Joseph Conrad And Popular Culture

This highly original study opens up a new dimension to Joseph Conrad by revealing his lifelong fascination with the popular culture of his day. Drawing on original archival materials and treating subjects as diverse as Bovril advertising, spirit photography, sea shanties, global tourism, and the new sport of speed-walking, it shows how Conrad's fiction makes a sustained response to early-twentieth-century popular culture and will be of interest to all students, scholars and enthusiasts of Conrad.

This bibliography, the first volume in the new Conrad Studies series published in cooperation with The Joseph Conrad Society (UK), collects and annotates impressions and memories of Joseph Conrad by his family, friends, and acquaintances. It covers full length memoirs as well as newspaper and magazine articles, and in its wide sweep offers abundant details about the novelist's personality and life. Of particular value is Martin Ray's emphasis on difficult-to-trace items and the in-depth coverage of Conrad's trip to the United States in the spring of 1923. An essential tool for the scholar, this book can also be read with pleasure for the light it throws on Conrad the man.

Joseph Conrad: The Short Fiction offers a wide range of perspectives on Conrad’s short stories. Nine essays, by established and emerging scholars, deal with early and classic stories as well as the relatively neglected works of Conrad’s later career. The essays explore in depth the historical and publishing contexts of individual stories and provide insights into Conrad’s practice as a writer of short fiction. These new readings, based on contemporary theoretical and interpretive perspectives, will appeal not only to specialists of literary Modernism but also to the advanced student and the general reader.

A merchant sailor works for a decade, captaining a yacht up and down the coasts of Malaysia, in the hope that his crooked employer will stay true to a promise... Years after a pandemic sweeps across Europe, wiping out its all-white population, a pilgrim returns to his Polish birthplace in search of the only other non-white kid he knew at school... An inscrutable hotelier loses his composure when a secret passage is discovered in his hotel, leading to a mysterious room and a previously hidden existence... Born in what is now Ukraine to Polish parents, naturalised as a British citizen, and schooled on the high seas of international commerce, Joseph Conrad was a true citizen of the world. His novels bore witness to the dehumanising repercussions of empire, explored a world in which state-sponsored terrorism ruined individuals' lives, and pioneered complex narrative structures and subjective points-of-view in what was to become the first wave of literary modernism. To mark his 160th birthday, 14 authors and critics from Britain, Poland and elsewhere have come together to celebrate his legacy with new pieces of fiction and non-fiction. Conrad felt that the writer's task was to offer 'that glimpse of truth for which you have forgotten to ask.' In an age of increasing isolationism, these celebrations remind you of the value of such glimpses.

This is a collection of difficult-to-find and typically early commentary on Conrad¿s life and works. The selections contained shed light on Conrad¿s life and works, as well as the way in which his works were promoted to the public. Selections include those by the American novelist Christopher Morley and the Irish novelist Liam O¿Flaherty. Also included is a previously unpublished essay by Conrad¿s friend Richard Curle. Of particular interest are the promotional materials, which are collected together for the first time and reveal how Conrad was perceived by the general reading public and how he was marketed by his publishers.

Joseph Conrad is one of the most intriguing and important modernist novelists. His writing continues to preoccupy twenty-first-century readers. This introduction by a leading scholar is aimed at students coming to Conrad's work for the first time. The rise of postcolonial studies has inspired interest in Conrad's themes of travel, exploration, and racial and ethnic conflict. John Peters explains how these themes are explored in his major works, Nostromo, Lord Jim and Heart of Darkness, as well as his short stories. He provides an essential overview of Conrad's fascinating life and career and his approach to writing and literature. A guide to further reading is included which points to some of the most useful secondary criticism on Conrad. This is a most comprehensive and concise introduction to studying Conrad, and will be essential reading for students of the twentieth-century novel and of modernism.