to avoid living under the Russian dominion but in the Congo was employed by those coming in to dominate, during which time he came into contact with Roger Casement. There's a natural flow in both from their feelings for their native lands to opposition to the exploitation of the Congo.
The End of the Tether
Another story of how we flow with the tide, a captain brought to the end of his tether reacts differently to how he did in happier times.
There is a lot here in the background about time passing and the changing of the environment (socially, politically and economically) as sailing ships are pushed out of business by steam ships and lone operators by companies. Colonies develop, settlements grow from simplicity to complexity. Two of the lead characters and several in the background are in their places but out of their time. "These good times won't last for ever" (p252). The key is knowing when to stop, sell up or change and then to move on which our main characters with the exception of Mr Van Wyk are not able to do.
Nice point about race and attitudes. Captain Whalley asks "is he a white man" (p154) of the owner of the steam ship yet the four white men who officer it are a circus of people chasing unrealisable desires. The elderly Malay Serang who keeps the captain's watch perhaps suggests the reader's attitude: "He was not troubled by any intellectual mistrust of his senses. If his captain chose to stir the mud it was well. He had known in his life white men indulge in outbreaks equally strange. He was only genuinely interested to see what would come of it" (p172).
December 4, 2021
Herz der Finsternis:
Männer aus Europa müssen sich im Angesicht kolonialer Erschließung des afrikanischen Kontinents verschiedenen Unternehmungen stellen sowie den finsteren, bösen Seelenkräften, die unter den Bedingungen völlig grenzenloser Machtentfaltung schrankenlos gedeihen. Die Einnahme Afrikas erweist sich nicht als hehre Zivilisationserweiterung, sondern als Gewaltorgie weißer Hasardeure.
Aus heutiger Sicht ambivalenzfördernd ist wohl die Tatsache, dass der Schauplatz Afrika selbst als das "Andere" inszeniert und damit zum Antipoden oder Kampfplatz der Zivilisation erhoben wird. Das ergibt oft abstruse und satirisch gezeichnete Szenen und eine grundsätzlich beißende Kritik an der Ineffektivität und Inhumanität der Kolonialstaaten.
Doch Conrads Schilderungen der Schwarzen waren für mich oft schwer zu ertragen. Gerade im Umgang mit der kongolesischen Bevölkerung zeigt sich der Wert oder Unwert der Europäer, aber zur Ausstaffierung und Betonung dieses Effekts muss Conrad sein "Herz der Finsternis" und dessen Bewohner in recht grellem Kontrast malen. Da muss man als Leser wohl oder übel durch. Es war sehr unangenehm, diese rassistische Weltsicht kennenzulernen, als weltanschauliche Grundlage der Eroberer ist sie jedoch der moralische Angelpunkt dieser Geschichte.
Mit einseitiger Hostilität gegen Afrika hat das in meinen Augen allerdings nichts zu tun, viel zu drastisch und negativ fallen die Bewertungen der Weißen aus, allen voran Elfenbeinjäger und Gott "Kurtz" sowie die "Totenstadt" (hinter der sich Brüssel verbirgt, wie mir die Recherche verriet).
In vielen Teilen zu metaphernschwanger und sprachlich überladen für meinen Geschmack, gerade das letzte Kapitel ist mir zu üppig bei gleichzeitiger inhaltlicher Unschärfe. Die Flussfahrt durch den Dschungel zum sagenhaften Kurtz fand ich genial. Zwar habe ich Apokalypse now nicht gesehen, aber dennoch hatte ich unweigerlich sattgrüne Bilder und die zirpende Geräuschkulisse inmitten des Regenwalds im Kopf.
Ich schließe nicht aus, dass ich bei wiederholter Lektüre die tiefere Fahrrinne finde wie der Flusskapitän Marlow, aber vorerst würde ich jedem Celines Reise ans Ende der Nacht empfehlen, denn auch hier droht die Finsternis, doch ist sie bei Celine allumfassend und weltweit, sie liegt im Senegal wie in New York, in Paris wie in Detroit. Und lustiger fand ich Celins Roman auch. Übrigens ließ sich der Franzose offenbar vom polnisch-englischen Vorbild inspirieren. Allzu deutlich sind die Anspielungen.
Aber klar, beide eint die Verzweiflung über die Finsternis des menschlichen Herzens.
Männer aus Europa müssen sich im Angesicht kolonialer Erschließung des afrikanischen Kontinents verschiedenen Unternehmungen stellen sowie den finsteren, bösen Seelenkräften, die unter den Bedingungen völlig grenzenloser Machtentfaltung schrankenlos gedeihen. Die Einnahme Afrikas erweist sich nicht als hehre Zivilisationserweiterung, sondern als Gewaltorgie weißer Hasardeure.
Aus heutiger Sicht ambivalenzfördernd ist wohl die Tatsache, dass der Schauplatz Afrika selbst als das "Andere" inszeniert und damit zum Antipoden oder Kampfplatz der Zivilisation erhoben wird. Das ergibt oft abstruse und satirisch gezeichnete Szenen und eine grundsätzlich beißende Kritik an der Ineffektivität und Inhumanität der Kolonialstaaten.
Doch Conrads Schilderungen der Schwarzen waren für mich oft schwer zu ertragen. Gerade im Umgang mit der kongolesischen Bevölkerung zeigt sich der Wert oder Unwert der Europäer, aber zur Ausstaffierung und Betonung dieses Effekts muss Conrad sein "Herz der Finsternis" und dessen Bewohner in recht grellem Kontrast malen. Da muss man als Leser wohl oder übel durch. Es war sehr unangenehm, diese rassistische Weltsicht kennenzulernen, als weltanschauliche Grundlage der Eroberer ist sie jedoch der moralische Angelpunkt dieser Geschichte.
Mit einseitiger Hostilität gegen Afrika hat das in meinen Augen allerdings nichts zu tun, viel zu drastisch und negativ fallen die Bewertungen der Weißen aus, allen voran Elfenbeinjäger und Gott "Kurtz" sowie die "Totenstadt" (hinter der sich Brüssel verbirgt, wie mir die Recherche verriet).
In vielen Teilen zu metaphernschwanger und sprachlich überladen für meinen Geschmack, gerade das letzte Kapitel ist mir zu üppig bei gleichzeitiger inhaltlicher Unschärfe. Die Flussfahrt durch den Dschungel zum sagenhaften Kurtz fand ich genial. Zwar habe ich Apokalypse now nicht gesehen, aber dennoch hatte ich unweigerlich sattgrüne Bilder und die zirpende Geräuschkulisse inmitten des Regenwalds im Kopf.
Ich schließe nicht aus, dass ich bei wiederholter Lektüre die tiefere Fahrrinne finde wie der Flusskapitän Marlow, aber vorerst würde ich jedem Celines Reise ans Ende der Nacht empfehlen, denn auch hier droht die Finsternis, doch ist sie bei Celine allumfassend und weltweit, sie liegt im Senegal wie in New York, in Paris wie in Detroit. Und lustiger fand ich Celins Roman auch. Übrigens ließ sich der Franzose offenbar vom polnisch-englischen Vorbild inspirieren. Allzu deutlich sind die Anspielungen.
Aber klar, beide eint die Verzweiflung über die Finsternis des menschlichen Herzens.
November 30, 2016
As always with classic literature, I must first warn you NOT to read the introduction before the main event. Why publishers put analysis that ruins the whole thing at the front of the book baffles me. Particularly in this case, as an author’s note and end notes are also included. Whyever isn’t the so-called introduction situated as an afterword? It would make far more sense so arranged.
Anyway, I skipped the introduction then read it after the three novellas/extended short stories. It succinctly analysed all three stories so well that there seems little left to say about their themes, motifs, or subtext. It also pointed out, though, that all three stories draw heavily from Conrad’s own life. This was fascinating to learn more details about. I was originally prompted to read this book by King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa, a devastating piece of non-fiction about the Belgian exploitation of the Congo. Conrad travelled up the Congo river and saw this regime in action, subsequently turning his experiences into ‘Heart of Darkness’.
Thus it did not surprise me to find ‘Heart of Darkness’ the stand out story of the book. All three were extraordinarily well written, however. The collection took me a lot longer to read than I expected as a result of this. I couldn’t keep up reading momentum when beautiful sentences and paragraphs kept forced me to read them several times. Conrad’s writing has a texture (for want of a better word) that I loved. ‘Heart of Darkness’ displays this quality to its utmost, given the atmosphere of menace that pervades it. ‘Youth’ and ‘The End of the Tether’ both have their appeal, but ‘Heart of Darkness’ is justly famous. ‘Youth’ is tense and exciting, whereas ‘The End of the Tether’ is gloomy and inexorable, thus they make for effective bookends. It seems unnecessary to praise ‘Heart of Darkness’, which I feel that I need to re-read several times to truly appreciate its terrible intensity.
This passage from it was among those that I found especially striking:
I think that 'Heart of Darkness' reminded me of nothing so much as studying the Aeneid a decade ago. It reads like a journey into a monstrous mythical underworld, with the firm assurance that even once you have left you are forever tainted by the experience.
Anyway, I skipped the introduction then read it after the three novellas/extended short stories. It succinctly analysed all three stories so well that there seems little left to say about their themes, motifs, or subtext. It also pointed out, though, that all three stories draw heavily from Conrad’s own life. This was fascinating to learn more details about. I was originally prompted to read this book by King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa, a devastating piece of non-fiction about the Belgian exploitation of the Congo. Conrad travelled up the Congo river and saw this regime in action, subsequently turning his experiences into ‘Heart of Darkness’.
Thus it did not surprise me to find ‘Heart of Darkness’ the stand out story of the book. All three were extraordinarily well written, however. The collection took me a lot longer to read than I expected as a result of this. I couldn’t keep up reading momentum when beautiful sentences and paragraphs kept forced me to read them several times. Conrad’s writing has a texture (for want of a better word) that I loved. ‘Heart of Darkness’ displays this quality to its utmost, given the atmosphere of menace that pervades it. ‘Youth’ and ‘The End of the Tether’ both have their appeal, but ‘Heart of Darkness’ is justly famous. ‘Youth’ is tense and exciting, whereas ‘The End of the Tether’ is gloomy and inexorable, thus they make for effective bookends. It seems unnecessary to praise ‘Heart of Darkness’, which I feel that I need to re-read several times to truly appreciate its terrible intensity.
This passage from it was among those that I found especially striking:
I could see the cage of his ribs all astir, the bones of his arms waving. It was as though an animated image of death carved out of old ivory had been shaking its hand with menaces at a motionless crowd of men made of dark and glittering bronze. I saw him open his mouth wide - it gave him a weirdly voracious aspect, as though he had wanted to swallow all the air, all the earth, all the men before him.
I think that 'Heart of Darkness' reminded me of nothing so much as studying the Aeneid a decade ago. It reads like a journey into a monstrous mythical underworld, with the firm assurance that even once you have left you are forever tainted by the experience.
March 11, 2025
Go and watch Apocalypse Now again, you haven't for a while. As an added bonus, you won't have to drag yourself through this one as it's functionally the same story but harder to follow and without Flight of the Valkyries.
February 6, 2013
Great compilation. These book includes three different stories but which explore similar themes. Each one represents one of three stages of life; a hopeful youth (Youth), an unenlighted maturity (Heart of Darkness) and old age (The end of the Tether). I bought this book for the much praised Heart of Darkness having never read anything by Conrad, and I was surprised by how much I liked the other two.
Youth is a kind of "long" short story in which Marlow tells about his first trip to the East in first person. All the expectations, hopefulness and resoursfulness of youth are depicted expertly by Conrad. A voyage to the mysterious East, place of many fancies for young Marlow, ends up in a catastrophy which does not diminish his enthusiasm and anxiety to reach his much longed for destination. This story is rather simple in plot but very complex and profound in meaning. Conrad's psychological study of youth is masterful.
Heart of Darkness is I think Conrad's best well-known story. It also features Marlow, though many years later. Here he tells about his voyage down the Congo River into the deep, unknown heart of the jungle. This is a story which explores deeply the human soul. The trip into the jungle is nothing more than a trip into oneself, into the unexplored darkness of our souls. It also tackles expertly some themes as madness in the wilderness, colonialism, racism, civilization versus savagery. This is a great story much discussed which can reach deeply into one if read carefuly.
The End of the Tether is the story of Captain Whalley, previously admired, who now has lost everything in a bank crash and accepts command of a steamer to save money for his daughter. It takes various viewpoints alowing us to have insights into many different characters. It deals mostly with identity, old age and principles. The voyage which ends in catastrophy depicts the stages Captain Whalley experiences during his old age.
This compilation has an introduction woth reading (but after you've finished the stories). After this I will continue reading Joseph Conrad, he has made a really great impression on me. I first picked him up after reading how well considered he was by Jorge Luis Borges (whom I admire deeply). Here I leave something he wrote about Conrad(translated):
Manuscript Found in a Book of Joseph Conrad
In the shimmering countries that exude the summer,
the day is blanched in white light. The day
is a harsh slit across the window shutter,
dazzle along the coast, and on the plain, fever.
But the ancient night is bottomless, like a jar
of brimming water. The water reveals limitless wakes,
and in the drifting canoes, face inclined to the stars,
a man marks the limp time with a cigar.
The smoke blurs gray across the constellations
afar. The present sheds past, name, and plan.
The world is a few vague tepid observations.
The river is the original river. The man, the first man.
Youth is a kind of "long" short story in which Marlow tells about his first trip to the East in first person. All the expectations, hopefulness and resoursfulness of youth are depicted expertly by Conrad. A voyage to the mysterious East, place of many fancies for young Marlow, ends up in a catastrophy which does not diminish his enthusiasm and anxiety to reach his much longed for destination. This story is rather simple in plot but very complex and profound in meaning. Conrad's psychological study of youth is masterful.
Heart of Darkness is I think Conrad's best well-known story. It also features Marlow, though many years later. Here he tells about his voyage down the Congo River into the deep, unknown heart of the jungle. This is a story which explores deeply the human soul. The trip into the jungle is nothing more than a trip into oneself, into the unexplored darkness of our souls. It also tackles expertly some themes as madness in the wilderness, colonialism, racism, civilization versus savagery. This is a great story much discussed which can reach deeply into one if read carefuly.
The End of the Tether is the story of Captain Whalley, previously admired, who now has lost everything in a bank crash and accepts command of a steamer to save money for his daughter. It takes various viewpoints alowing us to have insights into many different characters. It deals mostly with identity, old age and principles. The voyage which ends in catastrophy depicts the stages Captain Whalley experiences during his old age.
This compilation has an introduction woth reading (but after you've finished the stories). After this I will continue reading Joseph Conrad, he has made a really great impression on me. I first picked him up after reading how well considered he was by Jorge Luis Borges (whom I admire deeply). Here I leave something he wrote about Conrad(translated):
Manuscript Found in a Book of Joseph Conrad
In the shimmering countries that exude the summer,
the day is blanched in white light. The day
is a harsh slit across the window shutter,
dazzle along the coast, and on the plain, fever.
But the ancient night is bottomless, like a jar
of brimming water. The water reveals limitless wakes,
and in the drifting canoes, face inclined to the stars,
a man marks the limp time with a cigar.
The smoke blurs gray across the constellations
afar. The present sheds past, name, and plan.
The world is a few vague tepid observations.
The river is the original river. The man, the first man.
March 31, 2020
Of the three stories in this volume, it is "Heart of Darkness" that stands out to most people's minds. It is usually considered Conrad's greatest and most important work, collapsing the boundaries between the civilized and the so-called uncivilized, as represented in the figure of Kurtz. This realization is what dooms Kurtz and haunts the narrator, Marlow, until the end of his days--or at least the end of this book--for Marlow also appears in several other of Conrad's stories and novels. In terms of form, what is most interesting is that the psychological untangling of Kurtz occurs following his death, as Marlow muses upon and reveals his discussions with the man and also unveils his writing and descent into the void, the abyss.
Yet, for my interest, it is the other two stories that are most interesting. "The End of the Tether" and "Youth: A Narrative" both point more towards the melancholy and elegiac tones that Conrad would most often employ. Not the the total darkness that envelopes Marlow, Kurtz, and the reader in "Heart of Darkness." The two earlier stories seem more in line with what I believe to be Conrad's greatest work, Lord Jim, and to anticipate much of what will follow in other stories and novels.
"Youth" and "End of the Tether" perfectly bookend each other. "Youth" describes a young seaman gaining his first position of authority as second mate on a vessel bearing coal from London to Bangkok. The young sailor's delight at experiencing adventure and challenges is contrasted to the 60 year-old captain aboard. The old man has just gained his first command and it turns into a disaster for him but an enlightenment for the young Marlow, both the protagonist and narrator of this tale. It opens him to the exotic East, even as it leaves the old man, Captain Beard, broken and destroyed.
It is a case of the reverse in "End of the Tether," where the focus is on the aged Captain Whalley, trying to make just one last run as the captain of his vessel. Already isolated and penniless, the victim of misfortune and corruption, Whalley also nurses a fatal secret that leads to his destruction. All of the optimism and thirst for experience that carries Marlow along throughout the pages of "Youth" appear in "End of the Tether" as lost filaments of the past. Exhaustion dominates the atmosphere. Exhaustion with life. Even exhaustion with the sea. Only one motivation remains: duty.
Yet, for my interest, it is the other two stories that are most interesting. "The End of the Tether" and "Youth: A Narrative" both point more towards the melancholy and elegiac tones that Conrad would most often employ. Not the the total darkness that envelopes Marlow, Kurtz, and the reader in "Heart of Darkness." The two earlier stories seem more in line with what I believe to be Conrad's greatest work, Lord Jim, and to anticipate much of what will follow in other stories and novels.
"Youth" and "End of the Tether" perfectly bookend each other. "Youth" describes a young seaman gaining his first position of authority as second mate on a vessel bearing coal from London to Bangkok. The young sailor's delight at experiencing adventure and challenges is contrasted to the 60 year-old captain aboard. The old man has just gained his first command and it turns into a disaster for him but an enlightenment for the young Marlow, both the protagonist and narrator of this tale. It opens him to the exotic East, even as it leaves the old man, Captain Beard, broken and destroyed.
It is a case of the reverse in "End of the Tether," where the focus is on the aged Captain Whalley, trying to make just one last run as the captain of his vessel. Already isolated and penniless, the victim of misfortune and corruption, Whalley also nurses a fatal secret that leads to his destruction. All of the optimism and thirst for experience that carries Marlow along throughout the pages of "Youth" appear in "End of the Tether" as lost filaments of the past. Exhaustion dominates the atmosphere. Exhaustion with life. Even exhaustion with the sea. Only one motivation remains: duty.
October 26, 2025
Młodość / Jądro Ciemności / U Kresu Sił
Charlie Marlow my man
Charlie Marlow my man
November 20, 2017
Joseph Conrad brings discord to our household. For thirty years or more he has been one of my favourite authors, but my partner can’t abide him. She says he disregards women and his works too often read as though they are a bad translation from the French. It is true there are not that many notable women characters in Conrad’s work, but I see this as a limitation rather than a damning failure; and maybe he has a tendency towards a Frenchism or two, but if we look for an author’s voice in a work, it seems natural that the English of a French speaking Pole should have a French accent. But I suspect that a lot of my partner’s prejudice against Conrad is not to do with the writer himself, but with the creepy English teacher who enthusiastically taught Conrad at her school. This is the book that she studied and she bought me a copy to prove how dreadful it is...I, of course, like it. Originally published as ‘Youth: A Narrative and Two Other Stories’, it is a collection of three long short stories, two of them, if published separately, being long enough to count as novellas. The most famous, and the one I had previously read, is Heart of Darkness. This tale of a physical journey to the centre of a ‘dark’ continent and a symbolic journey to the dark heart of ‘Man’, has a certain mythic force going beyond the original text – the most famous version now being Apocalypse Now. The most controversial aspect of the story, however, is its treatment of Africa and Africans. While the tale is a critique of the savagery of European colonialism (and therefore in marked contrast to the vast majority of European literature which praised the colonial project), the Africans become little more than savage types, never characters: the story could be reduced to the moral that colonialism reduces the colonialists to the level of the savage African. We can take the story to be largely symbolic, that the cannibal Africans are representations of European fears of savagery: although this is valid, it does not negate the fact that the ‘Africans’ of the story are representations of historical Africans in Africa, and therefore the charge of racism remains. However, we should note the form of the narrative: it begins with a first person narrator (the ‘author’ of the tale), but then moves to a second narrator, the seaman Marlow telling of his experiences while captaining a boat up a great African river: unlike a third person narrative it does not lay claim to be a ‘True’ version of events, but a perspective, a point-of-view: the attitudes expressed do not claim to directly reflect a reality, but one character’s viewpoint: as readers we can challenge the viewpoint without rejecting the tale. It should also be noted that Marlowe ponders upon the inhabitants who lived beside the Thames centuries before and their response to a Roman trireme: parallels are made between the ancient British and today’s Africans: civilization and savagery are not, as Victorian science might claim, biologically determined, or, as Victorian theology might claim, divinely determined, but matters of historical development. But, despite all this, our doubts will probably remain. It has also been noted that there is a certain emptiness at the centre of the tale: it is very difficult to pin down what exactly is at the heart of darkness. Some commentators, such as Tzvetan Todorov, have seen this as a fascinating ambiguity, one that constantly generates meaning, others, notably F.R. Leavis, have seen it as a vagueness, an imaginative fuzziness that limits the impact of the work: I tend towards the latter view. The first story, Youth, is also related by Marlow: it is the story from his youth, a voyage from London to pick up coals in Tyneside and transport them to Bankok, but it is a catalogue of disasters, the ship taking many months before it even manages to leave the coast of England. It is a sort of comic version of Conrad’s previous story Typhoon, the captain of the ship doggedly continuing with his purpose despite all setbacks and adverse circumstances...but here the captain’s determination seems to be based on a pig headed lack of imagination. The final story, The End of the Tether, the longest in the volume, is a story of age, a once successful sea captain, now impoverished by unwise investments, has command of the worst of ships with the worst of partners...and also finds he is going blind. It is a fine story of a good man who has made some unwise decisions...and has a foolishly optimistic view of human character (not one of Conrad’s mistakes). It is a fine story, but it suffers, as do many of Conrad’s earlier works, by the inclusion of too many picturesque descriptions of the Far East. Although there are other Conrad stories to go to first, this is a fine volume.
November 20, 2017
I read and reviewed each of the three novellas in here separately, so this is really just for my own records. The 3 star rating is an average of the individual ratings: both "The End of the Tether" (which has excellent characterisation and is the pick of the bunch) and "Youth" (unintentionally funny but still entertaining) got 3 stars each. "Heart of Darkness", on the other hand, only got 2. I'm aware that it's supposed to be the pick of Conrad's work, and it was well-written - if less so than "Tether" - but everyone in it's so nasty and monotonously grim that I was glad to see the back of it.
December 29, 2020
Youth is a spectacular short story. The writing, particularly at the end is breathtaking. This was a huge, wistful treat for me. Heart of Darkness, obviously big, exceptional, read it many times before. The End of the Tether I couldn't finish. This is a smart grouping of stories and it's revealing to me that Tether's older man questioning his purpose in the world drove me nuts, while Youth's middle-aged man pondering the full spirit of his youth was so beautiful to me. I cannot get enough Conrad and expect to read and reread him forever.
September 19, 2025
Bravo! I recommend the book to seasoned readers. A sleeper hit for me, I was pleasantly surprised. It took me awhile to get used to the pace and language but I adjusted. In fact, I’ll probably read the book again, especially story number three.
I don’t remember how this book was suggested to me. I suspect Goodreads itself :-). It’s been on my Want to Read list for a VERY long time. Happy to check this off the list!
I don’t remember how this book was suggested to me. I suspect Goodreads itself :-). It’s been on my Want to Read list for a VERY long time. Happy to check this off the list!
November 30, 2025
Youth is a splendid story, full of misadventures , delusions... and blabbering of an old sailor. Marlow truly TALKS in the book, I loved listening to him !
Heart of Darkness lost me. The wilderness of Africa driving men crazy turned into nonsense at some point (?). Maybe that was the purpose, and I just don't know how to read it. Sorry Marlow.
I didn't read the last one. Marlow isn't in it and I was very disappointed by the ending of the previous one.
Heart of Darkness lost me. The wilderness of Africa driving men crazy turned into nonsense at some point (?). Maybe that was the purpose, and I just don't know how to read it. Sorry Marlow.
I didn't read the last one. Marlow isn't in it and I was very disappointed by the ending of the previous one.
Read
July 23, 2022The book was called 'Heart of Darkness & other stories'. It was just that.
December 15, 2023
A glimpse into a terrible night
January 12, 2025
Captain Whalley’s existential crisis
June 29, 2025
First published 1902.
September 2, 2025
Youth: 4*
Heart of Darkness: 3*
The End of the Tether: 5*
Heart of Darkness: 3*
The End of the Tether: 5*
June 9, 2025
The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a flutter of the sails, and was at rest...
The line's rhythm and structure are subtly poetic...
The line's rhythm and structure are subtly poetic...
August 14, 2021
The End of the Tether
The consequences of changing George Massy's steamer (Sofala) seven miles to the eastwards, from going north to Pangu Bay, after leaving Batu Beru, are foreshadowed at the beginning of the story:
"...the low swampy coast had retained its appearance of a mere smudge of darkness beyond a belt of glitter..."
Captain Henry Whalley is at the end of a career that has had major highlights (Whalley Island, Condor Reef).
Unfortunately, in old age, Captain Whalley has entered into a financial arrangement with a steamship owner (Massy) over confidently, in order to help his daughter (Ivy) financially: ...illness...let that go..."
Consequently, Captain Whalley has become a target for the mate's scheming (Sterne) and the owner's fraud (Massy).
Mr. Van Wyk (tobacco owner), Captain Whalley's friend at Batu Beru, proves helpless against such machinations.
Set among the 19th century British skilled seafaring profession there are themes of family responsibility, business and professional skills, and personal honor.
Outlined in detail are the excitements of youthful discoveries and accomplishments, set against the opposing humiliations of reduced abilities and physical impairment.
Captain Whalley's honorable demeanor is set against the underhand motivations of Sterne's desire for promotion and Massy plans to commit insurance fraud.
Chronology and geographical features take secondary roles to past biographical events, which encompass the thoughts and feelings relevant to current actions of the story, up to and including one's sense of obligation for oneself and others.
This is similar to other Modernist texts including in Virginia Woolf, William Faulkner and Marcel Proust where there are long asides.
Geographical, cultural and colonial disruptions hover in the background of the events occurring on the Sofala. We learn that one local youth is in "awe" of white men:
..."the arbitrary and obstinate men who pursue inflexibly their incomprehensible purposes."
The steamer's eastward trajectory leads to the crux of the story:
...the "middle-aged, pock-marked, Sumatra Malay, ...perceived with amazement that in that short time, in this smooth water, with no wind at all, the ship had gone swinging far out of her course."
This takes up a thread from the first few lines of the story when the Sofala is being "...swung through a quarter of a circle..."
Just after the steamer's unexpected change of course is noticed by the Serang he informs Captain Whalley and instructs the helmsman accordingly.
Captain Whalley had been unable to pick up on the underhand issue involved in the situation: "...take better care..."
The narrative then passes to the steamer's movement in the water going on as usual, past the swampy coast, until the unexpected contact with the reefs to the east of Pangu Bay causes an accident: "in the great calm of the sea."
A great seafaring story about reduced capability to pilot a steamer.
The consequences of changing George Massy's steamer (Sofala) seven miles to the eastwards, from going north to Pangu Bay, after leaving Batu Beru, are foreshadowed at the beginning of the story:
"...the low swampy coast had retained its appearance of a mere smudge of darkness beyond a belt of glitter..."
Captain Henry Whalley is at the end of a career that has had major highlights (Whalley Island, Condor Reef).
Unfortunately, in old age, Captain Whalley has entered into a financial arrangement with a steamship owner (Massy) over confidently, in order to help his daughter (Ivy) financially: ...illness...let that go..."
Consequently, Captain Whalley has become a target for the mate's scheming (Sterne) and the owner's fraud (Massy).
Mr. Van Wyk (tobacco owner), Captain Whalley's friend at Batu Beru, proves helpless against such machinations.
Set among the 19th century British skilled seafaring profession there are themes of family responsibility, business and professional skills, and personal honor.
Outlined in detail are the excitements of youthful discoveries and accomplishments, set against the opposing humiliations of reduced abilities and physical impairment.
Captain Whalley's honorable demeanor is set against the underhand motivations of Sterne's desire for promotion and Massy plans to commit insurance fraud.
Chronology and geographical features take secondary roles to past biographical events, which encompass the thoughts and feelings relevant to current actions of the story, up to and including one's sense of obligation for oneself and others.
This is similar to other Modernist texts including in Virginia Woolf, William Faulkner and Marcel Proust where there are long asides.
Geographical, cultural and colonial disruptions hover in the background of the events occurring on the Sofala. We learn that one local youth is in "awe" of white men:
..."the arbitrary and obstinate men who pursue inflexibly their incomprehensible purposes."
The steamer's eastward trajectory leads to the crux of the story:
...the "middle-aged, pock-marked, Sumatra Malay, ...perceived with amazement that in that short time, in this smooth water, with no wind at all, the ship had gone swinging far out of her course."
This takes up a thread from the first few lines of the story when the Sofala is being "...swung through a quarter of a circle..."
Just after the steamer's unexpected change of course is noticed by the Serang he informs Captain Whalley and instructs the helmsman accordingly.
Captain Whalley had been unable to pick up on the underhand issue involved in the situation: "...take better care..."
The narrative then passes to the steamer's movement in the water going on as usual, past the swampy coast, until the unexpected contact with the reefs to the east of Pangu Bay causes an accident: "in the great calm of the sea."
A great seafaring story about reduced capability to pilot a steamer.
September 14, 2020
Drei Geschichten in diesem Buch: die erste, Jugend, handelt von einem zwanzigjährigen Seemann, von seiner ersten Fahrt als Offizier, aber auf einem alten Schiff, auf dem von Anfang an alles schief geht. Auf der ersten Fahrt verrutscht der Ballast, dann, mit Kohle beladen, muss das Schiff, inzwischen mit Kohle für Bangkok beladen, dreimal wegen Lecks nach England zurückkehren. Dann, endlich im Indischen Ozean, entzündet sich die Kohle, das Schiff geht brennend unter, die Mannschaft kommt, fast verhungert und verdurstet, in drei kleinen Rettungsbooten in Fernost an. Und die ganze Zeit ist die junge Hauptperson fest davon überzeugt, dass er alle Schwierigkeiten überwinden kann. Er schafft es sogar, wie er es sich vorgenommen hat, vor den beiden anderen, eigentlichen schnelleren Rettungsbooten, im rettenden Hafen anzukommen. Jugend halt!
In der zweiten Geschichte ist Marlow, der junge Seemann der ersten Geschichte, auf einem rostigen kleinen Flussdampfer auf dem Kongo unterwegs, im Auftrag der belgischen Kolonialgesellschaft. Und erlebt alle Abgründe des europäischen Kolonialismus: „Das Grauen, das Grauen!“
Und in das „Ende vom Lied“ versinkt ein Kapitän vor der malaiischen Küste mit seinem Dampfer, den sein Eigner, um die Versicherungsprämie zu kassieren, auf ein Riff laufen lässt, nachdem er den Kompass mit rostigem Eisen manipuliert hat. Der Kapitän, berühmt und erfolgreich, hat auf diesem alten Küstendampfer - weit unter seinem Niveau - angeheuert, weil er durch den Bankrott seiner Bank bis auf 500 Dollar alles verloren hat. Er hat angeheuert, um seiner Tochter in Australien, die er seit Jahrzehnten nicht mehr gesehen und die er über alles liebt, hat wenigstens diese 500 Dollar vererben zu können. Er entdeckt nach der Havarie die Kompassmanipulation, aber da seine fast vollständige Erblindung, die er bis dahin vor allen verbergen konnte, für die Versicherung natürlich ein Grund wäre, nichts zu zahlen, auch seine 500 Dollar nicht, die er in den Dampfer als kleinen Anteil investiert hat, sagt er nichts und geht mit dem Schiff unter.
Eine kluge Auswahl von drei Erzählungen, die zusammen Jugend, Mitte des Lebens und Alter umfassen. Mit vielen Details zur Seefahrt, zum britischen Empire, zu Weißen und Nicht-Weißen, Asiaten, Afrikanern. Ein ganzes Leben. Eine ganze Welt!
In der zweiten Geschichte ist Marlow, der junge Seemann der ersten Geschichte, auf einem rostigen kleinen Flussdampfer auf dem Kongo unterwegs, im Auftrag der belgischen Kolonialgesellschaft. Und erlebt alle Abgründe des europäischen Kolonialismus: „Das Grauen, das Grauen!“
Und in das „Ende vom Lied“ versinkt ein Kapitän vor der malaiischen Küste mit seinem Dampfer, den sein Eigner, um die Versicherungsprämie zu kassieren, auf ein Riff laufen lässt, nachdem er den Kompass mit rostigem Eisen manipuliert hat. Der Kapitän, berühmt und erfolgreich, hat auf diesem alten Küstendampfer - weit unter seinem Niveau - angeheuert, weil er durch den Bankrott seiner Bank bis auf 500 Dollar alles verloren hat. Er hat angeheuert, um seiner Tochter in Australien, die er seit Jahrzehnten nicht mehr gesehen und die er über alles liebt, hat wenigstens diese 500 Dollar vererben zu können. Er entdeckt nach der Havarie die Kompassmanipulation, aber da seine fast vollständige Erblindung, die er bis dahin vor allen verbergen konnte, für die Versicherung natürlich ein Grund wäre, nichts zu zahlen, auch seine 500 Dollar nicht, die er in den Dampfer als kleinen Anteil investiert hat, sagt er nichts und geht mit dem Schiff unter.
Eine kluge Auswahl von drei Erzählungen, die zusammen Jugend, Mitte des Lebens und Alter umfassen. Mit vielen Details zur Seefahrt, zum britischen Empire, zu Weißen und Nicht-Weißen, Asiaten, Afrikanern. Ein ganzes Leben. Eine ganze Welt!
September 10, 2011
As a combination, these are three stories about life at sea. Seperately, each one has its own tone and underlying agenda.
Because I read these stories over a series of months, I hardly recall "Youth" except that it, obviously, had a very youthful tone of anticipation and excitement. Also a very short read.
"Heart of Darkness" (my real reason for picking this book up in the first place) is more dark and complex in its narration as well as its deeper meaning. As the main charachter, Marlow, sails deep into the African jungle to bring home an ivory trading post manager who has survived in the jungle a little too long, as is evident upon their arrival at his station.
This story has been interpreted in many ways in relation to the meaning of the journey into the deep/dark jungle or the "darkness within" oneself.
It does raise questions as to what the human spirit can endure.
I just finished "The End of the Tether" so I have not had a lot of time to reflect upon it, but I think I may like this one the best. Though the main charachter is Captain Whalley, you get a glimpse of some of the supporting charachters from interesting perspectives as well (within their minds and how they view each other as well as events that occur).
Captain Whalley is a retired ship captain who has lost almost everything in the stock market crash. He is forced to pick up one last contract in his old age to help his struggling daughter. However, his life starts to crumble quickly when he nears the end of his contract...
Though this story, like the others has a somewhat sorrowful tone, to me it captures the mystery of sea-faring life the best.
Because I read these stories over a series of months, I hardly recall "Youth" except that it, obviously, had a very youthful tone of anticipation and excitement. Also a very short read.
"Heart of Darkness" (my real reason for picking this book up in the first place) is more dark and complex in its narration as well as its deeper meaning. As the main charachter, Marlow, sails deep into the African jungle to bring home an ivory trading post manager who has survived in the jungle a little too long, as is evident upon their arrival at his station.
This story has been interpreted in many ways in relation to the meaning of the journey into the deep/dark jungle or the "darkness within" oneself.
It does raise questions as to what the human spirit can endure.
I just finished "The End of the Tether" so I have not had a lot of time to reflect upon it, but I think I may like this one the best. Though the main charachter is Captain Whalley, you get a glimpse of some of the supporting charachters from interesting perspectives as well (within their minds and how they view each other as well as events that occur).
Captain Whalley is a retired ship captain who has lost almost everything in the stock market crash. He is forced to pick up one last contract in his old age to help his struggling daughter. However, his life starts to crumble quickly when he nears the end of his contract...
Though this story, like the others has a somewhat sorrowful tone, to me it captures the mystery of sea-faring life the best.
July 24, 2007
I hate to admit it, but this book defeated me. If there's one thing I dislike in this world it's starting a book and not finishing it. That said, I could not slog through the end of this book. I enjoyed some of the dark and morbid descriptions, but on the whole I did not really enjoy the story. First of all, this narrative style always annoys me. I don't understand why 19th and early 20th century authors felt the need to tell a story by having the character tell a story. I suppose it's because this is Marlowe's musings on what happened so long ago, filtered through the experience of years, but I find the story difficult to understand. Why not just say plainly what happened, instead of alluding to an incident, continuing the narrative, and then five paragraphs later saying plainly what went on.
Also, I did not understand the fascination with Kurtz. Once again, Conrad did not say very plainly what made him so mesmerising. I enjoyed Apocalypse Now, but I haven't seen it in a while. I feel that the movie has the same sort of veil between the audience and the characters that I felt with this book. However in the movie, although events are difficult to understand, you still feel sympathy for Marlowe, and witness some of the terrible attraction he feels.
I feel like a failure for not finishing....
Also, I did not understand the fascination with Kurtz. Once again, Conrad did not say very plainly what made him so mesmerising. I enjoyed Apocalypse Now, but I haven't seen it in a while. I feel that the movie has the same sort of veil between the audience and the characters that I felt with this book. However in the movie, although events are difficult to understand, you still feel sympathy for Marlowe, and witness some of the terrible attraction he feels.
I feel like a failure for not finishing....
September 15, 2009
Conrad is one of the most influential writers of the modern era. His narrative and character development set a precedence for nearly everything written in the 20th and 21st century. Along with Steinbeck, I'm not sure I can name another author I enjoy reading more.
I remember HoD being of one those summer reading books that was tortuous in high school. Reading it twelve years later, I'm baffled at how I did not appreciate it more the first time...I'm sure it's due to maturity and exposure to other literature, or maybe it was just poor teaching.
Either way, I look forward to falling back on this collection of short stories years into the future.
I remember HoD being of one those summer reading books that was tortuous in high school. Reading it twelve years later, I'm baffled at how I did not appreciate it more the first time...I'm sure it's due to maturity and exposure to other literature, or maybe it was just poor teaching.
Either way, I look forward to falling back on this collection of short stories years into the future.
October 2, 2012
From the Author's Note, the three stories (Youth, Heart of Darkness, The End of the Tether) were chosen to be published together. I am not a sufficiently literary person to analyse this choice/these choices in depth, but they do comprehend the span of a life, the first two with the fiction of Marlowe as narrator, of whom Conrad says,"Of all my people he's the one that has never been a vexation to my spirit. A most discreet, understanding man...".
The effect of the three together is so powerful, that I'd recommend even finding the stories separately and reading them in this order.
The effect of the three together is so powerful, that I'd recommend even finding the stories separately and reading them in this order.
February 7, 2008
Two-for-one offers are usually crap. You feel like you are getting more, but the add-ons are rubbish, anyway. Not so with this. I brought it for the highly recommended 'Heart of Darkness'(after seeing Apocalypse Now, nach) and ended up also getting absorbed in the short story 'Youth'in a big way. Oozing with sentiment.
July 7, 2008
"Heart of Darkness" is important, but "Youth" is the real treasure here. One of the greatest short stories in the English language, it's unfortunately too long for certain high school British Literature textbooks. It's also one of the better examples of Conrad's humor ("I thought people who had been blown up deserved more attention."). Great collection.
July 29, 2012
This wonderful little book combines some of Conrad's best short novels into one book that becomes his exploration of man in all of his ages. Heart of Darkness remains his definitive work, but End of the Tether will surprise you with its beautiful conjunction of symbols and exploration of the father/daughter relationship.
March 1, 2013
It's a very nice and attractive books: Its difficult and HORROR prose (sometimes close to poem) specially in heart of darkness, is exactly the thing that many reader are searching for, and can't find in new short minimal stories.
Try the three stories and find a whole new world that you wish enter into that, even it scares you to death.
Try the three stories and find a whole new world that you wish enter into that, even it scares you to death.
September 13, 2016
The first story, Youth, is very exciting and fun to read. Heart of Darkness is a great modernist classic, the first few pages of which rank among the greatest thing ever written, and well worth my third reading of it. The End of the Tether has a different feel from the rest of Conrad, and is a bit long-winded, but worth the effort.
January 4, 2020
Although I bought this in order to read Heart of Darkness, I think my favourite of the three stories is 'Youth' a darkly humorous tale of a doomed attempt to ship coals to Bangkok. Repulsive ideas about race aside, all three stories are entertaining and offer a fascinating glimpse into life in the Empire at the turn of the last century
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