Short Stories by Joseph Conrad

The reviewer has picked three specific stories,namely- Amy Foster,The Informer and The Idiots.I will restrict myself to them too.
Amy Foster- The plot is one of story within a story,a literally tool Conrad often used.Amy's story is being described to the narrator by Kennedy,a Doctor friend.The main reviewer has given the storyline of the book.I am just interested in how this novel fits in his larger oeuvre.Amy's love is Yanko Goorall who is based on Conrad himself.
Like Yanko, Conrad too is a Pole living in England, far from his native land.The book is believed to reflect Conrad's own social alienation in English society.We again find the setting of a seaboard forming the backdrop of the plot.The two things that stand out are distinctive narrative technique and the anti-heroic characters.
The cause of Amy's going away is almost ludicrous and leads to the tragic end of the novel.

The Informer-Mr X to say the least is a fascinating figure.The distinctions between him and the author becomes grey as the novel progresses.The main story is again of a love affair between the woman who owned the hideout and her comrade.The story is told by Mr. X to the author,so again a story within a story.The end is tragic with Sevrin being found out as a mole in their anarchist group.

The Idiots:Perhaps the most tragic of the three short stories,in this case the driver narrates the story to the author.The misfortunes of the family are unnatural and it is unable to cope with them.Of all the three this is most direct in its criticism of the society.If not for the ridicule and the social conventions the idiot children might not have suffered as much as they do.


General Characteristics of Conrad's works - Most of his works have elements of realism,romanticism and adventure.His works and narrative modes are a precursor to the modernist literary movement.The narration is in omniscient third person narrative and story telling forms a major part of his narrative.

Ravi Prakash
2007CE10449

PS-The writers that i got to review were Kafka(austrian wrote in german),Hermann Hesse(german wrote in german) and Conrad(polish who couldnt speak fluent english till very late in his career).And till now the only thing i admired about central-eastern europe was their women.Well music too.