Au bout du rouleau

by Joseph Conrad

'(Conrad) thought of civilised and morally tolerable human life as a dangerous walk on a thin crust of barely cooled lava which at any moment might break and let the unwary sink into fiery depths'
- Bertrand Russell

This selection of four tales by Conrad is about radical lone human beings involuntarily forced into confrontation with a terrifying universe in which they can never be wholly at home. It leads with 'The End of the Tether' and includes also ' The Duel', ' The Return', and 'Amy Foster' - Sailor, Soldier, Rich Man, Immigrant. These powerful shorter works remind readers that Conrad is not just the teller of sea stories and tales of imperialist action, and not only the author of the
ubiquitous 'Heart of Darkness'. This is the Conrad who is master of the terror element - global crisis, individual test, and personal trauma - in modern literature.

For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Genres: Fiction, Classics, Adventure, Novels, English Literature, British Literature, Classic Literature

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1902

About the author

Joseph 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.

Reviews

[Lyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading The End of the Tether, Joseph Conrad’s somber, mature and beautifully crafted novella published in 1902 reminds me of what a great debt English literature owes to this Polish gentleman, particularly the Lost Generation expatriate writers.

Ford Madox Ford collaborated with Conrad on three publications and Bertrand Russell was enamored of the older writer, but Hemingway too was a literary descendant of Conrad’s brooding prose. The End of the Tether tells the melancholy, inevitable story of Captain Walley, striding with a seaman’s strong and dignified gait into his destiny.

Conrad’s language is redolent of his masterpiece Heart of Darkness as is the setting, but I was also vaguely reminded of Joyce’s Ulysses with the subtle, realistic imagery, underscored emotion and brilliant similes.

As with the Heart of Darkness and some other of Conrad’s works, perhaps a prevailing theme in his works is the contrast and distinction between Western civilization and the rest of the world. Conrad’s perspective as a merchant captain allowed him a unique glimpse at the imperialism of the late 1800s. Conrad’s observation to our postmodern sentiments may seem sexist and racist (and would be in today’s world) but I suspect and submit that Conrad revealed a restrained skepticism about the sensibilities and morality of western expansion.

[David Sarkies · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sea captain's final journey
28 March 2015

I would say that this is just another story about a sea journey, but then again it was written by Joseph Conrad, and despite the three stories that I have read being about ships and journeys, I simply cannot describe it using the words 'just another'. The book in which this story was originally published was called 'Youth and other tales' and contained (in this order) Youth, Heart of Darkness, and The End of the Tether. The book I read also contained these three stories, however it was called 'Heart of Darkness and other stories' and had Heart of Darkness coming first, followed by Youth.

The reason that I raise that is because these three stories deal with characters at different stages of their life: Youth obviously has the protagonist as a young man; Heart of Darkness has the protagonist as middle aged; while the protagonist in The End of the Tether is in his twilight years. I have already written reviews on Youth and Heart of Darkness, so I will be mostly focusing on The End of the Tether (which is not surprising considering this is a review of this story).

The End of the Tether is about an old ship's captain who has since retired on his savings but a banking crisis has left him penniless. It is not so much that he doesn't have any money any more (though that still is a bit of a problem), but rather than he wanted to pass some money down to his daughter so that she might not live in want. In fact there is a whole story about his daughter, but then again this particular book is incredibly complex with the various threads weaving through it.

Anyway, Captain Whalley (as he is called) decides that he will scrape together his last remaining 500 pounds and return to the sea – in part because he has grown tired of living on the land and yearns to return to the deck of a ship, and in part because he wishes to provide a decent amount of money to his daughter before he dies. Unfortunately he has been away from the sea for too long and many of his contacts have since left the business to be replaced by a much younger crowd. However he does manage to buy into a ship, the Sofala which, like Whalley, is on its last legs. To add to the complications, the first mate – the person with whom Whalley is going into partnership with, is a problem gambler and needs Whalley has he had just blown the last of his money in the casinos of Manilla.

The first thing that really struck me about this story is how deeply flawed the characters happened to be. For instance, Masey is a problem gambler – not the type that sits in front of pokie machines for hours on end, but rather the one that sits in smoke filled rooms playing poker. Mind you, it makes me wonder sometimes what a problem gambler really is: is it somebody that always loses, and in doing so lands up in so much debt that the mob want to hunt them down as an example; or is it somebody who simply cannot help but gamble, despite the fact that they always seem to come out on top? For some reason though I suspect that the second type doesn't really exist and is only a creation of Hollywood. Okay, there is a saying that 'The House always wins', though that is not necessarily the case either (as the businessman James Packer discovered when he invested his father's fortune in a casino in Macau, only to discover that nobody was going there).

Anyway, Masey's gambling addiction is evident throughout the book in how he is always trying to get more money out of Whalley. He even attempts to set him up to try and get him off of the ship so that he can then sell it and return to Manilla and the gambling dens that he frequents so often (though when people talk about Manilla I generally don't think of a place full of gambling dens, though since I have never been to Manilla I cannot say for sure).

Whalley is the other deeply flawed character, no so much because of any particular vice that he has (in fact is quite an honourable person, and is also a highly decorated ship's captain) but rather the situation in which he has landed. He is a captain of an old ship with a first mate that is doing his best to get rid of him, and his sight is failing dramatically. He does manage to keep this a secret through the use of a confidant, but you can see through the story that the only reason that he is pushing on is due to his love for his daughter. Even then his daughter has gone and married a man whom he does not believe is suitable for her and has also taken a job as a governess of a boarding house. In a way I guess that is the struggle that all parents go through – they have great dreams for their children and are shattered when that dream comes to naught.

This is a beautiful, and in a way heart wrenching, story of a man nearing the end of his life; with his golden days long behind him. I guess in a way it is an allegory of life in that as we grow old life becomes ever more difficult as our body begins to break down. In a sense each of the stories in this book can be seen as allegories – with Youth about the eagerness of the young and the hurdles that they must overcome as they go out into the world, and Heart of Darkness about the time when we come to see the nastiness of life. Once again Joseph Conrad has drafted a marvellous piece of literature that highlights his ability so much more since not only did he come from the working class, but that English was also his second language. In fact, a quick look over his biography suggests that he never even attended university.

[Tristram Shandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

”Captain Whalley was not dwarfed by the solitude of the grandly planned street. He had too fine a presence for that. He was only a lonely figure walking purposefully […].”

The End of the Tether was originally published in conjunction with two other novellas by Conrad, namely Youth and Heart of Darkness, under the title of Youth, a Narrative, and Two Other Stories. It is likely that the three novellas were combined because, together, they mirror the three ages of man, and while nowadays, Heart of Darkness has become one of the key texts to Joseph Conrad, it is also clear, at least to me, that The End of the Tether is one of the author’s most powerful and moving stories, and as such a reading experience that it would be sad to miss.

The novella centres on Captain Whalley, a well-versed and skilled shellback, who can look back on a blameless career and who, in the old days of sailing ships, even discovered a new route that saved the British marine valuable time. In these halcyon days, he also had his wife and his little daughter Ivy on board with him, but eventually his wife died, and his daughter married a man who is not able to support his family so that it is Captain Whalley who bears the brunt of his daughter’s financial burden, and who bears it gladly because providing for his daughter imbues him with a feeling of being close to her. Things begin looking less rosy, however, when Captain Whalley, who meanwhile has retired from active service and has bought his own little ship and simply cruises for the pleasure of cruising, realizes that all his life’s savings have been lost in a stock market crash. He now sells his own ship and invests the 500 £ of returns into a partnership with the owner of an old and rickety steamship, the Sofala. This way, Captain Whalley can earn his own living and forward any revenue to his daughter, while keeping the 500 £, which will be due to him at the expiration of the partnership after three years, intact to be given to his daughter when he is too old to continue working. Entering into this partnership gives Whalley a lot more than he bargained for because the shipowner and engineer, Mr. Massy, who won the money with which he bought the Sofala in a lottery, has ever since been addicted to buying lottery tickets on a grand scale, throwing every spare penny into the abyss of the lottery system. Consequently, he is not too happy finding that he will soon have to pay out his captain and that Whalley is unwilling to prolong their partnership when he urgently needs some money to buy new boilers for the Sofala. Captain Whalley, on the other hand, who has always been sure that his health would remain with him to the last, has to face the terrible truth that he is slowly going blind – and that if Mr. Massy finds this out, according to the terms of their contract, the owner can dismiss Whalley as a captain and withhold the invested money for one further year. Henceforth, Whalley does his best to hide the fact that his eyesight is getting dimmer and dimmer, but there is the first mate, Mr. Sterne, who is eager for promotion and ready to step over his captain’s body – figuratively speaking – to get it, and Mr. Sterne has got wise to Captain Whalley and his terrible secret.

As usual, Conrad does not tell us a linear story, but treats us to lots of flashbacks and changes of perspective, which make The End of the Tether a very dense and anfractuous text. One might even have the feeling of groping one’s way through it like Captain Whalley carefully senses where to set his next footstep when no longer on board the Sofala. While giving us enough of insight into the minds of people like Sterne and Massy and also of Mr. Van Wyk, a friend of Whalley’s, who has withdrawn into solitude out of dissatisfaction in love matters, the narrator focuses on Whalley himself, and here Conrad creates one of the most memorable and likeable characters I have ever come across in fiction: Whalley is an honourable, decent and valiant man, whose life is fulfilled by going to sea and by the love of his wife and his daughter. Throughout his life, he has preserved his naïve faith in the ultimate justice of life, of God, thinking that since he does not need his health simply for himself but for his daughter, God will grant him this health to the end of his days:

”’As it happens, my life is necessary; it isn’t my own, it isn’t — God knows.’”

This sentiment is, by the way, also the kind of revelation that grants new sense to the life of another of Joseph Conrad’s heroes, in Lord Jim, and we can maybe regard it as a recurring motif in Conrad’s thinking. At the end, however, in his blindness, Captain Whalley comes to realize the bitter truth of life:

”Surely God would not rob his child of his power to help, and cast him naked into a night without end. He had caught at every hope; and when the evidence of his misfortune was stronger than hope, he tried not to believe the manifest thing.

In vain. In the steadily darkening universe a sinister clearness fell upon his ideas. In the illuminating moments of suffering he saw life, men, all things, the whole earth with all her burden of created nature, as he had never seen them before. […] All the days of his life he had prayed for daily bread, and not to be led into temptation, in a childlike humility of spirit. Did words mean anything? Whence did the gift of speech come? The violent beating of his heart reverberated in his head — seemed to shake his brain to pieces.”

The tragedy inherent in these thoughts is mirrored in the chain of unfortunate and sometimes ludicrous coincidences, misunderstandings and talks at cross purposes which finally lead to a catastrophe, all the while there still being the gleam of some hope alive on the horizon. In Conrad’s universe, which may not be too far off our own universe, the gods not only torture their creatures, but they laugh merrily while doing so.

And yet, there are two things that even the gods cannot take away from Captain Whalley – the first is his dignity, the way he reacts to what seems to be his fate and his dependence on accident, and the very first is the love he feels for his daughter, a love that is, as we finally learn, returned. And so, we can even imagine Captain Whalley happy …

[Frederick · Rating 4 out of 5]

SPOILERS ahead, but this is Joseph Conrad we're talking about. His style is the star. His work is essentially spoiler-proof.
This novella (which, by today's standards, would be termed a short novel) shows Conrad's gift of sympathy. Captain Whalley, twenty-five years after losing his wife, prepares for a comfortable retirement but learns that his daughter's husband can no longer work. Whalley sells the little ship he'd been intending for relaxation and for running small commercial errands. With the small amount the sale gets him he becomes partners with an avaricious ship-owner who has bought a ship after winning a lottery. Whalley, although captain of this man's ship, must endure, in his old age, the constant barrage of criticism from his ignoramus of a partner, who is also the ship's engineer. A weird legal situation in which the owner of a ship must hire someone else as its captain has brought these two polar opposites together. Whalley plans to stay for the three years he's signed on for, after which he plans to go home to his daughter to help her run the boarding house she's set up during her husband's illness. In the meantime, he sends her his earnings. That's the set-up.
The rest is a wrenching story clearly inspired by Shakespeare. Most authors, to this day, try to capture a Shakespearean mood occasionally, but Conrad almost seems to point to Shakespeare. Whalley has something of Lear in him. There is an Iago in this story as well. I wonder if, perhaps, James Joyce used a little of the conversation between the elderly Captain Whalley and the youngish Mr. Van Wyk to inform the passage in ULYSSES in which Mr. Bloom and Stephen Daedalus commune. Conrad reflects Shakespeare and anticipates Joyce. He is not the innovator either of those authors were, but he is almost invariably profound.
Having read a fair amount of Conrad and about him, it strikes that most of what he wrote is based on what he actually witnessed or heard about from witnesses. His works are almost exclusively sea stories, but however detailed they are about ships, ship's crews and the people who deal with ships and their crews, these works give the reader tremendous insight into human motivation, particularly in exclusively male, working environments. Conrad's experience of toil is rare in an author and virtually absent in a great one. Many authors know hardship. But Conrad is almost alone in his focus on men who struggle with good and evil while also controlling, battling or simply maintaining vast machinery. That such characters also have to face other characters with the same abilities but without any of their moral scruples makes Conrad a monumental author. He is famous for his irony. In fact, people speak of "Conradian irony." But he always seems to be a friend, which is ironic in an ironist, to be sure.

[Mateo Toledo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Novela marinera.

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Two generations of seamen born since his first day at sea stood between him and all these ships at the anchorage. His own was sold, and he had been asking himself, What next?"

This is a typically terse and moving Conrad novel, something he excelled at, bringing pathos to what was essentially the opposite of his usual "adventure" stories. More aptly, "An old man and the sea", Tether's main anti-protagonist is the aging Captain Whalley who, now a widower and past retirement age, struggles to keep aboard ship to support his distant daughter, the only person left on earth who really knows who he is. Against all external judgment, he takes a final job as captain of a steamer in the East Indies to try and keep the remittances to his daughter's family going and comes up against obstacles both within himself and in others.
One of Conrad's more depressing stories, but wonderfully hewn with its bathetic resolution one of dark obsolescence, betrayal, and fatal bravery.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short novel is difficult to read because it is about an old sea captain who is going blind.. As an elderly person myself, I am very conscious of how, when one is old and doesn't have money, one can suffer grievously. Captain Whalley of Joseph Conrad's The End of the Tether had been a famous sea captain of the South Seas. In an effort to help his daughter Ivy, who married a man who became crippled, he captains a run-down freighter owned by a former lottery winner who also happens to be the ship's engineer. For years, Whalley manages to get by with the help of a Malayan serang who acts as his eyes on board. This way, he manages to keep secret his advancing disability.

A very touching novel by the master of the sea story.

[RosasRojas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Todo lo que siento es dolor :(

[Procyon Lotor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Add�o capitano Whalley, add�o "serang" C'� poco in questo libro, tolto il Mare, La Vita, Dio, il Ricordo, il Rispetto, la Malattia, l'Amicizia, il Tradimento, la Morte, la Vigliaccheria, la Pusillanimit�, la Fede, la Speranza, la Giovent� e la Vecchiaia, la Lotta, l'Occidente e l'Oriente, il Bianco e l'Indigeno, l'Onore... non rimane molto dal sacchetto delle maiuscole (la Gloria non c'�, Sesso neppure, pur essendo tutto il libro sensualissimo), se non la sensazione, per l'eventuale lettore di vampirla o draghi nani e ballerine che vi si accostasse, di aver buttato alle ortiche anni leggendo stronzate immani. In un afoso braccio di mare orientale (in Conrad spesso si svolge tutto sotto un afa opprimente) un uomo, pressato da motivazioni inevitabili, cerca un imbarco come capitano. Un disperato lo ingaggia, odiandolo per averlo salvato. Riscrivo qui un brano dal libro: La parola pilota suggeriva l'idea di fiducia, di dipendenza, l'idea dell'aiuto benvenuto e illuminato portato al navigante che brancola nel buio in direzione della terra, che avanza alla cieca nella nebbia, che cerca a tentoni la via nella densit� delle tempeste di vento che, riempiendo l'aria della foschia salina soffiata su dal mare, riducono da ogni lato la visibilit� a un ristretto orizzonte che sembra a portata di mano. Un pilota vede meglio di un forestiero, perch� la sua conoscenza dei luoghi, come una vista pi� acuta, completa le forme di cose adocchiate fugacemente; penetra i veli di bruma stesi sopra la terra dalle burrasche del mare; determina con sicurezza i contorni di una costa che si stende sotto la cappa di nebbia, le forme dei punti di riferimento semisepolti in una notte senza stelle come in una tomba poco profonda. Riconosce perch� conosce gi�. Non � al suo occhio lungimirante ma alla sua conoscenza pi� estesa che il pilota chiede certezze; la certezza sulla posizione della nave da cui pu� dipendere il buon nome di un uomo e la pace della sua coscienza, la giustificazione della fiducia riposta nelle sue mani, e anche la sua stessa vita, che di rado � interamente sua per gettarla via, e le umili vite di altri che forse stendono radici in affetti lontani, e sono altrettanto onerose delle vite dei re per il peso del mistero che le aspetta. Conrad stesso scrisse: Dubito molto che rilegger� mai "Al limite estremo". Non c'� bisogno che dica di pi�. Si concilia meglio con i miei sentimenti separarmi dal capitano Whalley in affettuoso silenzio.

[Gianni · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una decina di anni prima dell’uscita di All’estremo limite Emile Zola pubblicava Il denaro, la storia di una colossale e catastrofica speculazione finanziaria ispirata a un evento realmente accaduto nel 1882; poco tempo dopo, nel 1914, Theodore Dreiser scrive Il Titano, ispirato alla figura del finanziere senza scrupoli C. T. Yerkes.
Sono i decenni dello sfrenato sviluppo capitalistico senza regole (ma ce ne sono di regole oggi?) e del colonialismo razzista e imperialista, che Conrad aveva già tratteggiato in Cuore di tenebra scritto pochi anni prima.
Capitan Whalley, il protagonista principale di All’estremo limite, è un vecchio e conosciuto comandante di famose compagnie di navigazione; ormai in pensione, perde tutti i propri averi nel tracollo di una banca e si trova a cercare un nuovo ingaggio per ottenere denaro da inviare all’amata figlia che naviga anch’essa in cattive acque, ”Al tempo del crollo della Trevancore & Deccan, non aveva forse sentito dire che il povero Whalley era rimasto completamente ripulito? “L’uomo è a secco, per Giove!” pensò, subito gettando un’occhiata in tralice dal basso in alto verso il suo compagno.”
Il mondo è cambiato parecchio da quando Whalley non naviga più, gli uomini con pochi scrupoli si sono moltiplicati, così come gli arrivisti bramosi di ricchezze, gli opportunisti e gli immancabili giocatori. Whalley è un uomo retto, d’altri tempi, ha una visione comprensiva dell’umanità, ”credeva esistesse una disposizione al bene in ogni uomo, anche se nel complesso il mondo non era un luogo troppo felice. Non aveva però altrettanta fiducia nella saggezza degli uomini. Una simile disposizione doveva essere talora aiutata con qualche durezza, ammise. Gli uomini potevano essere stupidi, sviati, infelici; ma naturalmente cattivi - no.”
Nonostante ciò, Whalley è capace di amare la figlia lontana e prendersene cura, fino al sacrificio di sé e dei suoi princìpi.
La natura selvaggia delle terre e delle isole dei mari d’Oriente, la nave e il suo comando fanno da cornice, ma restano sullo sfondo, lasciando il primo piano al denaro.
Il romanzo è costruito magistralmente, ogni capitolo prepara il successivo e via, via, costruisce la storia; i personaggi sono ben tratteggiati dal punto di vista psicologico.
È il primo romanzo di Conrad che leggo senza imbattermi nella fatica di leggere.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

The End of the Tether by Joseph Conrad demonstrates again his mastery of prose fiction forms. In this case Conrad has written a novella about a sea captain named Whalley who has had a financial disaster at the end of a distinguished career. All he wants is to leave his only daughter some money to help her deal with her unsuccessful marriage, so he invests his last 500 pounds in an old steamer owned by its chief engineer, a man named Massy, and serves as its captain on local runs through what can be called Conrad country, the innumerable islands of Indonesia.

Massy is a desperate man who won the money to buy his ship in a lottery. He only takes Whalley on as partner because his steamer is fast deteriorating and he would like to get rid of him under terms of the contract that would give him a year to repay the 500 pounds. Whalley has a problem in that he can barely meet the terms of the contract because he is going blind and trying to conceal that fact by relying on a Malay servant who dutifully carries out the captain's orders and could virtually sail the ship himself.

A further complicating factor is the second engineer's desire to reveal Whalley's blindness and take over as captain himself. All thee main characters have one more journey in which to resolve their respective challenges

The characterizations in this novella are superb, forceful, distinctive and raw. Ships require intimate cooperation that often bleeds into psychological entanglement. In general Conrad writes about the moods of the sea with dazzling perceptiveness. He has a painter's eye for light, sunset, nightfall, the murky hours of late watches and the refreshing mysteries of timeless mornings, ever recurring, ever renewing.

The natural companion to this tale is Melville's Billy Budd. The elemental force of Melville's novella is its strength. The End of the Tether is more morally complex and ingeniously plotted. There is a wholeness here, a fully developed cast of characters whose motivations and weaknesses are clear and painful. Are we really such brutes? Do we have such bad luck? The poignant realism here verges on the bitter realism in Thomas Hardy's novels. Sometime Conrad overwrites, but his missteps are an excess of talent.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

A work of genius. Never has being a sailor seemed so incredibly romantic and yet so hopelessly depressing.
As is his wont, Conrad sometimes fuses sentences together with such a litany of semicolons that you need a machete to hack through the twisted jungle of his lengthier paragraphs. However, whatever your take on Conrad's over-complicated prose, I don't see how you could deny the wall-to-wall brilliance of this novel, which delivers a treasure trove of rich emotion as well as a page-turner of a plot. It's also a great look into the past, since I don't think there exists any author alive today who can write seafaring tales with anywhere near the same elegance, vividness, and authenticity as Conrad was capable of.
Furthermore, I would have to rack my brain very hard to come up with a novel of such relatively short length that does a better job exploring the human condition. Such a shame that most people's familiarity with Joseph Conrad begins and ends with HEART OF DARKNESS.

[Czarny Pies · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Pole Joseph Conrad is the Poet Laureate of the real England not the one to be found south of Scotland on the Island but the England that dominated the Seven Seas. He wrote great novels about the courageous English marine who spent most of their lives on ships far away from the comforts of Albion. They lived and in the case of the hero of this book died by a strict code of honour.

I greatly enjoyed this book when I read it as a teenager. It's only weakness is that it resembles a great many of Conrad's other novels. If you are not already jaded, this one is excellent and has the merit of being very short.

[Teal Veyre · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a sad, beautiful, and poignant story. There was a lot to love about it. The only reason I can't give it a higher rating is because it ends with a suicide and that suicide is portrayed as heroic. I just can't give higher than 3 stars to any story that glorifies suicide.

However, the story aside from the ending was really beautiful. The captain's love for his daughter was so powerful. The complicate dynamics of the men aboard the ship added such tension. And the prose! Conrad had a gift for sweeping, immersive, beautifully intricate prose.

[Tuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

fantastic short novel and so melancholy. we know the old , brave, famous, intrepid, widowed ship captain, now reduced to running a tramp steamer on a 1600 mile milk run in the straights of Malacca area is destined for a bad, sad, end. an so it is true. but in this ship shape and tidy craft conrad makes us feel safe, if not very hopeful.

[Tom McInnes · Rating 5 out of 5]

At his best, Conrad creates fully realised living characters who nonetheless embody moral archetypes without having to resort to the kind of didacticism that weighs down your Dostoevskys and other 19th century heavyweights. Here, the themes drives the narrative without ever for an instant subsuming the human drama. Tight, tragic, and basically perfect.

[Carol · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is my favorite of the stories authored by Joseph Conrad so far. It's a sad story, about a sea captain who saved up for retirement, only to have the company he invested in go bankrupt. This could be the story of many older people now.

[Rafa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Si te gustan las historias del mar...

[Juan Marín · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una lección magistral de suspense y narrativa. Si alguien no tiene claro qué es un punto de giro, en qué consiste o para qué sirve... que no deje de leerlo.

[Miltiadis Michalopoulos · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best novels I have ever read in my life. It reminds me the Heart of Darkness but it is deeper and better in every sense. I have nothing else to say (for now..). A masterpiece

[eleanor · Rating 2 out of 5]

i’ve decided conrad should only write short stuff because his plots are just not it but the imagery🥺🫶🫶🫶🫶

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eerste keer dat ik een traan heb gelaten om het einde van het boek. Tyfus wat een tragisch einde...

En nogmaals zo onterecht dat Heart of Darkness zo veel bekender is dan dit boek

[Jim Puskas · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know of no writer who was able to immerse the reader so deeply in the atmosphere of his stories as did Joseph Conrad. In this short novel, we are surrounded by the sights, sounds and oppressive heat of the shallows, reefs and mangrove-choked shorelines of the East Indies. Muddy river estuaries; sandbars; teeming tropical forest spilling into the sea; primitive, muddy, jetty-less ports of call, swarmed by sampans and dugout canoes. We can feel the prickle of hear rash and feel the sweat running down our necks.
Conrad’s characters fit the landscape/seascape perfectly: the frustrated, resentful Massy, raging against everyone he believes has been victimizing him; the scheming, duplicitous Sterne; and most of all, the stoical Captain Whalley, desperately trying to save a bit of his last remaining capital for his daughter, by essentially making “a deal with a devil”.
We are aboard an aged coasting steamer as it scratches out a meager income for its owner. Every one of the characters aboard have troublesome issues, both within themselves and with each other. This is a voyage that cannot end well.
Wonderful stuff!

[Alberto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Con la soga al cuello fue mi primer acercamiento a Joseph Conrad, uno de esos clásicos de la literatura inglesa que vas aplazando hasta que -con gran injusticia- casi te olvidas de él. Dispuesto a poner fin a semejante desvarío, un día escogí una de sus novelas al azar, sin saber muy bien qué iba a encontrarme.

En esta novela corta, Conrad nos pone en la piel del capitán Whalley, un viejo y consagrado marino al que el destino, en sus últimos coletazos, da un par de reveses que ponen patas arriba toda una vida de éxitos. Su trayactoria profesional le hizo testigo directo el expansionismo imperialista de occidente a finales del siglo XIX; criado y curtido, en pos de nuevos horizontes, en una amalgama de culturas y contrastes. Pero no es el capitán Whalley el único enfoque que nos ofrece el autor. Más bien al contrario, pronto descubriremos que éste, ni corto ni perezoso, salta constantemente y sin previo aviso entre los personajes secundarios para formar una composición polifacética y bien cohesionada. Entre estos personajes encontraremos historias, ambiciones y sombras tan humanas y conocidas como un resfriado común; es la forma y la finura con que Conrad presenta sus conflictos internos donde radica la excelencia del relato.

Una prosa magistral y fluida, evocadora. Una historia llena de melancolía, tristeza y orgullo. Una magia que te mete hasta el fondo en el corazón de los personajes, como si Conrad lo desgajase limpiamente delante de tus narices para dejarte ver sus caras más oscuras; miseria y grandeza humana en algunas de sus formas.

Existen algunos peros de poca importancia que, en mi opinión, deslucen el resultado final. A veces, el ritmo se rompe por completo con el único objetivo de introducir a un personaje que finalmente resulta no tener ningún peso en la trama, ni ningún interés en general para el lector. Simplemente, pasaba por allí. El omnisciente Conrad no puede resistirse a su vena biográfica. Algunos también podrían tener la impresión, durante la lectura, de que el autor pierde demasiado a menudo el foco de la historia. Bueno, esto no es un punto negativo per se; todo depende de cómo interpretemos la intención del narrador. Quiero creer que Conrad no pretende tanto contar las últimas andadas del capitán Whally como perforar en el universo del viejo marino, esbozando una visión global de los muchos y complejos matices que determinaron las vidas de los hombres de su época y oficio.

Joseph Conrad es un autor poco leído para la calidad que tiene, así que nunca voy a cansarme de recomendarlo. Otro punto a favor es que, dado el corto tamaño de la novela, resulta ideal para alternar con otras lecturas más largas.

[LyL3_Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ho l'impressione che Conrad potrebbe anche descrivermi in un intero libro un pomeriggio in compagnia di signore che prendono il tè, e che io, nonostante l'indolenza dell'atmosfera, possa comunque leggermelo tutto, e non senza delizia.
Conrad mi piace ed era pure bravo.
Come opera è decisamente minore, e visibilmente rimpolpata per rendere il tutto più consistente. Lui descrive, descrive... nell'atmosfera afosa dei mari orientali, descrive gli arcipelaghi battuti dai venti e dal volo degli uccelli marini, o avvolti nelle brume della bonaccia; descrive l'aspetto di ogni persona che incontra, nel minimo dettaglio, dai baffi alle linee che formano i capelli, alle scarpe lucide, piccole o sporche, al rapporto delle persone col denaro. Ecco, il denaro, è lui il vero protagonista del racconto, per mezzo dello scontro fra la solida figura patriarcale, tragica e illusa (visibile retaggio di un mondo passato pressoché ideale e idealizzato, quello in cui il vento riempiva le vele) e anche stolida, e una realtà avida e materiale. Conrad dipinge i personaggi con una maestria e una ricchezza di dettaglio a mio avviso abbastanza fuori dal comune. Per lo più personaggi simbolici, forse anche troppo granitici in molti loro aspetti, eppure mai davvero lontani da un vissuto reale. Il mare è ancora una volta una scusa per una scrittura intimista.
Certo, deve piacere una certa verbosità -eppure mai convoluta, non si perde mai il filo, riesce sempre ad essere semplice e abbastanza lineare-. Poi, tutto molto studiato, nei tempi, nella costruzione dei fatti, come sa fare solo un abile tessitore.
Niente di imperdibile. Ma per me Conrad è un piacere davvero particolare. Quindi: perché no?

[Paul Cornelius · Rating 4 out of 5]

Captain Whalley's closely guarded secret launches him, literally, on a course that would have been tragic, had not the heroism in the captain's heart already played itself out many years before. Perhaps there is a diluted echo of King Lear in this novella, the old man who wants to retire and pass on his success in life to his daughter but who is betrayed by the greed and ambitions of those around and even above him. Despair dominates. At the end, what is there but to keep putting one foot in front of the other, to last it out.

This novella is somewhat neglected, especially as it appeared alongside Heart of Darkness in an early collection. Yet it is a successful work. Conrad excelled at the long short story/novella form. The psychological reveals are not only modern but universal.

[Miles Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story of an aging sailor chronicles a captain's last years as he tries to save his estranged daughter from poverty. The atmosphere of Southeast Asia is pervasive, and like all of Conrad's works the descriptions of place add to the exotic nature of the works. End of the Tether is more religiously tinged than say Heart of Darkness, and the ending is more human. Conrad's ontological presumptions lie somewhere between outright nihilism and a sort of theistic existentialism ala Kierkegaard. At times one might see his tales as Augustinian pleas for Christian eschatological resolution, but thats a stretch. This work sees people as basically good, but often driven to evil behavior by circumstances.

[Beatriz Cumplido · Rating 3 out of 5]

Estuve a punto de admitir que la novela adolece de descripciones demasiado copiosas. La primera parte es una maravilla, porque nos entrega a un personaje digno de añoranza en la literatura universal: el capitán Whalley; la segunda, sin embargo, me pareció por momentos lenta. Luego vienen las últimas diez gloriosas páginas y uno queda infinitamente satisfecho: ¡que no muera nunca la literatura!

Muchas gracias, Conrad.

[Octavia Cade · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well-written but extremely depressing novella about an old sailor on the edge of penury, trying to hide a disability long enough to keep a job that will support his daughter. It's a quiet little story with very little melodrama, and the muted misery of it is far more effective than the repetition of horror in Heart of Darkness, for instance. Ultimately it's so unhappy a story that I don't think I'll read it again, but it's certainly affecting and the characterisation is excellent.

[Daniel Little · Rating 3 out of 5]

Comes to a fore more strongly than Heart of Darkness, leaving the reader feeling more fulfilled, yet simultaneously distraught with what happens to Captain Whalley, in a way that one does not for Mr Kurtz. Whilst the last few pages of End of the Tether, though, the reader dare not leave, it is only by the end that they have managed to capture you anywhere near as completely as does the ominous mystery that oozes from Hear of Darkness almost immediately.