Photograph of Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad

(1857—1924)

Poland

Biography

Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born novelist who spent most of his adult life in Britain. He is regarded as one of the greatest English novelists, which is even more notable because he did not learn to speak English well until he was in his 20s.

Conrad is recognized as a master prose stylist. Some of his works have a strain of romanticism, but more importantly he is recognized as an important forerunner of Modernist literature. Writing during the apogee of the British Empire, Conrad drew upon his experiences in the British Merchant Navy. In 1894, at the age of 36, he left the sea to become an English author. His first novel, Almayer's Folly, set on the east coast of Borneo and was published in 1895.

Conrad's narrative style and anti-heroic characters have influenced many writers, including Ernest Hemingway, D.H. Lawrence, Graham Greene, William S. Burroughs, Joseph Heller, John Maxwell Coetzee as well as Jerzy Kosinski and inspired such films as Apocalypse Now (drawn from Heart of Darkness).

Joseph Conrad died of a heart attack, and was interred in Canterbury Cemetery, Canterbury, England.

(source: Wikipedia)

ePub Books Available by Joseph Conrad

7 Titles Online

A Set of Six Book Cover Image

A Set of Six [en] (1908)Film!

Certain individualities grow into fame through their vices and their virtues, or simply by their actions, which may have a temporary importance; and then they become forgotten. The names of a few leaders alone survive the end of armed strife and are further pre- served in history; so that,...

Genre: Short Stories

Chance Book Cover Image

Chance [en] (1913)

Chance is narrated by Conrad's regular narrator, Charles Marlow, but is characterised by a complex, nested narrative in which different narrators take up the story at different points and attempt to interpret various episodes in the life of Miss de Barral, the daughter of a convicted swindler...

Genre: Romance

Heart of Darkness Book Cover Image

Heart of Darkness [en] (1899)Film!

In Conrad's haunting tale, Marlow, a seaman and wanderer, recounts his physical and psychological journey in search of the enigmatic Kurtz. Travelling to the heart of the African continent, he discovers how Kurtz has gained his position of power and influence over the local people. Marlow's...

Genres: Action/Adventure, Short Stories

Lord Jim Book Cover Image

Lord Jim [en] (1900)Film!

A hundred years ago a seaman's life was full of danger, but Jim, the first mate on board the Patna, is not afraid of danger. He is young, strong, confident of his bravery. He dreams of great adventures - and the chance to show the world what a hero he is. But the sea is no place for dreamers....

Genre: Psychological Novel

Nostromo Book Cover Image

Nostromo [en] (1904)Film!

A gripping tale of capitalist exploitation and rebellion, set amid the mist-shrouded mountains of a fictional South American republic, employs flashbacks and glimpses of the future to depict the lure of silver and its effects on men. Conrad's deep moral consciousness and masterful narrative...

Genre: Nautical

The Secret Agent Book Cover Image

The Secret Agent [en] (1907)Film!

In The Secret Agent (1907) a triangle of conspiracy is built, then destroyed, by the self-interest of its participants. Mr. Verloc, employed by a foreign embassy to incriminate an anarchist group, instead destroys his family, his illusions, and his own life in a terrorist act gone utterly...

Genre: Espionage/Spy

Under Western Eyes Book Cover Image

Under Western Eyes [en] (1911)Film!

Bomb-throwing assassins, political repression and revolt, emigre revolutionaries infiltrated by a government spy: much of Under Western Eyes is more topical than we would wish. Set in Czarist Russia and in Geneva, and told through the Western eyes of Conrad's English narrator, we are given a...

Genre: Espionage/Spy