Conrad And Poland

Born into a Polish szlachta (noble) family, the extraordinary modern novelist Joseph Conrad maintained, even in exile, strong ties to his Polish heritage and culture. Yet the author earned renown by writing in English, often about nautical adventures in remote parts of the world. In Joseph Conrad's Polish Soul, G. W. Stephen Brodsky seeks to reclaim the essentially Polish sensibility of Conrad's groundbreaking oeuvre. He finds in Conrad's work a distinct Polonism that plays intriguingly with selfhood, freedom, and irony. For Brodsky, Conrad's outlook and writing betray numerous contradictions. Despite the novelist's practical realism, Conrad was drawn to romance, orientalism, and the exotic. Frequently sick, he nevertheless pursued a life at sea. He despised adventurers, yet loved risk. An instinctive skepticism, conservatism, and nationalism complicated his liberalism and respect for humanity, and though he resigned himself to Poland's tragic destiny, Conrad refused to despair over the terribleness of his times. In this incomparable study, Brodsky shows how these inherent aspects of Conrad's personality inform and guide his Polonism, along with the best attributes of his fiction.

The first part of this book analyzes Conrad's first novel, Almayer's Folly, and four of his greatest works: Lord Jim, Nostromo, The Secret Agent and Under Western Eyes. The second part of the book looks at two autobiographical works: A Personal Record and «A Familiar Preface.»

“Enlightening, compassionate, superb” —John Le Carré Winner of the 2018 Cundhill History Prize A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of 2017 One of the New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2017 A visionary exploration of the life and times of Joseph Conrad, his turbulent age of globalization and our own, from one of the most exciting young historians writing today Migration, terrorism, the tensions between global capitalism and nationalism, and a communications revolution: these forces shaped Joseph Conrad’s destiny at the dawn of the twentieth century. In this brilliant new interpretation of one of the great voices in modern literature, Maya Jasanoff reveals Conrad as a prophet of globalization. As an immigrant from Poland to England, and in travels from Malaya to Congo to the Caribbean, Conrad navigated an interconnected world, and captured it in a literary oeuvre of extraordinary depth. His life story delivers a history of globalization from the inside out, and reflects powerfully on the aspirations and challenges of the modern world. Joseph Conrad was born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski in 1857, to Polish parents in the Russian Empire. At sixteen he left the landlocked heart of Europe to become a sailor, and for the next twenty years travelled the world’s oceans before settling permanently in England as an author. He saw the surging, competitive "new imperialism" that planted a flag in almost every populated part of the globe. He got a close look, too, at the places “beyond the end of telegraph cables and mail-boat lines,” and the hypocrisy of the west’s most cherished ideals. In a compelling blend of history, biography, and travelogue, Maya Jasanoff follows Conrad’s routes and the stories of his four greatest works—The Secret Agent, Lord Jim, Heart of Darkness, and Nostromo. Genre-bending, intellectually thrilling, and deeply humane, The Dawn Watch embarks on a spell-binding expedition into the dark heart of Conrad’s world—and through it to our own.

This collection of essays address such issues as Conrad's use of the Polish literary canon, his politics, the role of the Polish courtly tradition in his fiction, his representation of women, the impact of Polish on English style, and the influence of his works on twentieth-century Polish artists such as Andrzej Wajda and Czeslaw Milosz.

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Up-to-date and extensive revision of Najder's much-acclaimed scholarly biography of Conrad, employing newly accessible sources. Joseph Conrad is not only one of the world's great writers of English -- and world -- literature, but was a writer who lived a particularly full and interesting life. For the biographer this is a double-edged sword, however: thereare many periods for which documentation is uncommonly difficult. Zdzislaw Najder's meticulously documented biography first appeared in English in 1983, garnering high praise as the best, most complete biography of Conrad. Najder's command of English, French, Polish, and Russian allowed him access to a greater variety of sources than any other biographer, and his Polish background and his own experience as an exile have afforded him a unique affinity forConrad and his milieu. All this has come into play once again in the present, extensively revised edition: much of its extensive new material was unearthed in newly-opened former east-bloc archives. There is new material on Conrad's father's genealogy and his role in Polish politics; Conrad's service in the French and British merchant marines; his early English reading and correspondence; his experiences in the Congo; the circumstances of writing his memoirs, and much more. In addition, several aspects of Conrad's life and works are more thoroughly analyzed: his problems with the English language; his borrowings from French writers; his attitude toward socialism, his reaction to the reception of his books. Zdzislaw Najder teaches at the European Academy, Cracow.

Joseph Conrad's Authorial Self is organized around the category of the author with some illuminating aspects of Conrad's Polishness as the major area of consideration. It starts with a theoretical treatment of Conrad's authorship, continues through a focus on autobiography along with his creative process, proceeds with analyses of his ideas derived from his Polish heritage as presented in his personality and oeuvre, and moves on to biographies of the writer's relatives. This set is followed by papers on "Amy Foster," a short story of strong Polish resonance and a classic of émigré literature, considerations of translations of his works into Polish, and essays on central/south-central Europe and the sea. The main integrative concept of authorial self is supported by two secondary principles: delimitation by the geographical area covered: mainly Poland, but also Russia and central and south-central Europe, and the chronology of Joseph Conrad's life and works, from influences upon Konradek in Lwów and the significance of East Carpathian poetics to juxtapositions of his oeuvre with early twentieth century authors as well as a contemporary Polish author and translations of his works. The final five papers span the whole period studied in this volume, from the first Polish translation published in 1897 to one of the most recent in 2011, from possible influences upon Conrad in his childhood and youth to the most recent reception of his works in the Balkans. This book is volume 27 of the series Conrad: Eastern and Western Perspectives, edited by Wiesław Krajka.

Originally published in 1941, this book provides a brief study of the life and work of Joseph Conrad ('Poland's English genius') through the lens of his writings. Bradbrook divides Conrad's stories by three main themes: the wonders of the deep, the hollow men and recollections in tranquillity, in order to show Conrad's literary development. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in Conrad's writings.