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The Secret Agent
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The Secret Agent - Week 1
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I'm only up to chapter 3, so everything might change in chapter 4, but these are my views so far on the first few points:1. Verloc's mundane home life and tawdry shop are presumably excellent cover for a secret agent - as is his identity as a family man. So I was surprised in chapter 2 by Vladimir's exclamation "Married! And you a professed anarchist, too! What is this confounded nonsense?" when surely an unremarkable marriage is one of the things that enable an activist to go unnoticed in society.
2. In chapter 2 it becomes clear that Verloc's role as a agent until now has merely been to keep his ear to the ground within revolutionary circles, and provide reports of upcoming activity - which (he claims) have been of great use. But this is not enough for Vladimir who wants him to arrange "a series of outrages" - starting with an attack (presumably an explosion) on the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. This is where the meridian line is, by which all time zones in the world are defined. While blowing it up would be a great symbolic gesture, I'm not quite sure what it would be symbolic of, and as far as I'm aware it would hardly cause any practical disruption.
No wonder Verloc is incredulous and wonders if this is just a joke.
It also makes the reader wonder just how well Vladimir understands his own business. Vladimir's already displayed an ignorance of the revolutionary world "which filled the silent Mr Verloc with inward consternation." Vladimir explains his outlook both at great length and with huge oversimplification - "All the damned professors are radicals at heart... intellectual idiots." He tells Verloc he's trying to educate him, but I think he actually just likes the sound of his own voice.
3. And he's not the only one. In chapter 3 the revolutionaries are an unattractive and umimpressive lot - so unattractive that it's hard to imagine we're meant to take any of their speeches seriously. Most horrible of all is Yundt the self-styled terrorist: he's malevolent but enfeebled, and has never actually undertaken any terrorist acts, but has only urged them on. All three seem to be more talk than action. As Verloc says goodbye to this bunch he realises that they will be hopeless for the task he's been given.
4. Stevie is a more sympathetic character than any other we meet in chapter 3. We can identify with his fear at Yundt's talk about quivering flesh and blood, while his devotion to his sister and his obsessive drawing of perfect circles are rather touching. But he is also like "an excited animal in a cage" that Verloc does not know how to handle, and according to Mrs Verloc he may have a capacity for violence in the cause of justice which I fear does not bode well for his future role in this book...
I've now read chapter 4... wow. I didn't see that coming. Presumably Verloc couldn't find any of his associates to carry out his gruesome task - or could he? We don't actually know yet who got blown up.
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Yes, I wondered about that too. We only know the Professor gave the explosives to Verloc and it sounds like identification of the body would be almost impossible with the methods of the day.
One thing that strikes me about this book so far is how often the surroundings contain disconcerting or contradictory details. For instance, in Chapter 2, when Verloc goes out, the carriages are described as holding the skins of wild beasts with women's faces, and the sun is bloodshot yet has an air of "benign vigilance." And in chapter 4 in the bar where Ossipon meets the Professor, the mechanical piano keeps striking up with totally inappropriate tunes like "a vulgar and impudent ghost", giving the whole scene a surreal aspect. To me, the world in this book feels strange and off-kilter.
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Really good point, there is a nightmarish quality to the world as seen here.
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I've got a bad feeling that was Stevie. Conrad devoted a lot of attention to him, so it seems he was destined to play a big part. And I think Verloc would have used the explosive correctly.
I don't have much else to say at this point, since I'm just figuring out what the book is about. Looking forward to seeing what's happening.
Conrad writes with strange syntax and it's hard to follow sometimes. I'd never read anything by him before. Is it true that he was a bit racist? I thought I'd heard something, and his description of Ossipov seems to confirm that. I'll have to look him up later when I'm not on my dad's computer.
Lori wrote: Is it true that he was a bit racist? I thought I’d heard something, and his description of Ossipov seems to confirm that.
I’ve been poking around on the internet today and the Conrad Wikipedia page is very in depth, useful, and seems well documented. This page does say that Chinua Achebe accused Conrad of racism based on “Heart of Darkness” but many critics have argued against this view by evaluating his entire works. They argue that Conrad is using prevailing prejudicial stereotypes to highlight his anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism. That far from encouraging a positive image of these concepts, he is showcasing their brutality.
Conrad’s family had been exiled because of his father’s political resistance as a Polish nationalist against Russian imperialism. As an adult, one of his reasons for becoming a British subject was to finally reject his official Russian citizenship (Wikipedia quotes letters between Conrad and his uncle)
An essay titled “Autocracy and War” is said to embody Conrad’s political views. I’ve included the link below. I haven’t had a chance to read it yet but supposedly while it warns against the autocracy of Russia and increasing power of Prussia, it doesn’t see much help coming from the selfishness of capitalist democracy.
https://archive.org/details/jstor-251...
The quote below from Conrad’s letters (that I found on Wikipedia and is sourced as coming from a Conrad biography) I think directly ties in with questions 3 and 4. Conrad's alienation from partisan politics went together with an abiding sense of the thinking man's burden imposed by his personality, as described in an 1894 letter of Conrad's to a relative-by-marriage and fellow author, Marguerite Poradowska (née Gachet, and cousin of Vincent van Gogh's physician, Paul Gachet) of Brussels:
We must drag the chain and ball of our personality to the end. This is the price one pays for the infernal and divine privilege of thought; so in this life it is only the chosen who are convicts—a glorious band which understands and groans but which treads the earth amidst a multitude of phantoms with maniacal gestures and idiotic grimaces. Which would you rather be: idiot or convict?[15]:195.
Michaelis, the convict, seems the most sympathetic of the anarchist characters we are introduced to which makes sense since Conrad’s own father was a political convict.
That places Stevie more as an epitome of the other characters’ “idiocy.” (Which is disappointing because I agree with Emma that from a modern perspective Stevie is a very sympathetic character) Today we are much better able to appreciate Stevie as a human being and frame his behavior within a probable diagnosis of autism. At the time of this novel, that was not the case. So I’m thinking Stevie’s intellectual disability is being used ironically as a statement about the blind misunderstanding of the other characters’ actions or non actions.
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Lori, I had the same thought about Stevie and I hope we’re wrong. But if it was Stevie who got blown up, I wonder whether it was accidental? If Verloc was looking to get away from his obligations to the Embassy, faking his death would be a decent plan. But I haven’t read ahead of chapter 4 so have no idea where this story is headed, could be way off base.
I'm worried about Stevie too. That's an interesting idea of Jill's that Verloc might be hoping to fake his own death. But if he used Stevie to set off the explosion, he couldn't predict how well he would be able to follow instructions.By the way, what do other people make of Stevie's obsessive drawing of circles? Is he looking for some sense of perfection or completion, or is that reading too much into it?
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Thanks Jenny! I didn't realize he was anti-imperialist.
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Yes, it also reminded me of that book, but I couldn't remember the name.
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2. In Chapter 2, we see that Verloc is in a sense a bureaucrat, in that he provides reports to his superiors. What is Verloc's actual assignment? Do you agree that attacking science is an effective plan? ( I have a feeling that wouldn't be the case today.)
3. In Chapter 3, we get the views of Michaelis, Yundt, and Ossipon. There is a continuing discussion in this book about whether the goal of disruption should be to establish a new order or just to remove order altogether. Do you think Conrad is favoring either of those positions?
4. Stevie, who overhears the conversation, can only take literally any mention of blood or flesh. Today he might be defined by a diagnosis on the autism spectrum or a learning disability. What do you think of Conrad's use of Stevie as a character?
5. In Chapter 4, we switch perspective to see Ossipon and a new character, the Professor, who is an explosives expert with the goal of a perfect detonator. What do you think of his views of the United States vs. Britain? What has Verloc done and why?