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Joseph ConradJoseph Conrad

I have been called a writer of the sea, of the tropics, a descriptive writer - and also a realist. But as a matter of fact all my concern has been with the 'ideal' value of things, events and people. That and nothing else - Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad, born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski; (3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Polish-British writer regarded as one of the greatest novelists to write in the English language. He joined the British merchant marine in 1878, and was granted British nationality in 1886. Though he did not speak English fluently until he was in his twenties, he was a master prose stylist who brought a non-English sensibility into English literature. He wrote stories and novels, many with a nautical setting, that depict trials of the human spirit in the midst of an impassive, inscrutable universe.

Conrad is considered an early modernist, though his works still contain elements of 19th-century realism. His narrative style and anti-heroic characters have influenced many authors, including T. S. Eliot, William Faulkner, Graham Greene, and Salman Rushdie. Many films have been adapted from, or inspired by, Conrad's works.

Writing in the heyday of the British Empire, Conrad drew on, among other things, his native Poland's national experiences, and his personal 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 – while profoundly exploring human psychology.

Joseph Conrad was born on 3 December 1857 in Berdychiv, in a part of Ukraine that had belonged to the Kingdom of Poland before 1793 and was at the time of his birth under Russian rule. He was the only child of Apollo Korzeniowski and his wife Ewa Bobrowska. In 1874 Conrad left Poland to start a merchant-marine career. After nearly four years in France and on French ships, he joined the British merchant marine and for the next fifteen years served under the Red Ensign. He worked on a variety of ships as crew member (steward, apprentice, able-bodied seaman) and then as third, second and first mate, until eventually achieving captain's rank. Of his 19-year merchant-marine career, only about half was spent actually at sea.

In 1894, aged 36, Conrad reluctantly gave up the sea, partly because of poor health, partly due to unavailability of ships, and partly because he had become so fascinated with writing that he had decided on a literary career. His first novel, Almayer's Folly, set on the east coast of Borneo, was published in 1895. Its appearance marked his first use of the pen name "Joseph Conrad"; "Konrad" was, of course, the third of his Polish given names, but his use of it – in the anglicised version, "Conrad" – may also have been an homage to the Polish Romantic poet Adam Mickiewicz's patriotic narrative poem, Konrad Wallenrod.

Most of Conrad's stories and novels, and many of their characters, were drawn from his seafaring career and persons whom he had met or heard about. For his fictional characters he often borrowed the authentic names of actual persons. The historic trader William Charles Olmeijer, whom Conrad encountered on four short visits to Berau in Borneo, appears as "Almayer" (possibly a simple misspelling) in Conrad's first novel, Almayer's Folly. Other authentic names include those of Captain McWhirr (in Typhoon), Captain Beard and Mr. Mahon (Youth), Captain Lingard (Almayer's Folly, The Rescue, and elsewhere), and Captain Ellis (The Shadow Line). Conrad also preserves, in The Nigger of the 'Narcissus', the authentic name of the Narcissus, a ship in which he sailed in 1884.

from Wikipedia

Works by Joseph Conrad

Novels and novellas
Almayer's Folly, An Outcast of the Islands, The Nigger of the 'Narcissus', Heart of Darkness, The End of the Tether, Lord Jim, The Inheritors, Typhoon, Romance, Nostromo, The Secret Agent, Under Western Eyes, Freya of the Seven Isles, Chance Victory, The Shadow Line, The Arrow of Gold, The Rescue, The Nature of a Crime, The Rover Suspense

Short stories
"The Idiots", "An Outpost of Progress", "The Lagoon", "Youth", "Amy Foster", "The Secret Sharer"

Other works
The Inheritors (1901), Romance (1903), A Personal Record, Last Essays

Adaptations
Victory (1919), Lord Jim (1925), The Silver Treasure, Dangerous Paradise, Sabotage (1936), Victory (1940), Outcast of the Islands (1951), Lord Jim (1965), The Duellists, Apocalypse Now, Heart of Darkness, Victory (1996), The Secret Agent (1996), Nostromo (1997 TV), Gabrielle (2005), Almayer's Folly, Hanyut Spec Ops: The Line, The Secret Agent

White Seahorse Classics Titles by Joseph Conrad

 

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