Essays on Joseph Conrad in Memory of Professor Zdzisław Najder (1930-2021) / Eseje o Josephie Conradzie ku pamięci Profesora Zdzisława Najdera (1930-2021)
Essays on Joseph Conrad in Memory of Professor Zdzisław Najder (1930-2021) / Eseje o Josephie Conradzie ku pamięci Profesora Zdzisława Najdera (1930-2021)
Contributor(s): Jolanta Dudek (Editor), Andrzej Juszczyk (Editor), Joanna Skolik (Editor)
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego
Keywords: essays; Zdzisław Najder; Polish Joseph Conrad Society
Summary/Abstract: This volume of essays — dedicated to the memory of Professor Zdzisław Najder (1930–2021) — is a collective gift made by Conrad scholars from the United States, Canada and Europe. It comprises seventeen essays in English and twelve in Polish (including several texts containing reminiscences of Professor Najder), a bibliography of Professor Najder’s publications and an index of names. The essays discuss Joseph Conrad’s literary achievements and the ever-relevant questions they continue to raise, as well as drawing attention to Conrad’s European (and especially Polish) cultural roots — a field of research that for many years was of particular interest to Zdzisław Najder, who is shown to have been an unforgettable scholar and colleague — known not only for his thorough research into Conrad’s life and works, but also for his editorial work, his incisive literary criticism, his noble heart, his sensitivity and his friendly and inspiring approach to students. For many years, Professor Najder was the President of the Polish Joseph Conrad Society. He also founded the Jagiellonian University Joseph Conrad Research Centre, one of whose tasks is to publish the Yearbook of Conrad Studies (Poland).
- E-ISBN-13: 978-83-233-7270-7
- Print-ISBN-13: 978-83-233-5040-8
- Page Count: 480
- Publication Year: 2022
- Language: English, Polish
Zdzisław Najder’s Contribution to Conrad Studies in English
Zdzisław Najder’s Contribution to Conrad Studies in English
(Zdzisław Najder’s Contribution to Conrad Studies in English)
- Author(s):John G. Peters
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:11-29
- No. of Pages:19
- Summary/Abstract:This essay surveys and summarizes Zdzisław Najder’s contributions to Conrad scholarship in English in the areas of resources, commentary, and biography. The resources he contributed to Conrad scholarship rest in the numerous Polish documents he first made available to the English-speaking scholarly world. The commentary he contributed brought to the forefront the role of Polish culture in the forming of Conrad’s works, especially the chivalric tradition of honor that was so important in Polish culture of the nineteenth century. Finally, the biographical contributions he made consisted in drawing from numerous sources that were and remain unavailable to other biographers and in producing biographical work that relies heavily on documentation and eschews speculation.
- Price: 1.00 €
Accident and Design: Conrad and Contingency
Accident and Design: Conrad and Contingency
(Accident and Design: Conrad and Contingency)
- Author(s):Laurence Davies
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:33-47
- No. of Pages:14
- Summary/Abstract:In 1896, Joseph Conrad told his publisher that: “Our captivity within the incomprehensiblelogic of accident is the only fact of the universe.” This essay considers theimplications of that claim, including the presence of accidents and contingencies inConrad’s fiction, correspondence, and day-to-day experiences, with an emphasis onhis artistic practice. The individual sections deal with the letters, the relationshipbetween accident and contingency in Conrad’s writings, and a discussion of the shortstory “Falk,” which is particularly rich in accident and contingency.
- Price: 1.00 €
Donkin, Wait—Themes and Idioms in Conrad’s The Nigger of the “Narcissus”
Donkin, Wait—Themes and Idioms in Conrad’s The Nigger of the “Narcissus”
(Donkin, Wait—Themes and Idioms in Conrad’s The Nigger of the “Narcissus”)
- Author(s):Cedric Watts
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:47-61
- No. of Pages:15
- Summary/Abstract:In this essay, I discuss characters, themes and idioms in Conrad’s novel The Niggerof the “Narcissus” (1897). Conrad often makes his villains too caricatural: this is trueof Donkin. The novel’s political outlook is markedly conservative, influenced by theideas of W. E. Henley. The narrator argues, for instance, that “tenderness to suffering”manifests “latent egoism.” In the supernatural covert plot, the ship herself is opposedby Wait and Donkin; and though Wait is subjected to racially prejudicial treatment,he is at least treated sympathetically in his death. Donkin’s cockney idioms were latercorrected by Conrad, but the Cambridge edition of the novel deletes the correctionsand restores the errors.
- Price: 1.00 €
Marlow’s Maelström. A Few Remarks on the Possible Gothic Inspiration of Joseph Conrad’s Fiction: The Case of Lord Jim
Marlow’s Maelström. A Few Remarks on the Possible Gothic Inspiration of Joseph Conrad’s Fiction: The Case of Lord Jim
(Marlow’s Maelström. A Few Remarks on the Possible Gothic Inspiration of Joseph Conrad’s Fiction: The Case of Lord Jim)
- Author(s):Joanna Pypłacz
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:63-78
- No. of Pages:16
- Summary/Abstract:This article discusses the surprising similarities that are to be found between EdgarAllan Poe’s novella “A Descent into the Maelström” and Joseph Conrad’s novel LordJim. Despite the apparent differences—including the obvious fact that each of theseworks belongs to a different genre—they actually have quite a lot in common. First ofall, their main characters are lonely, tortured men who have undergone a trauma atsea. Secondly, both works are set in a characteristic environment that can be describedas Gothic sublime—Lord Jim in particular exhibits many typically Gothic traits. Inaddition, Conrad has given specific hints, such as the mention of the Norwegian seas,which could be considered to be an allusion to Poe (whose short story is set in Norway).Thirdly, both works revolve around the problem of dealing with moral responsibility, difficult choices and deep remorse by means of rationalization. Finally, Poe’s novellaand Conrad’s novel share yet another feature: they are arranged according to thesame compositional scheme, that is “a story within a story,” where the troubled maincharacter confesses his tragic story to a casual, yet rather compassionate friend. Tosum up, all the similar motifs, including the use of the Burkean sublime, as well astell-tale allusions, show that the fact that both works have so much in common mightnot be the result of sheer coincidence.
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“Fidelity to Race” in Conrad’s Lord Jim
“Fidelity to Race” in Conrad’s Lord Jim
(“Fidelity to Race” in Conrad’s Lord Jim)
- Author(s):Gene, M Moore
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:79-90
- No. of Pages:12
- Summary/Abstract:Conrad uses the phrase “awakened fidelity to race” in a long letter to S. S. Pawlingdescribing his plans for The Rescue and the dilemma faced by Lingard torn betweenhis commitment to Hassim and the duty he feels to protect Mrs. Travers from thepirates. As Zdzisław Najder has noted, “the concept of fidelity occupies a central positionwithin the framework of Conrad’s ethical concerns,” and “the motif of fidelityreverberates throughout [Lord Jim]”; but the racial aspects of this concept of fidelityhave remained largely unexplored. This essay considers the confrontation betweenLord Jim and Gentleman Brown in terms of such an “awakened fidelity to race,” andexamines Conrad’s use of light and darkness and descriptions of skin colours morebroadly and symbolically (for instance, in the descriptions of complexions, whichoften change suddenly in surprising ways).
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Conrad’s Language Circles and His Impressionistic Techniques
Conrad’s Language Circles and His Impressionistic Techniques
(Conrad’s Language Circles and His Impressionistic Techniques)
- Author(s):Joanna Kurowska
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:91-104
- No. of Pages:14
- Summary/Abstract:This paper investigates the relationship between Joseph Conrad’s Polish and Englishcultural backgrounds and his use of impressionistic techniques in his two“double-narration” works—the short story “Prince Roman” and the novel Heart ofDarkness; the first influenced by Conrad’s first-hand knowledge of Polish history andselected Polish literary works; the second being in part Conrad’s reaction to contemporarydiscourse regarding Africa and the Africans. The paper also addresses theissue of moral values in the context of impressionism.
- Price: 1.00 €
Conrad’s Personal Voice
Conrad’s Personal Voice
(Conrad’s Personal Voice)
- Author(s):Jakob Lothe
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:105-115
- No. of Pages:11
- Summary/Abstract:This essay links Conrad’s “personal voice,” as Zdzisław Najder understands it, to JakobLothe’s continuing work on the interplay of voice and perspective in Joseph Conrad’sfiction. Focussing on Lord Jim, Lothe also discusses the critical usefulness of the terms“narrator” and “implied author” in Conrad studies. The method is a combination ofnarrative analysis, and narrative hermeneutics.
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Conrad: Words and Reality
Conrad: Words and Reality
(Conrad: Words and Reality)
- Author(s):Hugh Epstein
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:117-128
- No. of Pages:12
- Summary/Abstract:Conrad’s Teacher of Languages states “Words, as is well known, are the great foesof reality”; but Conrad also writes of “technical language … created by simple menwith keen eyes for the real aspect of the things they see in their trade.” Charles Gouldlaments his Blanco fellow-travellers’ “trusting in words of some sort”—and so on.There have been many fine studies of Conrad’s language and Conrad and language(Fenandez; Senn; Ray; Galt Harpham; Greaney; Peters among others), and most recentlya volume of essays, Conrad and Language (Baxter and Hampson, eds.) devotedto “a questioning of the relation of words and things and a recognition of language’sapproximate representation of reality.” The particular focus of my own contributionto this discussion of the bifold nature of Conrad’s conceptions of language will be onwords themselves: “words, groups of words standing alone” (CL, 2:200), their weightand force, their fraudulence and truth as they sound in Conrad’s fiction. A range ofinstances and allusions to “words” drawn from his novels, as well as his letters andessays, finds out the contest between romance and scepticism that is such a productiveforce for Conrad’s strenuous fictional writing. The essay concludes by identifying thefive most important words for Conrad as a novelist, showing how they embodythe distinctiveness of his unillusioned search to tie words to reality.
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Joseph Conrad’s Linguistic Identities
Joseph Conrad’s Linguistic Identities
(Joseph Conrad’s Linguistic Identities)
- Author(s):Ewa Kujawska-Lis
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:129-141
- No. of Pages:13
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; language; identity; sociolinguistics
- Summary/Abstract:Being multilingual himself, Conrad had an extraordinary linguistic awareness. Hewas not only proficient in various languages, but also conscious of the ways in whichlanguage contributes to one’s national identity and professional distinctness. In hisprivate life, he created his distinct “selves” through different languages. His nationalidentity as a Pole was bound with his mother tongue that he continued to speak whenamongst his compatriots. His professional careers, first as a mariner, then as a writer,were linked with his command of English and its varieties. He employed French tocreate his “intellectual self.” This paper examines briefly Conrad’s different linguisticidentities, considering sociolinguistic approaches to language and identity.
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The Deathbed Repentance in Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilych” and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness
The Deathbed Repentance in Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilych” and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness
(The Deathbed Repentance in Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilych” and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness)
- Author(s):Brygida Pudełko
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:143-154
- No. of Pages:12
- Summary/Abstract:Joseph Conrad’s relation to Lev Tolstoy was complex—although he considered “Turgenev(and perhaps Tolstoy) the only two worthy” of Constance Garnett’s talent asa translator, Tolstoy’s works were judged severely by him. Conrad could not see anymerit in Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilych” and The Kreutzer Sonata, writing ina letter to John Galsworthy of “the gratuitous atrocity” of the deathbed repentance ofIvan Ilych and “the monstrous stupidity of such thing as the Kreutzer Sonata.” Despitethis open animosity there are certain commonalities in the work of both writer’s thatthis paper seeks to explore.In “The Death of Ivan Ilych” (1886) the titular character cherishes an illusion thathe is a successful person who has achieved happiness, only to discover through histerminal illness the shallowness of this view. His pain allows him to see that his lifehas been artificial because it lacked empathy for other people. When Ilych admits tohimself that his family would be better off with him dead, he is freed from his painand in his final moments, death seems no longer frightening. Though this death canbe seen as an object lesson in the poverty of a life lived without spiritual meaning, hisfinal spoken word is “joy!”
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Railway Children: How Conrad Almost Met Kafka
Railway Children: How Conrad Almost Met Kafka
(Railway Children: How Conrad Almost Met Kafka)
- Author(s):Anthony Fothergill
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:155-167
- No. of Pages:13
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; Franz Kafka; Albert Thys; Joseph Loewy; the Congo; railways and colonial exploitation; narrative style; the “Kafkaesque”
- Summary/Abstract:Although Franz Kafka never met Joseph Conrad, there are uncanny links betweenthem which the essay explores. Both wrote stories implicitly about the Congo. ForConrad it was from his actual experience, in Heart of Darkness and “Outpost of Progress.”In Kafka’s case his “experience” was virtual, in that he wrote two fragmentaryaccounts, one set in Africa, the other, “Memoirs of the Kalda Railway,” set in Russia,but both purely fictional, based on his Uncle Joseph Loewy’s memories of life in theCongo. But, as a missing link, Conrad and Loewy were both employed by AlbertThys, director of the Brussels Société Anonyme trading company, and sent almost atthe same time, to work in the Congo. The essay identifies uncanny affinities in thefictional accounts by Conrad and Kafka, bringing together thematic and stylisticsimilarities, surrounding the motif of speculative railway-building projects.
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Conrad and Forster: Not Only a Matter of Style
Conrad and Forster: Not Only a Matter of Style
(Conrad and Forster: Not Only a Matter of Style)
- Author(s):Andrzej Busza
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:169-184
- No. of Pages:16
- Summary/Abstract:Although a whole generation separated them, as active novelists Joseph Conrad andE. M. Forster were virtually contemporaries, producing their best work (with oneexception) in the decade preceding the outbreak of the First World War. The essayjuxtaposes the two writers, using one as a foil to the other, and thereby demonstratingthe co-presence of two distinct and in telling ways contrary strains in early twentieth-century British writing. Both writers reveal residual legacies of the Romanticmovement. However, whereas Conrad still has in many ways a nineteenth-centuryframe of mind and sensibility, Forster is already a post-Victorian, designated by manyan Edwardian, or even a Georgian, as Virginia Woolf prefers to classify him. WhileConrad shows certain positivist and organicist tendencies, stressing, among otherthings, the importance of communal bonds: duty, solidarity, loyalty, tradition; Forster,feeling threatened by the mass pressures, sprawl, muddle, and fragmentation of themodern world, values above all individual vision, personal relations and the internalorder of art. In a broadly philosophical sense, Conrad is an absolutist and his ethicshave a formal character; while Forster’s ethics overlap with his aesthetic proclivities,are relativistic and subjectivist. These distinctions are reflected in the nature of theirprose and the structure of their narratives.
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Zdzisław Najder’s Aesthetic and Hermeneutic Reading of Lord Jim in the Light of Roman Ingarden’s Phenomenology
Zdzisław Najder’s Aesthetic and Hermeneutic Reading of Lord Jim in the Light of Roman Ingarden’s Phenomenology
(Zdzisław Najder’s Aesthetic and Hermeneutic Reading of Lord Jim in the Light of Roman Ingarden’s Phenomenology)
- Author(s):Jolanta Dudek
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:185-206
- No. of Pages:22
- Summary/Abstract:The aim of my paper is to show that Zdzisław Najder’s approach to Conrad was at leastin part inspired by the phenomenology of Roman Ingarden.The point of departure for Ingarden’s phenomenology is the rejection of abstractphilosophical speculation in favour of first-hand sensual contact with reality. Thiswould seem to concord with Conrad’s conviction that the artist’s task is “by thepower of the written work to make you hear, to make you feel—it is, before all tomake you see.”Ingarden makes a very clear distinction between the schematic literary work of art(which abounds in so-called places of indeterminacy) and its aesthetic concretizationby a particular reader. He observes that aesthetic qualities—which may be valued asbeing positive or negative—are dependent on the artistic qualities which are to befound in each of the “layers” or “strata” of the work and in each of its sequential parts.The four “layers” or “strata” are those of sound, meaning, represented objects (designatedby means of “states of affairs,” which in turn are determined by the meaningsof words and sentences) and schematized aspects (through which the representedobjects manifest themselves).Ingarden analyses various aspects of interior and exterior reality that have beentransformed within literary works and observes that in real life this reality manifestsitself to us not as a ready-made and ordered collection of objects, events and relations,but, as we read in the preface to The Nigger of the “Narcissus,” rather as a riot ofmulticoloured phenomena of various shapes and forms—individual phenomena thatengage the artist’s senses and feelings, demanding of him “A single-minded attemptto render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe by bringing to light thetruth manifold and one, underlying its every aspect. … Their one and illuminatingquality—the very truth of their existence.” Ingarden’s way of saying this would beto speak of experiencing those particularly important aesthetic qualities—which hecalled “metaphysical qualities”—that “illuminate” the situations and events whichare represented in the work. One of them is the tragic element of Lord Jim, which—asNajder has shown—permeates the overall structure of Conrad’s novel, including theconstruction of the narrative time perspective.This process of discovering simple or derivative metaphysical qualities—whichpermeate and illuminate the situations and events that are shown in the literary workof art—therefore exhibits the characteristics of hermeneutic cognition as understoodby Heidegger (whom Ingarden cites in this regard), since it reveals the deeper meaningof our existence (and culture) as well as its hidden primary fabric.
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Professor Najder as the Narrator. A Reminiscence
Professor Najder as the Narrator. A Reminiscence
(Professor Najder as the Narrator. A Reminiscence)
- Author(s):Marcin Piechota
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts
- Page Range:207-218
- No. of Pages:12
- Keywords:Najder; teacher; Opole; university; The Secret Agent; narrator; ideals
- Summary/Abstract:It is a person record of author’s relation with Professor Najder given from three differentperspectives. First, Najder is shown as an outstanding teacher who, with hisattitude and open-mindedness, differed substantially from author’s previous teachers.Then Najder is presented as author’s boss, demanding but fair, thanks to which theircooperation was fruitful and successful. Finally, Najder is shown as the author’s friendand mentor, a person whom he could trust and believe, a man faithful to his idealsand preconceptions.
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A Note of Gratitude
A Note of Gratitude
(A Note of Gratitude)
- Author(s):Joanna Kurowska
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:219-220
- No. of Pages:2
- Price: 1.00 €
Zdzisław Najder and Hans van Marle
Zdzisław Najder and Hans van Marle
(Zdzisław Najder and Hans van Marle)
- Author(s):Gene, M Moore
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:221-222
- No. of Pages:2
- Price: 1.00 €
Zdzisław Najder – badacz Conrada
Zdzisław Najder – badacz Conrada
(Zdzisław Najder as a Conrad Scholar)
- Author(s):Stefan Zabierowski
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:225-261
- No. of Pages:37
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; Zdzisław Najder; biography; interpretation
- Summary/Abstract:This article discusses Zdzisław Najder’s contribution to Conrad studies in Poland.As a Conrad critic, Najder first came to the attention of Polish public opinion in1957. His literary criticism was highly regarded by the renowned writer and Conradexpert Maria Dąbrowska. In the 1970s, Najder’s work gained worldwide recognition.His main achievements were a scholarly reconstruction of Conrad’s biography, ananalysis of the author’s artistic achievement and bringing to light the world of ideasthat shaped the Conradian view of the world. Najder also has a place of his own asthe Polish editor of Conrad’s complete works in commendable Polish translations. AllNajder’s achievements show that he is the most eminent Polish Conrad scholar.
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Conrad jako czytelnik „Wędrowca”
Conrad jako czytelnik „Wędrowca”
(Conrad as a Reader of the Magazine Wędrowiec)
- Author(s):Agnieszka Adamowicz-Pośpiech
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:263-281
- No. of Pages:19
- Keywords:Wędrowiec; travel magazine; Conrad; geography; Africa; the Arctic; exploration
- Summary/Abstract:Conrad was “a reading boy” and he was an avid reader not only of books, but also ofmagazines. One which he read on a regular basis and which was remembered by hisfriends was a weekly called Wędrowiec (The Wanderer). Wędrowiec was a periodicalwhich originally dealt with the subjects of travel and geography, but later also touchedon social, cultural and political themes. It was launched by Józef Unger and was publishedin Warsaw from 1863 to 1906. It reprinted and translated a number of articlesfrom the French travel journal Le Tour du Monde: Nouveau Journal Des Voyagesand generally followed its editorial principles and layout, together with its elaborateengravings. It was targeted at a general readership and gave detailed descriptions ofmost of the great expeditions which marked the turn of the century. The aim of thepresent article is to give a general outline of the texts that the young Conrad couldhave read in this travel magazine and to see whether there are any connections betweenhis early “reading diet” and his subsequent literary output, to say nothing ofhis decision to go to sea.
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Kolebka rzemiosła
Kolebka rzemiosła
(The Nursery of the Craft)
- Author(s):Marek Pacukiewicz
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:283-297
- No. of Pages:15
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; The Nursery of the Craft; The Mirror of the Sea; A Personal Record Zdzisław Najder; literary biography; modern humanities science of culture; semiotic model of culture;;
- Summary/Abstract:There are two ways of constructing literary biography in modern humanities: throughLife of a Writer or through Work of an Author. Zdzisław Najder has proposed anotherperspective which is based on “lexicography” of most important elements of a particularcultural tradition. In this manner biography of Joseph Conrad-Korzeniowskibecomes a part of science of culture, its subject being a tradition considered as semioticmodel of culture.
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Denegacyjne i intertekstualne implikacje Uśmiechu losu Josepha Conrada-Korzeniowskiego
Denegacyjne i intertekstualne implikacje Uśmiechu losu Josepha Conrada-Korzeniowskiego
(A Denegative and Intertextual Implications of Jospeh Conrad’s “A Smile of Fortune”)
- Author(s):Grażyna Maria Teresa Branny
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:299-318
- No. of Pages:20
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; “A Smile of Fortune;” denegation; intertextuality; incest
- Summary/Abstract:The present article is a part of a larger project on Conrad’s less known short fiction, thearea of his writing which is largely undervalued, and even deprecated at times. Thepaper’s aim is to enhance the appreciation of “A Smile of Fortune,” by drawing attentionto its “inner texture” as representative of Conrad’s “art of expression,” especiallyin view of the writer’s own belief in the supremacy of form over content as well as“suggestiveness” over “explicitness” in his fiction. To achieve this aim “close reading,”intertextual, comparative and denegative approaches to Conrad’s story have beenadopted, especially in relation to Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom! and Light in Augustas well as Bernard Malamud’s short story The Magic Barrel and Herman Melville’snovel Moby Dick. The intertextual and comparative reading of A Smile of Fortunewith Faulkner’s novels as a point of reference, reveals the workings in Conrad’s storyof a modernist device of denegation, of which evidently Conrad seems to have beena precursor rather than Faulkner. Conrad’s use of denegation in his tale reveals thenew implications of the story’s ending side by side with the theme of incest at its core.
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Między „Ja”, „Innym” i sobą samym. Podwojone osobowości w ’Twixt Land and Sea Josepha Conrada
Między „Ja”, „Innym” i sobą samym. Podwojone osobowości w ’Twixt Land and Sea Josepha Conrada
(Between “I”, “Other” and Self: Double Personalities in ’Twixt Land and Sea by Joseph Conrad)
- Author(s):Andrzej Juszczyk
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:319-337
- No. of Pages:19
- Keywords:doubleness; double; dialectic; identity; phantasm; Conard Joseph; “The Secret Sharer”; “A Smile of Fortune”; “Freya of the Seven Isles”
- Summary/Abstract:The article is an attempt to read a collection of short stories by Joseph Conrad – entitled’Twixt Land and Sea – not as three separate texts, but as a kind of whole, in whichthe dominant strategy turns out to be the doubling of the text on many planes. Thecharacters in each story, as well as in the whole set, are sometimes juxtaposed as surprisingpairs. Relationship between these characters seems to be specially complicated:they are seemingly dichotomous, but in fact this opposite becomes the starting pointfor a more complicated relationship. All this seems to serve the specific dialectics ofthe subject, which results in the suspension of our judgment of reality.
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Trylogia malajska Josepha Conrada jako „traktat” o przygodzie
Trylogia malajska Josepha Conrada jako „traktat” o przygodzie
(Joseph Conrad’s Malayan Trilogy)
- Author(s):Anna Szczepan-Wojnarska
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:339-349
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:romance; adventure novel; Malayan Trilogy; Joseph Conrad
- Summary/Abstract:Joseph Conrad’s Malayan Trilogy serves as an example of Conrad’s creative use ofconventional forms such as the adventure novel or the romance to produce a new form.This interpretation shows the writer’s attempt to bring to light the ethical aspect of theconcept of “adventure,” which is understood as an illusion which helps to appeasethe fear aroused by the random nature of human existence.
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Lord Jim w oczach fenomenologa. Na przykładzie badań literackich Romana Ingardena
Lord Jim w oczach fenomenologa. Na przykładzie badań literackich Romana Ingardena
(Lord Jim Seen Through the Eyes of Phenomenologists: The Case of Roman Ingarden)
- Author(s):Łukasz Front
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:351-366
- No. of Pages:16
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; Lord Jim; Roman Ingarden; phenomenology
- Summary/Abstract:Roman Ingarden (1893–1970) was an eminent philosopher. His phenomenologicalresearch concerned, among others, two areas: the philosophy of literature and thetheory of literature. In particular, we shall analyse his book entitled O poznawaniudzieła literackiego (The Cognition of the Literary Work of Art). Ingarden concentrateson the specific qualities of the literary work (resp. literary work of art) and its perception.He deliberates, for instance, on the phenomena of temporal perspective in theconcretization of the literary work. The phenomena of temporal perspective appearin various forms (and in various modifications): on the one hand, in the representedtime, i.e., in the events and processes of the presented world of a literary work, and,on the other hand, also in the order of the sequence of its parts. To make it clearer,Ingarden gives, among others, several exemplifications from Joseph Conrad’s LordJim. Thus, this article is a concise analysis of an excerpt of the Ingarden’s book, and,simultaneously, an attempt to apply the concepts of phenomenology to a reading ofConrad’s novel.
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Dialektyka światła i ciemności w prozie Josepha Conrada
Dialektyka światła i ciemności w prozie Josepha Conrada
(The Dialectics of Light and Darkness in Conrad’s Fiction)
- Author(s):Monika Malessa-Drohomirecka
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:367-377
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:light; darkness; pessimism; dialectic; fear; the unpredictability of the worldy; symbolism
- Summary/Abstract:Man’s predicament at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries was a constantsubject of concern for Conrad and it permeated his work. Recurring imagesof light and darkness – which have meaningful implications – convey this anxiety.A play of light and darkness reflects the conflicts and contradictions that arise withinthe human soul. Shadows, mist and the dazzling light of the tropical sun – which canmake us lose our bearings – suggest the inscrutability of human condition, while theglimmering flame of candle light portrays the fragility and uncertainty of the worldand the human soul, both of which elude cognition. The symbolism of light and darknesswhich depicts the mysteriousness of human nature has become a characteristicfeature of Conrad’s fiction.
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Konwencje. Stanisław Vincenz i Zdzisław Najder o europejskości Conrada
Konwencje. Stanisław Vincenz i Zdzisław Najder o europejskości Conrada
(Conventions: Stanisław Vincenz and Zdzisław Najder on Conrad’s Europeanness)
- Author(s):Wiesław Ratajczak
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:379-390
- No. of Pages:12
- Keywords:conventions; European identity; the ethos of chivalry; Joseph Conrad; Stanisław Vincenz; Zdzisław Najder; spiritual environment
- Summary/Abstract:Zdzisław Najder and Stanisław Vincenz throw light on the European aspect of JosephConrad’s works from different perspectives. Both take into account the change ofspiritual environment that the future writer experienced in his youth. Both arriveat the conclusion that in Conrad’s works there is a constant opposition between theethos of fidelity – which is fundamental to Polish culture – and the West’s pragmaticapproach to life. They both consider the clash of attitudes and the confrontation ofincompatible values to be the organizing principle of Conrad’s works. In Vincenz’sanalysis, the notion of convention relates to the most permanent human ideas, attitudesand values that are to be found in Conrad’s writing and this brings him closeto Najder’s understanding of the Conradian idea of fidelity. Both see Conrad as theinsightful critic of a culture that has been dominated by economic interests and relativism.
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Echa romantyzmu polskiego w Korsarzu Josepha Conrada
Echa romantyzmu polskiego w Korsarzu Josepha Conrada
(The Echoes of Polish Romanticism in The Rover by Joseph Conrad)
- Author(s):Karol Samsel
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:391-423
- No. of Pages:33
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; The Rover; Polish Romanticism; (haunted) intertextuality; interfigurality; psychoanalysis; the anxiety of influence; Harold Bloom, Michael Riffaterre; Pan Tadeusz; Father Marek; The Silver Dream of Salomea
- Summary/Abstract:The echoes of Polish Romanticism in The Rover resonate and – therefore – overlapin a system that is difficult to separate because of its intricate interweaving of intertextualdependences. The dominant accent of that Polish-Romantic intertextualityis probably Adam Mickiewicz’s Pan Tadeusz, which would also seem to be essentialfor the private decisions of the writer (here meaning Conrad being haunted by thethought of returning to Poland). That is not all, however, for one can also detect echoesof a possible reminiscence of a reading of Juliusz Słowacki’s Father Marek and TheSilver Dream of Salomea, which here overlap with the Mickiewicz intertexts. Finally,the intertextual “flickering” of succeeding figures and places presented in The Rovercould here be described in terms of so-called “interfigurality” as well as the idea ofnumerous interfigural accumulations. At first sight, Arlette is Mickiewicz’s Zosia(just as Peyrol is Jacek Soplica, young Tadeusz—the Count etc.), but she has alsobeen endowed with elements of Słowacki’s Judith and Salomea, primarily becauseof the phrenesis of description used by Conrad. Similarly, Escampobar appears tobe reminiscent of Mickiewicz’s Soplicowo as well as Słowacki’s Bar and Stempowce.The Rover is a unique example of Polish-Romantic intertextuality in a Conradnovel, which would indicate (through many interfigural accumulations) the insufficiencyConrad’s command of the organisation of the novel’s universe. This specificcase should be re-read in the light of Riffaterre’s and Bloom’s research, above all inthe field of discovering further relations between intertextuality and psychoanalysisand that of deepening the theory of the anxiety of influence. The Polish-Romanticintertextuality which is visible in The Rover might be responsible for the unconsciouscrystalizing of an unfortunate analogy with the French Revolution as described byConrad, who indulges in recurrences of Polish-Romantic motives proceeding fromhis imaginarium, thus recalling prominent Romantic representations of the feudalborderland uprisings of the eighteenth century (the Koliivshchyna Rebellion andthe Confederation of Bar). In order to excuse Conrad as well as to motivate his unconsciousinsistence on unifying styles (which, being unconscious, should be calledan “inclination”), it is reasonable in one’s own analysis to keep close to that field ofresearch which is called haunted intertextuality.
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J.C. i Z.N.
J.C. i Z.N.
(J.C. and Z.N.)
- Author(s):Michał Komar
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:425-435
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; Zdzisław Najder; biography
- Summary/Abstract:A personal recollection. An economy student, who had been expelled from the MainSchool of Planning and Statistics (now: Warsaw School of Economics) read in 1969a volume of Joseph Conrad’s letters, edited by Zdzisław Najder and translated byHalina Carroll-Najder. Reading that book made him reverse his plans. Setting asidethe works of Adam Smith and David Ricardo he delved into Joseph Conrad’s richoutput. He is the author of many books and film scripts, among them an acclaimedbook Conrad’s Hell (Piekło Conrada) and several theatre and TV adaptations basedon Conrad’s works.
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Śladami Najdera
Śladami Najdera
(In the Footsteps of Najder)
- Author(s):Joanna Skolik
- Language:Polish
- Subject(s):Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:437-447
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:Joseph Conrad; Zdzisław Najder; biography; Polish Joseph Conrad Society
- Summary/Abstract:I write about my acquaintance with Professor Najder, thanks to whom I have beeninterested in Joseph Conrad all my life. The history of my acquaintance with theProfessor is at the same time the history of my adventure with Conrad. ProfessorNajder first became my Guide to the writer’s works and then my Guiding Light. Andit all started with my MA thesis. It was at the end of the 1980s, when I was writinga thesis on two visions of the apocalypse (Coppola and Conrad). Looking for materialson Conrad, I mainly reached for Najder’s texts. Many years later, I met the Professorand under his supervision worked on my PhD thesis. Later we worked togetheron a collection of Polish Conradian documentary sources. I recall the Professor asPresident of the Polish Joseph Conrad Society and write about the important rolehe plays in Conrad studies. Listening to the discussions that took place around thepapers delivered during the sessions (and also backstage) of the conferences I attended,I understood the importance of the things Professor spoke and wrote about, especiallyin texts published in English and addressed to an English-speaking audience. I writeabout the fact that the Professor’s dream of creating a Conrad Centre eventually cametrue in 2006, when the Conradianum – The Jagiellonian University Joseph ConradResearch Centre – was established in Cracow.
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