Conrad, Joseph Books

Heart of Darkness

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 17 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Most Overated Book of all Time 2 out of 5 stars.
5 of 6 people found this review helpful.

I know that scholars are going to disagree with me but Conrad's narrative alternates between exasperatingly long stories of inconsequential matters and skimming over consequential matters. For instance, we are given page after page of Marlowe waiting for his rivets and then, all of a sudden, he is underway with no explanation of how the repairs got done or when the rivets finally arrived. Kurtz himself is just a tiny part of the narrative. We really dont learn about the inner Kurtz. More time is spent with his grieving fiance than is spent with him. " The horror, the horror" , has for some reason become a famous line in literature , much like, " We'll always have Paris, has become in the cinema.

I read this book in college, years ago and thought it was boring at that time. I ordered it for my Kindle, thinking the mature me would appreciate the book but I was still disappointed.

Some of the description is excellent and it is a good look at colonial Africa at the time, so the book was not a total loss but a disappointment nevertheless.

It reads very much like a novel translated from another language into English. Of course, we know that Conrad, although born in Poland, was perfect in English but the writing somehow seems awkward.

My Kindle has been perfect for re reading the classics but this one fell quite short.

Editorial Review:

Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness was first published in 1899 in serial form in London’s Blackwood’s Magazine.

Loosely based on Conrad’s firsthand experience of rescuing a company agent from a remote station in the heart of the Congo, the novel is considered a literary bridge between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. With its modern literary approach to questions such as the ambiguous nature of good and evil, the novel foreshadows many of the themes and techniques that define modern literature.

This Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Edition includes a glossary and reader’s notes to help the modern reader contend with Conrad’s complex approach to the human condition.

Heart of Darkness and The Congo Diary (Penguin Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

'The Emperor's New Clothes', no less... 1 out of 5 stars.
4 of 13 people found this review helpful.

Arriving at this page, inspired, enthused by Coppola's cinematic masterpiece 'Apocalypse Now'? Or maybe from the documentary 'Hearts of Darkness - A Filmmaker's Apocalypse'? Eager to learn more? maybe drink at the fountain from which perhaps the greatest piece of cinema, was born? Think again. What we have here is purely and simply a VERY mediocre novella, a work that was written not by a writer, but by a Mariner with a typewriter - a hobbyist. On no account could or should this be taken as a seminal work of either fact or fiction, and I wish those who are forever trying to have this work classified as such a literary milestone would find a real cause to champion. I mean why is this one of the supposed greats? Is it original? No! Well written? No! Does it have well-drawn characters? No! an intriguing plot, perhaps? No. Does it use language in a new or creative way? No. Does it re-define the novella? No! Does it have potential to influence, either in style or content, the works of other writers? No! - then what? What is it that reverberates so loudly? If not the work then the noise of the crowd surrounding the pedestal - eager for a glimpse of the masterpiece that (they have been told) is so revered, so special.
Between the pseudo-intellectual and the literary professor's attempts to 'interpret' this work (for interpret read: paint it their colour) there is nothing hidden, nor magical here, no genius lies between the poor structure and the even worse punctuation. A simple tale, nothing more. Had one not know Conrad actually ventured to the African Continent, one could have easily mistaken his poorly drawn figures, his stereotypical characters as being the stuff of a boyhood imagination - too many comics and children's novels read under the blanket with a torch...
The only extra-ordinary factor here is the fact that Coppola, in his undisputed genius, took this simple, fragmented tale of no real literary worth and from its inspiration produced a moment in cinematic history which will never again be glimpsed, a peak never again scaled. That is the only thing one need be in awe of here.

Editorial Review:

Penguin inaugurates a series of revised editions of Conrad’s finest works, with new introductions

Exploring the workings of consciousness as well as the grim realities of imperialism, Heart of Darkness tells of Marlow, a seaman and wanderer, who journeys into the heart of the African continent to discover how the enigmatic Kurtz has gained power over the local people.

Heart of Darkness and The Secret Sharer (Signet Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 385 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

humidity drips off the end of each line like a light mist in a heavy fog 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Probably the dampest book I've ever read--humidity drips off the end of each line like a light mist in a heavy fog. More is left unsaid than is written on the page, and this is truly a classic even though there is too much left unsaid for me to rate it at the very top.

Favorite line: As Marlow cautiously pilots the steamboat up the river toward the inland station and its mysterious keeper Kurtz, his manager says "I authorize you to take all the risks." Marlow curtly snaps back "I refuse to take any."

Very, Very Short and Unremarkable 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Like most people, I was familiar with Heart of Darkness, both as an acclaimed work of literature and as the inspiration for the remarkable movie Apocolypse Now. For some reason, I recently decided to make an attempt at reading it, despite my concern that it was written at a level beyond my capacity to understand.

Upon receipt of the volume from Amazon, I was initially under the impression that I had mistakenly ordered the Cliff's Notes version of the work. I had no idea that the book was essentially a short story, easily readable in 2-3 hours.

Even more surprising, was the ease with which I was able to follow and understand the story, though admittedly written in a slightly dense prose. Perhaps this was due to having seen Apocolypse Now and being familiar with the broad outline of the story and having read other works of history on the Belgian Congo.

In any event, it was a decent story, filled with some beautifully descriptive language and imagery. I must say, however, that I was not bowled over. Steamship Captain pilots a ragged boat up the Congo, accompanied by colonial agents and support staff (cannibals and other natives) in an attempt to relieve a long stranded station agent (Kurtz) who has "gone native" and become the insane source of worship for the local natives. If you've seen Apocolypse Now, you know the story, just replace the Mekong with the Congo.

I go back to my first paragraph in which I related a concern over my ability to understand what is considered a classic work of literature. I fully understood it, but was perhaps not qualified to fully appreciate it.

Editorial Review:

Two of Conrad’s BEST-KNOWN works—in a single volume

In this pair of literary voyages into the inner self, Joseph Conrad has written two of the most chilling, disturbing, and noteworthy pieces of fiction of the twentieth century.

The Secret Agent: Centennial Editon (Signet Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 72 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

100 Years of Relevance 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 3 people found this review helpful.

After 100 years, Conrad's distinctive novel of espionage and counter-espionage is still the apex of the genre, the indispensable masterpiece. It's bleak, mordant, suspenseful, and funny, and it's wildly under-appreciated judging by the other reviews here on amazon.

This is so perfect a spy novel that frankly no other spy novel needed ever to be written. Conrad has said it all. It's tightly plotted, completely plausible except perhaps for a few too-convenient chance meetings on the street, and profoundly insightful into the "politics" of terror. And it's freshly pertinent, even to the point of including an inadvertent suicide bomber.

There are no "good guys," it's true, and nobody on any side of things with indomitable physical or mental abilities. Every single personage is picturesquely grotesque. Every character considers himself cleverly invulnerable yet reveals himself to be irremediably foolish. The descriptions of these moral clowns and the deplorable world of mucky squalor and gilded corruption in which they move are the best writing, sentence by sentence, that Conrad ever did -- worthy of Dickens or Dostoyevsky. There's a sardonic, scornful humor in every scene, however grizzly. This is the darkest picture of human nature I've ever read. Even love and loyalty are degenerative psychoses. One expects a certain fatalistic pessimism from Conrad, sprawling across an ungainly plot, with complicated narrative overlays and ambiguous judgments. The Secret Agent is utterly different; it's as terse and unified as its subtitle claims; it's "a Simple Tale."

"Mr. Verloc, going out in the morning, left his shop nominally in charge of his brother-in-law. It could be done, because there was very little business at any time, and practically none at all before the evening. Mr. Verloc cared but little about his ostensible business. And, moreover, his wife was in charge of his brother-in-law."

That's the first paragraph; if you don't already feel in the presence of a master of subtle indirection just from that much, perhaps you'll be as unresponsive to this great novel as the hapless fools would be who populate its pages.

Hitchcock made a film of it in the 1930s. I've never seen the film, but I can imagine that Hitchcock would have read the novel with sardonic glee and captured its humor. It's Hitchcock in prosody.

Yo! Peeps, if I tell it's totally NOIR, will you give it a ride?

Editorial Review:

Inspired by an actual attempt in 1894 to blow up London's Greenwich Observatory, here is a chillingly prophetic examination of contemporary terrorism-and the literary precursor to today's espionage thriller.

Lord Jim: A Tale (Penguin Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 74 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

When Lord Jim first appeared in 1900, many took Joseph Conrad to task for couching an entire novel in the form of an extended conversation--a ripping good yarn, if you like. (One critic in The Academy complained that the narrator "was telling that after-dinner story to his companions for eleven solid hours.") Conrad defended his method, insisting that people really do talk for that long, and listen as well. In fact his chatty masterwork requires no defense--it offers up not only linguistic pleasures but a timeless exploration of morality.

The eponymous Jim is a young, good-looking, genial, and naive water-clerk on the Patna, a cargo ship plying Asian waters. He is, we are told, "the kind of fellow you would, on the strength of his looks, leave in charge of the deck." He also harbors romantic fantasies of adventure and heroism--which are promptly scuttled one night when the ship collides with an obstacle and begins to sink. Acting on impulse, Jim jumps overboard and lands in a lifeboat, which happens to be bearing the unscrupulous captain and his cohorts away from the disaster. The Patna, however, manages to stay afloat. The foundering vessel is towed into port--and since the officers have strategically vanished, Jim is left to stand trial for abandoning the ship and its 800 passengers.

Stripped of his seaman's license, convinced of his own cowardice, Jim sets out on a tragic and transcendent search for redemption. This may sound like the bleakest of narratives. But Lord Jim is also touching, elevating, and often funny. Here, for example, the narrator describes the ship's captain (proving that clothes do indeed make the man):

He made me think of a trained baby elephant walking on hind-legs. He was extravagantly gorgeous too--got up in a soiled sleeping suit, bright green and deep orange vertical stripes, with a pair of ragged straw slippers on his bare feet, and somebody's cast-off pith hat, very dirty and two sizes too small for him, tied up with a manilla rope-yarn on the top of his big head. You understand a man like that hasn't a ghost of a chance when it comes to borrowing clothes.

This is formidable prose by any standard. But when you consider that Conrad was working in his third language, the sublime after-dinner story that is Lord Jim seems even more astonishing an accomplishment. --Teri Kieffer

The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale (Penguin Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Feminism in a Tasty Dystopia Shell 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Conrad's afterword to this book, written twelve years after the book's original publication, shows pretty clearly that he had to be and was defensive about its value. I think the strength in this book is not really in the actual machinations of the anarchists, or their pathetic struggle to find strength in their own obvious weakness(this is often too hateful on Conrad's part for my taste--he clearly loathes them), but in Winnie's story, subdued by most of the events of the novel, and her mostly ignored "Maternal Passion" as Conrad puts it. This is the novel's heart, and the rest of the characters make up a sad, self-important circus around what is essentially her modern feminist heroism.

Editorial Review:

Penguin inaugurates a series of revised editions of Conrad’s finest works, with new introductions

In a corrupt London underworld of criminals, terrorists, and fanatics, Mr. Verloc is assigned to plant a bomb. The tragic repercussions for his family show how Conrad’s ironic voice is concerned not with politics but with the terrible fates of ordinary people.

Heart of Darkness & Selections from The Congo Diary

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

With an Introduction by Caryl Phillips
Commentary by H.L. Mencken, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, Bertrand Russell, Lionel Trilling, Chiua Achebe, and Philip Gourevitch

"Heart of Darkness," which appeared at the very beginning of our century, was a Cassandra cry announcing the end of Victorian Europe, on the verge of transforming itself into the Europe of violence," wrote the critic Czeslaw Milosz.

Originally published in 1902, Heart of Darkness remains one of this century's most enduring--and harrowing--works of fiction. Written several years after Conrad's grueling sojourn in the Belgian Congo, the novel tells the story of Marlow, a seaman who undertakes his own journey into the African jungle to find the tormented white trader Kurtz. Rich in irony and spellbinding prose, Heart of Darkness is a complex meditation on colonialism, evil, and the thin line between civilization and barbarity. This edition contains selections from Conrad's Congo Diary of 1890--the first notes, in effect, for the novel which was composed at the end of that decade.
Virginia Woolf wrote of Conrad, "His books are full of moments of vision. They light up a whole character in a flash. . . . He could not write badly, one feels, to save his life."

The Shadow-Line: A Confession (Vintage Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Editorial Review:

The masterpiece of Joseph Conrad’s later years, the autobiographical short novel The Shadow-Line depicts a young man at a crossroads in his life, facing a desperate crisis that marks the “shadow-line” between youth and maturity.

This brief but intense story is a dramatically fictionalized account of Conrad’s first command as a young sea captain trapped aboard a becalmed, fever-wracked, and seemingly haunted ship. With no wind in sight and his crew disabled by malaria, the narrator discovers that the medicine necessary to save the sick men is missing and its absence has been deliberately concealed. Meanwhile, his increasingly frightened first mate is convinced that the malignant ghost of the previous captain has cursed them. Suspenseful, atmospheric, and deceptively simple, Conrad’s tale of the sea reflects the complex themes of his most famous novels, Lord Jim and Heart of Darkness.

Heart of Darkness and the Secret Sharer (Enriched Classics (Pocket))

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

ENDURING LITERATURE ILLUMINATED BY PRACTICAL SCHOLARSHIP

Two of Joseph Conrad's most compelling and haunting works, in which the deepest perceptions and desires of the human heart and mind are explored.

EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES:

• A concise introduction that gives readers important background information

• A chronology of the author's life and work

• A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context

• An outline of key themes and plot points to help readers form their own interpretations

• Detailed explanatory notes

• Critical analysis, including contemporary and modern perspectives on the work

• Discussion questions to promote lively classroom and book group interaction

• A list of recommended related books and films to broaden the reader's experience

Enriched Classics offer readers affordable editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and insightful commentary. The scholarship provided in Enriched Classics enables readers to appreciate, understand, and enjoy the world's finest books to their full potential.

SERIES EDITED BY CYNTHIA BRANTLEY JOHNSON

The Secret Agent (Oxford World's Classics)

Joseph Conrad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Great novel by Conrad 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 6 people found this review helpful.

Anarchism was a big thing in the late 19th century and early 20th century (you can compare it with the situation of Islamic terrorism today). Several kings, presidents and other politicians were killed by anarchists during that epoch (US president McKinley and Austrian Empress Sissi was among them). Conrad's book is one of the best novels about the anarchist world, dealing with an anarchist cell working in London during that time. The protagonist, Verloc, is the head of the cell and also an informer for the police and an agent for an unnamed foreign country (thus, he is a triple agent) and his attempt to blow up the Greenwich observatory ends tragically for an unwitting member of his family. Note: Conrad amusingly says in the prologue that he never personally met an anarchist himself, but the main story is based on real events he probably picked up from the press of the time.

Editorial Review:

Mr Verloc, the secret agent, keeps a shop in London's Soho where he lives with his wife Winnie, her infirm mother, and her idiot brother, Stevie. When Verloc is reluctantly involved in an anarchist plot to blow up the Greenwich Observatory things go disastrously wrong, and what appears to be 'a simple tale' proves to involve politicians, policemen, foreign diplomats and London's fashionable society in the darkest and most surprising interrelations. Based on the text which Conrad's first English readers enjoyed, this new edition includes a full and up-to-date bibliography, a comprehensive chronology and a critical introduction which describes Conrad's great London novel as the realization of a 'monstrous town,' a place of idiocy, madness, criminality, and butchery. It also discusses contemporary anarchist activity in the UK, imperialism, and Conrad's narrative techniques.