φαρμακός

Having carried an increasingly dog eared copy of "Lord Jim" through three continents, I have had time to think about the relevance
that Joseph Conrad might have for anybody who is tempted to take to writing as a profession. "Le vrai metier de chien!" as he is reported as
claiming in conversation with Ford Madox Ford.

Conrad should be given to younger writers with a health warning, his depression is sometimes so infectious.
I was puzzled, at first, when in class we were asked to read such a gloomy writer, but his ability to create a plausible, recognisable
world and keep one's curiosity alive as to what might happen next ensured that he became a favourite, albeit over quite a few years.

Also, I remember how, as students, we used discuss the dreadful fate that might await any enthusiastic lady
who would dare marry a literary genius. Biographies of Conrad were unflattering when it came to his almost child-like reliance on a wife who,
if she had been medieval matron, would by now have been canonised as a model of selfless attention to marital duty.
Women in his books seemed to be strangely of another planet, but that might be quickly explained by the fact that the past
is another country and they did things differently there. Their passivity always irritated me, but perhaps they are
a true representation of the sort of women Conrad actually met.

The universal appeal of Conrad's insights, however, seem to be increasing in value, rather than the opposite.
Some years ago I chatted with a friend about the fact that when we first read it "Heart of Darkness" seemed to be a literary fossil
and that Africa was all sorted and organised now. However we admitted that we were probably mistaken and when it comes
to seeing the ongoing effects of colonialism in many countries, Joseph Conrad is as good as any writer to read in an effort
to understand why exploiters and exploited continue to be real life people who fill newspapers daily with their woes.

The enemy within, the unreliable witness, the shadow of mistrust are perennial human realities.

"He was too much one of us not to be dangerous"


The ability that Conrad had in increasing the dramatic importance of seemingly trivial and banal events is his strength.
A promising young seaman loses his licence due to abandoning ship at a time of crisis. This does not seem to be the stuff of
tragedy, but the impression made on everybody who encounters Jim is heightened to almost operatic importance. His own
sensitivity to his position is central to how others perceive him. The tragic play of sin and retribution that makes the central
character charge through the novel is impressive in the telling. Ordinarily, the loss of honour and position would not lead
to summary execution at the hands of an incoherent leader in some obscure jungle stronghold cut all from all "civilizing"
influences. However, Conrad makes the story plausible, if one is able to follow the often distorted logic of Jim's efforts
to rehabilitate himself.

"He was a terrible bungler" was Marlowe's assessment, as his protoge charges from one position to another in search of
an ideal, heroic role that will restore everybody's trust. "He was too much one of us not to be dangerous" brings the truth
of the matter closer. The colonies seem to have been populated with delusional seekers after personal success and fortune.
men mostly, who through dodgy dealings had cut off contact with the dull respectability of life in Europe and whose
view of the ordinary bourgeois was tinged with distain:

The bored married couples in Chapter 7 are mindless participants in the then new travel industry:

they are "just as intelligently receptive of new impressions as their trunks upstairs. Henceforth they would be labelled
as having passed through this and that place, and so would be their luggage."

They, like the natives of Patusan are not "one of us". The bonds of camaraderie that link risk takers in the novel is finely written and the character of Stein, who analyses Jim's
predicament and who is given the last word on his second downfall, creates a sense of a community of men who survive
because they look out for one another and do not sink to the mindless passivity of those outside their group. They are adventurers, entrepreneurs, would-be
heroes.

Readers who find that the expression "one of us" excludes the native people of Patusan in a racist manner are now numerous.
However, it may be read that the docile, conventional members of Jim's family back in England also belong to the less heroic
group whose endeavours so often lead to tragedy and extreme acts.

However, the blinding hubris that so often misleads men of action, is clearly explored and, in the case of the Australian, Chester,
reviled. Piracy, cannibalism, exploitation are part of the pact. It is within the colonising group, not a feature of the colonised community.

The psychological setting of the drama that unfolds is clearly set out by Marlowe early in the novel:

‪"I see well enough now that I hoped for the impossible... for the laying of what is the most obstinate ghost of man's
creation, of the uneasy doubt uprising like a mist, secret and gnawing like a worm, and more chilling than the
certitude of death - the doubt of the sovereign power enthroned in a fixed
standard of conduct."
The multi-cultural Planet that is represented daily by the media would be easily recognised by Conrad,
one of the first truly modern writers.

And, when you think about it, like many of writers and journalists today he had a very frightening mind...

(With apologies to any reader who may find some of this a bit rambling.
I no longer have time to tweak it into better shape.)