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The Rescue

(Lingard Trilogy #3)

Joseph Conrad

3.65 · Rating details · 315 ratings · 26 reviews

Civil war rages between the native tribes of the Malay straits. Captain Tim Wingard sides with the Rajah Hassim. But as is the case with so much in the Far East, nothing is quite straightforward and events unfold by indirection.

An English yacht blunders into this confusion and runs aground. When Wingard goes aboard to offer assistance, the crew gives him insolence, not gra

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Published January 1st 1996 by Penguin Classics (first published 1920)

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Jan 07, 2016 Debbie Zapata rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: gutenberg

Review coming tomorrow. I have to think more about this one.

Jan 21 ~~ The Rescue is unusual because it is technically an early effort by Conrad, but he stopped working on it in 1898 and never went back to complete it until 1918, finally publishing in 1920. In his introduction he explains that he had put this novel aside to finish another project that had captured his imagination, and it simply became easier to then finish the next project and the next until 20 years had passed and he began to fe Review coming tomorrow. I have to think more about this one.

Jan 21 ~~ The Rescue is unusual because it is technically an early effort by Conrad, but he stopped working on it in 1898 and never went back to complete it until 1918, finally publishing in 1920. In his introduction he explains that he had put this novel aside to finish another project that had captured his imagination, and it simply became easier to then finish the next project and the next until 20 years had passed and he began to feel guilty for leaving this book dangling. He never says how much he edited the original text or at what point in the story he had stopped writing all those years ago. I am not enough of a Conrad scholar to be able to say 'this part is the younger man and this is the mature one'. But like all of his books, The Rescue is darkly intense, with much more going on beneath the surface than even the characters seem to understand. It not an easy book to spend a concentrated amount of time on. The tension, the uncertainty of what will happen next, the gloomy atmosphere, are all vivid and overwhelming. I could read in only short doses before needing to come up for clear air.

In the first section of the book we meet adventurer Tom Lingard aboard his brig Lightning. They are stuck with no wind on their way to...somewhere. The destination is not revealed just yet. We just know that the ship is not moving, the night is dark, and there may be pirates in the waters around them. But it is not a pirate who arrives beside them in a small boat. A yacht has grounded on a sandbank and the men in the boat have been sent out with urgent messages for help. But Lingard is dismayed to learn the exact location of the stranded yacht, for it turns out to be the very spot he is heading for himself, and he knows the unexpected presence of the yacht will complicate
his plans. The rest of the book deals with those plans and the way the people of the yacht (especially Mrs. Travers, the owner's wife) affect the destinies of Lingard, his crew, the friends he is on the way to meet and the plans they had made.

The events in the story take place over one week's time. A week of lurking intensity: The night effaced even words, and its mystery had captured everything and every sound—had left nothing free but the unexpected that seemed to hover about one, ready to stretch out its stealthy hand in a touch sudden, familiar, and appalling. There is a great deal of confusion on all sides; no one (not even Lingard) is quite sure what what will happen by the end of the week, and the ending surprises everyone.

I will want to read this again someday; I can never completely 'get' Conrad on a first reading. I was confused by some of the conversations between Lingard and Mrs. Travers. And I was annoyed at other times by Conrad's way here of stopping the action at a dramatic point at the end of one section, then beginning the next section with Lingard remembering what had happened. Conrad does this a few times, and I always had a 'hey, wait, what about...?' moment before I realized I would then be told about the conclusion of the scene. That broke up the flow of the story for me, but at least the next time I read the book I will be prepared.

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Jun 24, 2012 Feliks rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: brit-lit-classic

This novel was a revelation for me; who am well-familiar with most of Conrad's other titles. I'm just knocking off the last few I have left ('The Rover', 'An Outcast of the Islands') and discovering in Conrad a writing style I didn't believe he had any inclination or facility for.

'Rescue' is a slow, dense, read; but its immediately noticeable that Conrad here has not skimped or made things convenient for himself --as he can often be fairly accused of doing--by writing only the content which he i ...more

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Apr 10, 2014 Patrick rated it really liked it

Joseph Conrad is one of my favourite authors, so I was delighted to find a second-hand copy of this in the Penguin Classics paperback edition. I’ve read pretty much everything else he wrote but for some reason I had overlooked this one. While it isn’t especially rare, it is one of the more neglected novels in the author’s later works; it also has the interesting position of being a book that was originally started at the very beginning of his career, then set aside and only finished near the end Joseph Conrad is one of my favourite authors, so I was delighted to find a second-hand copy of this in the Penguin Classics paperback edition. I’ve read pretty much everything else he wrote but for some reason I had overlooked this one. While it isn’t especially rare, it is one of the more neglected novels in the author’s later works; it also has the interesting position of being a book that was originally started at the very beginning of his career, then set aside and only finished near the end of his life. You could even call it the last really big book he ever completed — though I do think that ‘The Rover’, which came later, was all the finer for its relative brevity. I don’t think it’s amongst his best work, or even his second-best, so I couldn't recommend it to new readers; but there’s a great deal here that will be of interest to those who are fans of this writer’s work.

The plot is one of those things that is simple to summarise but which is rendered complex by its execution. It follows the exploits of one Tom Lingard, a sort of roving sailor and 'adventurer' in what would now be called the Malay archipelago. Lingard comes upon a yacht which has run aground on a sandbank; the residents of the yacht are Mr and Mrs Travers, a sort of parody of a late-Edwardian gentleman with his intelligent and fiercely independent wife; D’Alcacer, a cool and observant diplomat; and Carter, who does all the actual sailing for the Travers couple. What these people don’t realise is that their arrival has come directly between Lingard’s work in restoring the kingdom of Hassim and Immada, the prince and princess of a tiny Malaysian kingdom who Lingard previously rescued from exile. What follows is a kind of delicate juggling operation between the immediate needs of the rescued white Europeans at sea with Lingard’s responsibilities to a tangled and ever-changing political situation on land.

What complicates things further is a situation rare in Conrad’s work: the presence of a love affair. It’s not that this is exactly done poorly, but it seems to me that the model here is Henry James above all else, to the extent that the author has all but abandoned his own style in pursuit of the grand Jamesian manner. And so there is rather a lot of stylised dialogue which is somehow mannered and teasing and tedious all at once; lots of talk and very little action. The whole form will probably seem unrecognisable to those readers who have only previously enjoyed ‘Heart of Darkness’ or ‘Lord Jim’, but I suspect this is best considered as an evolution of an authorial method which was already emerging in books like ‘Chance’ and (the highly underrated) ‘Victory’.

What this also has in common with those novels is Conrad’s interest in strong female figures. Mrs Travers is a great example of this, and feels very much to me like an attempt to invoke a heroine in the vein of James: smart and passionate while also being tightly constrained by propriety but also her own idealism. The key relationship is between her and Lingard, but there’s also D’Alcacer, who is supposedly also in love with her; if this were really a Henry James novel, D’Alcacer would probably be one of those cold-blooded protagonist-narrators, but by separating him from the actual narrative in ‘The Rescue’, Conrad is able to set up this Jamesian perspective as a slightly different thing to the structure of his novel as a whole.

The book also notable for its depiction of a foreign civilisation; unlikes those aforementioned early novels, there’s little sense here of the Malaysians as an ‘other’ who only serve to respect the unknowable aspects of their white masters. Instead, they are presented as developed and admirable characters in their own right, being active players in a well-developed political society — and the privileged whites who look down on them are also the most ridiculous figures in the book.

So far I’ve summarised this book as if it were a kind of love story, but there’s a great deal of darkness here too. The mysterious white-suited figure of Jorgenson looms about the margins of this story; an old white sailor with a somewhat mysterious past, he harbours a kind of hollowness reminiscent of all those men Marlow encountered in the deep colonial outposts of the Congo. Like the Professor in ‘The Secret Agent’, he is a nihilist, with a casual contempt for the everyday value of human life.

Jorgenson is a puzzle. On one hand I wonder if he was included simply to add shades of gloom to the corners, as if that was what his readers were expecting; but on the other, his appearances are so scene-stealing that I can’t help but feel that he might contain some secret inner desire of the author to be done with the world, a desire so dangerous it must be personified in the character of a madman. Indeed, there is a reoccurring sense throughout this book — manifest from various perspectives — of someone who is not only alienated by their society, but who is actively repelled by it, who even wants to destroy it.

Of course you couldn’t write that directly in a novel in 1920, I suppose. But It’s most haunting regardless. Look at the ridicule inherent in the masterful flashes of bitter irony in this little passage, for example, in which the author inhabits D'Alcacer as he considers the possibility of his imminent execution:

'He wondered also how far he had been sincere and how far affected by a very natural aversion from being murdered obscurely by ferocious Moors with all the circumstances of barbarity. It was a very naked death to come upon one suddenly. It was robbed of all helpful illusions, such as the free will of a suicide, the heroism of a warrior, or the exaltation of a martyr. "Hadn't I better make some sort of fight of it?" he debated with himself. He saw himself rushing at the naked spears without any enthusiasm. Or wouldn't it be better to go forth to meet his doom (somewhere outside the stockade on that horrible beach) with calm dignity. "Pah! I shall be probably speared through the back in the beastliest possible fashion," he thought with an inward shudder. It was certainly not a shudder of fear, for Mr. d'Alcacer attached no high value to life. It was a shudder of disgust because Mr. d'Alcacer was a civilized man and though he had no illusions about civilization he could not but admit the superiority of its methods. It offered to one a certain refinement of form, a comeliness of proceedings and definite safeguards against deadly surprises...' ...more

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Dec 21, 2014 Lydia rated it it was amazing

' "Am I a fat white man?" snapped the serang. "I was a man of the sea before you were born, O Sali! The order is to keep silence and mind the rudder, lest evil befall the ship." '

Enjoyed this read. Conrad knows how to describe a sea calm better than anyone else. ...more

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Feb 14, 2020 Paul Cornelius rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: literature-british-20th-century

Simply put, Conrad fails with this novel. It's not that it doesn't have its moments. And the cumulative impact of events on the ending brings off a tremendous effect, a blow that leaves an image of its protagonist, Lingard, forever changed--and damaged. As with many of Conrad's novels and stories, it illustrates the failure of people to connect. In this case, it is with the once heroic and respected Captain Lingard with a married woman, Mrs. Travers.

Alas, Lingard actually has few truly heroic d Simply put, Conrad fails with this novel. It's not that it doesn't have its moments. And the cumulative impact of events on the ending brings off a tremendous effect, a blow that leaves an image of its protagonist, Lingard, forever changed--and damaged. As with many of Conrad's novels and stories, it illustrates the failure of people to connect. In this case, it is with the once heroic and respected Captain Lingard with a married woman, Mrs. Travers.

Alas, Lingard actually has few truly heroic dimensions, making the possibility of a full tragedy almost impossible. And there is one other thing at work: if the reader has completed the other books in this series that deal with Lingard, Almayer's Folly and An Outcast of the Islands, he realizes just what is so infuriating about Lingard over the entire range of experiences. It's this: he is a horrible judge of human character. Such it seems it is with Mrs. Travers and virtually ever other figure in The Rescue, except perhaps for Mr. Carter. Although even with Carter, it seems that time will eventually tell. This "flaw," of course, was really given vent in An Outcast of the Islands, where Almayer lets loose a salvo of insults against Lingard for his trust in Willems and his loss of everything they've built together because of Willems conspiracy with a rival Arab trader.

But I guess Rescue lets us see how that flaw will dominate and consume Lingard later on. Here, it is made manifest in Lingard's all but adolescent mooning over Mrs. Travers. And the dialogue reflects that. In those passages where we explore the feelings, thoughts, and temptations of Mrs. Travers and Lingard, the prose plays out in a manner so slowly, repetitiously, and tediously that it seems as if you are listening to someone giving a lengthy dissertation on how to unwind a ball of yarn. You can admire Conrad's shifts in perspective and time. And you can appreciate his attempt to delve into the minutiae of Travers' and Lingard's psyche. But with regards to the latter, I simply think Conrad fails, here. Rather than a flawed giant, which seems the intent of the novel, Lingard comes off as too much of a sniveling, self absorbed teenager in love with his first girlfriend and ready to sacrifice everyone around him in order to get a date. ...more

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Oct 19, 2013 Bill Kupersmith rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: classics

Except for Heart of Darkness, which any instructor in Intro to Lit gets to know a lot better than one ever wanted to, I'd not read any Conrad in decades. Lucienne in Nicholas Freeling's Gun before Butter drew me to this under-appreciated novel - Conrad's hero Captain Lingard was her masculine ideal & I wanted to find out if he was worthy & indeed he is. Tho' the sleaze & the homme moyen sensual represent most of the male species, one can aspire to being a decent man or even better, a real man. A ...more

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Dec 01, 2016 Matthew rated it really liked it · review of another edition

For good and often for bad, Joseph Conrad’s late novels saw a resurgence in his romanticism. Conrad’s novels were always romantic, but the nature of that romanticism changed over time. In his early novels, the romance lay more in the description and the plotting than in the often sordid and seedy characters who dominated the stories.

By Conrad’s middle period, the romanticism was more submerged, as he examined political systems with a cynical and pessimistic eye. Pessimism is of course itself a s ...more

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May 15, 2018 Lukrezia Cosimo rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, indonesia, seafaring

The best of the Lingard trilogy (for me). With the exception of the end, which somehow lacks the power of much of the rest of the book, a tour de force. I love the descriptions of the landscape, the light, the sea ... Some good characters: Jorgensen, Lingard, Mr. Travers, ...

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May 06, 2017 Benjamin rated it liked it · review of another edition

I remember liking Conrad a lot in high school, and I still enjoy the intense dialogues that elaborate the themes of a thoroughly gripping adventure story. But everything is melodramatic and absolute--from the opening description of the sea down to the smallest twitch of a character's arm--and that can get a little tiring to read. ...more

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Apr 29, 2011 Michael Graeme rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

My introduction to Conrad after overdosing on Thomas Hardy. Compelling, pellucid and emotionally powerful.

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Aug 03, 2011 Kevin rated it it was ok · review of another edition

one of the most long-winded works i have ever read. some great passages, sure, but mostly this was "slower than whale shit", even for conrad. ...more

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Oct 29, 2012 Kevin Shannon rated it liked it · review of another edition

Aaah, the overwrought Victorians. This would make a good opera, much seething undisclosed passion in an exotic locale.

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Dec 18, 2016 Michael Canoeist rated it really liked it

Shelves: adventures, memorable-women, romance

When you close the covers of this book, you have been somewhere.

And not merely to its setting by Joseph Conrad in the Malay Archipelago, where the shallow waters of the Karimata Strait separate Sumatra to the west from Borneo to the east. Exotic to western readers, the locale renders even more special the romance between a freelance sea captain of a small boat and a British woman traveling with her husband on a yacht that has gone aground on a sandbar off one of the many islands. The locale enab When you close the covers of this book, you have been somewhere.

And not merely to its setting by Joseph Conrad in the Malay Archipelago, where the shallow waters of the Karimata Strait separate Sumatra to the west from Borneo to the east. Exotic to western readers, the locale renders even more special the romance between a freelance sea captain of a small boat and a British woman traveling with her husband on a yacht that has gone aground on a sandbar off one of the many islands. The locale enables it, in fact. The remoteness of the spot heightens and intensifies the action among the vividly drawn characters. It is a dangerous place, with political conflicts simmering among the islanders native to the region and the potential treasure of a British yacht and its passengers too much for some of the factions to resist.

The romance features only a few kisses, physically, but an emotional intensity that threatens to burn through some of the pages on which it manifests. The needs of the two characters, the odd circumstances of their meeting, the social and cultural obstacles and the limited time they have to share -- is it a week? maybe not even -- cause their surprised feelings to move rapidly on several levels.

That intensity is somewhat conveyed by Conrad's chapter titles, which begin (1,2,3) with “The Man and the Brig,” “The Shore of Refuge,” and “The Capture” to 4, 5, and 6 which are: “The Gift of the Shallows,” “The Point of Honour and the Point of Passion,” and finally “The Claim of Life and the Toll of Death.”

Who, glancing over that table of contents, could resist?

A critic has suggested the grandiosity of the titles registers a weakness of Conrad's vision or execution. It's possible, as this is not a perfect book, just a great one -- but I fell for the rhetoric completely, baroque or not.

The major characters, perhaps six or seven, rotate through omniscient authorial treatments of their natures and feelings, immersing the reader. That is why finishing the book made me feel like I was rising to the surface of this shallow sea and both desired and dreaded coming up for air. Conrad's understanding of human nature make these haunted characters -- and by no means only the Europeans -- find their commonality with you or with people you have known.

Conrad had started The Rescue in 1898, when he was 41, but put it aside as too much of a challenge for his skills at the time. He went on instead to “The Nigger of the ‘Narcissus’,” then “Heart of Darkness,” “Lord Jim,” and his other major works of the first decade of the 20th century. He came back to this manuscript 20 years later, feeling ready to bring it to completion. It runs 469 pages of poetic but restrained prose. You can hear phrases in spots that must have encouraged William Faulkner, among others, to unleash his own verbiage.

Captain Tom Lingard and Edith Travers had a romance that I expect to remember a long time. "The Rescue" is the third of Conrad's Lingard trilogy, starting with "Almayer’s Folly," his first novel. Lingard was reportedly the real name of the figure Conrad knew from his 20 years at sea; Almayer, for another example, is an actual trader William Charles Olmeijer.

Sometimes the exoticism makes for risks. Many readers seem to have accepted the 1970s era claim that “Heart of Darkness” is a racist treatment of natives and colonial exploiters. There are characters some might consider racist, but the accusation doesn't stand up to scrutiny, in my view. To me the conflicts stem more from the gulf between such different cultures, especially as experienced by characters with limited understanding, sympathy, or wisdom. Other than rereading that novel a few years back, I have not gone into Conrad titles since the few I read while young. This book tells me that was a mistake and I look forward to rectifying it.
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Jan 07, 2022 James Varney rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Excellent, but not quite the sublime Conrad. "The Rescue" ends the so-called Lingard trilogy, and oddly it is the novel that has more Lingard than any other. But I still can't place him. Essentially, he falls in love with Mrs. Travers. And here you realize love, and more especially soul mates of the opposite sex meeting, is a subject foreign to most Conrad. There is some in "Victory," Nostromo loves in "Nostromo," but the relationship itself is never the thing Conrad describes most deeply. As in Excellent, but not quite the sublime Conrad. "The Rescue" ends the so-called Lingard trilogy, and oddly it is the novel that has more Lingard than any other. But I still can't place him. Essentially, he falls in love with Mrs. Travers. And here you realize love, and more especially soul mates of the opposite sex meeting, is a subject foreign to most Conrad. There is some in "Victory," Nostromo loves in "Nostromo," but the relationship itself is never the thing Conrad describes most deeply. As in so much Conrad, and as in "Almayer's Folly" and "An Outcast of the Island," that precede "The Rescue," it is much more man and his relationship with the world, as opposed to each other, that draws his most attention. Again, we have wonderful, evocative passages describing the jungle and these places - off the chart specks, really - in the Malay archipelago, but unlike the first two of the trilogy we are no longer in Borneo. And, as noted, we finally have Captain Lingard himself as a main character, as opposed to this overarching presence as the figure that has set everything in motion. I think part of my problem was confusion among characters. There are a lot of them. I suspect that, like "Nostromo," repeated readings would make all clear. But, short version, there are several native chiefs who weave in and out of "The Rescue" and, improbably, they all seem to be spread along a beach in the lagoon where most of the action takes place. Despite the big cast, lots of the characters are memorable: Jaffir, the great messenger; Jorgensen, the white man lost to the jungle (and the world); D'Alcacer, a socialite that would normally be a cipher in Conrad, or a subject of his scorn, who is nevertheless sympathetically drawn and a most appealing man; and of course Tom Lingard. Lingard has a fixation like Charles Gould in "Nostromo," although it is never explicitly spelled out just what his prize or objective is (at least not to me). Lingard does bring Mrs. Travers in on the secret - his 'Guffin,' if you will - and it attracts her even more, but to this reader anyway exactly what Lingard hopes to accomplish is never clear. That is all goes to hell, on the other hand, is. As always, Conrad paints incredible settings for his characters that, like Faulkner, go through layers and layers of thought and remembrance without, in real time, doing much or going far. The whole novel takes place in something less than a square mile, I'd say, and one of the best things about "The Rescue" is how Conrad can make a world in this postage stamp on the south seas. "The Rescue" strikes me as something like Hamsun's "Rosa," which I also read recently. Both are outstanding books, but both are written by some of the greatest writers of all time and I feel like both are more for big fans of Conrad or Hamsun and not the ones to recommend to readers new to either author or not looking to make a deep dive in either. ...more

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Apr 23, 2022 Marianne Roncoli rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I finished it; I'm rescued. I can't include certain thoughts on the book without risking being thrown off Goodreads. Let's say that I couldn't put it down; it was an obsession captured as I was by the soaring prose that bordered on pure poetry. Conrad does that for me. For example, at the sight of his obsession on deck, Captain Linguard, observed,

..."Mrs. Travers rose nervously and going aft began to gaze at the coast. Behind her the sun, sunk already, seemed to force through the mass of waters ...more

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Sep 29, 2020 HansBlog rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Kurzer Auszug a.d. längeren Rezension m. Links u. Hintergründen i. m. Blog:
Fazit:
Der Ton ist teils märchenonkelhaft und voll überflüssiger Adjektive und Verallgemeinerungen. Teils konnte ich der Geschichte nicht folgen – weder den Gefühlen und Entscheidungen der Protagonisten noch den Inter-Island-Streithändeln – und musste in der englischen Zumbuchwiki die Handlung nachlesen; selbst dort verstand ich nicht alles.
Die Figuren erscheinen zu diffus, zu holzschnittartig lieb oder böse; die Hauptfi ...more

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Feb 13, 2018 Peter Prentice rated it liked it · review of another edition

This had a strong naval feel to it as most of Conrad's novels do, but I had a brighter, more enjoyable time while reading this, too. It was not as dark as his other texts, and it was nice to be in the shoes of a sea captain. Still, as part of a trilogy, it carries the same undertones as its predecessors, and a must read for those interested in colonialist works. ...more

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Apr 19, 2020 Katrina rated it liked it · review of another edition

This one is difficult to judge as the last third, written 20 years after Conrad started writing the book, is so much better than the first two thirds.

https://piningforthewest.co.uk/2020/0... ...more

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Dec 30, 2017 Vernon Dewhurst rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Not the best of Conrad, slow, verbose, heavy, over egged. Foggy plot, and the main character seems two dimentional. But i love Conrad and can forgive him this one!

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Mar 29, 2013 Jim Leckband rated it liked it

I had a hard time with this one, my second book on estuary hijinks before the First World War (The Riddle of the Sands). Some of it had some of the best writing by Conrad I've run across - and some it I was in the same doldrums Lingard's boat starts the novel in.

In the introduction Conrad relates that he started "The Rescue" before all of his masterpieces (The Nigger of the Narcissus, Heart of Darkness, and Lord Jim and it was sitting there in an unfinished state while he wrote those books that I had a hard time with this one, my second book on estuary hijinks before the First World War (The Riddle of the Sands). Some of it had some of the best writing by Conrad I've run across - and some it I was in the same doldrums Lingard's boat starts the novel in.

In the introduction Conrad relates that he started "The Rescue" before all of his masterpieces (The Nigger of the Narcissus, Heart of Darkness, and Lord Jim and it was sitting there in an unfinished state while he wrote those books that are very related to the present one. However, those books were written with a hand of fire, while this one was written with a hand of smoke.

A brig captain, Lindgard, is hailed out of his ship's, and his, doldrums by a mysterious rowboat of sailors. This sets the tone for the rest of the book - his not knowing what is the ultimate aim of the people he brings on board and how much he should trust them. A yacht has been stranded in the shallows of a coast that Lindgard knows very well - and he knows that if that yacht stays there, everything he cares for is doomed.

This book would make an excellent sea-noir film - I'm surprised that somebody hasn't made it yet! All the tropes of noir are there - femme fatale, honorable yet conflicted "Man of Fate", shifting allegiances, mysterious and/or inscrutable happenings, and a gloom of static dread that pervades everything. However, Conrad lays on the inscrutable doom too thick - I got the point, I just want to know what is happening sometimes! I never really got why the native chiefs of the island were so interested in the hostages and why the hostages kept going back and forth like passenger pigeons.

The book might also suffer from a little too obvious allegory to the First World War - the character Mr. Travers is an obvious allusion to the dolts who started the trench warfare and then washed their hands of it. And the situations of the hostages setting off a war seemed like the assassination of a minor prince - a happenstance that really doesn't mean much, but because it took place in a powderkeg, the whole thing blew up. ...more

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Apr 28, 2012 Jrohde rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: sea-tales

my favorite of Conrad - I relate to Lindgard somehow, the independent captain of a lovely brig and admirer of a young heroic deposed chief in the jungles of Borneo. his life work of replacing this man back on his throne is abruptly interrupted by the appearance of an English 'yacht' grounded at the mouth of the river where he is mounting his native force to retake the throne/power for his friend. he relates to the woman on the yacht as a fellow European and is unable to seperate himself from her ...more

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Feb 25, 2014 Lucy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

As is usual with Conrad (this is my penultimate novel of his) the beginning is confusing, you start to wonder if you are going to get into this one, and suddenly about a third of the way through you are totally hooked. It is tremendously detailed in both descriptions of what happens and of what the characters are thinking. The 'minor' characters are drawn with as much care as the major, with the truly appalling Travers and the faithful Jaffir. Being Conrad, it doesn't end well - that shouldn't b ...more

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Dec 07, 2020 Arlene Starr rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This story is written as a narration. It’s a sea story adventure interlaced with phycological romance.
It’s told through a sequence of shifts backward and forward, and is slow reading, fortunately as you progress along it becomes more suspenseful, making it more compelling to read.
It is about Tom Lingard, a character the author writes about in several other books. Tom is on his way to help a native friend reconquer Wajo. Along the way he encounters a stranded yacht and meets a woman. The story i ...more

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Jun 21, 2011 Michelle McGuinness rated it it was ok · review of another edition

I mean... it's Conrad. If you like Conrad, you'll like this. I don't like Conrad, but wanted to give him another shot. Ultimately, though, this is "Heart of Darkness" with Asians instead of Africans, from the disturbing racial slurs to the jungle setting to the pervading "darkness" to the "noble savages."

I will give Conrad credit for being a masterful writer, however. If you disregard the plot, the writing itself is gorgeous. Conrad was clearly a master craftsman when it came to writing in Engl ...more

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Feb 16, 2014 Tom rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Not too much to add beyond what others have said. Portions of the first part of the book are very fine. The second half is tough going. My favorite quotes is "the world is too prudent to be sincere." ...more

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Jan 04, 2016 Magda rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Beautiful. Poignant, understated, painful. Like life.

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Mar 11, 2015

Afloarei Mihai rated it really liked it
May 13, 2020

Bradley rated it it was ok
Aug 13, 2013

Terry rated it it was amazing
Nov 24, 2018

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About Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad

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Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski ) was a Polish-born English novelist who today is most famous for Heart of Darkness, his fictionalized account of Colonial Africa.

Conrad left his native Poland in his middle teens to avoid conscription into the Russian Army. He joined the French Merchant Marine and briefly employed himself as a wartime gunrunner. He then began to work aboard ...more