F IC TI ON,
"TWIXT LAND AND SEA."
IN one or two of the latest of Mr. Conrad's books some of his admirers have noticed with consternation signs of new and by
no means happy developments both in his matter and style. This change first became evident in The Secret Agent, which, for all its brilliance and interest, lacked, except for a few pages, the especial signs of its author's genius. Oddly enough, the most marked element in the new manner seemed to be the influence of a writer as far removed as possible in his inspira- tion from that of Mr. Conrad—the influence, we mean, of
Mr. Henry James. Much might be written of the effects of Mr. Henry James upon contemporary English fiction. It may be questioned whether there is a single prominent novelist who has not at one time or another fallen under his sway. (Could even Mr. Kipling be confidently quoted as an exception?) At all events, The Secret Agent seemed often to echo Mr. Henry James, not merely in the characteristic formation of his sentences, but even in his equally characteristic method of character-painting. And, whatever may be the value of Mr. James's surreptitious permeations into English literature in general, upon Mr. Conrad the effect was entirely lamentable. It is with deep satisfaction therefore that we see that in his new book he has once more shaken himself free. He has returned with fresh vigour to his earlier course, and is as triumphantly successful in it as he has ever been in the past.
There are three stories contained in 'Twixt Land and Sea, and the Indian Ocean with its islands acts as the ground base for all three of them. Mr. Conrad has lost none of his power of filling his pages with the terrifying glamour of the tropics. The actual descriptions are not many or long, but they are vivid enough to overflow, as it were, upon the rest of the story or to be called up afresh in the reader's memory by the stimulus of a single well-chosen word. Here, in two sentences, for instance, is the Malay Archipelago
"The brig's business was on uncivilized coasts, with obscure rajahs dwelling in nearly unknown bays; with native settlements up mysterious rivers opening their sombre, forest-lined estuaries among a welter of pale green reefs and dazzling sand-banks, in lonely straits of calm blue water all aglitter with sunshine. Alone, far from the beaten tracks, she glided, all white, round dark, frowning headlands, stole out, silent like a ghost, from behind points of land stretching out all black in the moonlight ; or lay hove-to, like a sleeping sea-bird, under the shadow of some name- less mountain waiting for a signal."
On such a background any drama would gain signifi- cance, and Mr. Conrad's dramas would be significant upon any background. The two together, supporting and emphasizing each other, create an overwhelming effect. All three of the stories are alike in this, though in
other ways they differ greatly in feeling. The first of them, "A Smile of Fortune," has more of the spirit of comedy in it than the others, though even there th& comedy is shot with satire and pathos. The interest of the story is psychological: it is of a girl who has lived alone all her lite shut up with her father and a great-aunt, and of the effect • 'Twist Land and Sea. By Joseph Conrad. London: J. M. Dent and Sons. [es.] upon her of the sudden introduction of a, strange man into the house. The denouement is moving, but it is a recollection
of characters rather than of events that is left at the end—of the strangely attractive, wild-beast-like Alice, and of her father, Mr. Jacobus, the fat, heavy-eyed, tranquil ship- chandler, whose past had been so disreputable that none of the respectable inhabitants of the port could speak to him. In "The Secret Sharer," on the other hand, the interest is essentially one of action. Here is the apotheosis of the adventure story. The captain of a sailing-ship anchored one night off an islet in the Malay Archipelago determines out of caprice to take a five hours' anchor-watch by himself. He notices that the rope side-ladder has not been hauled in.
"Not from compunction certainly, but as it were mechanically, I proceeded to get the ladder in myself. Now a side-ladder of that sort is a light affair and comes in easily, yet my vigorous tug, which should have brought it flying on board, merely recoiled upon my body in a totally unexpected jerk. . . . I put my head over the rail. The side of the ship made an opaque belt of shadow on the darkling glossy shimmer of the sea. But I saw at once something elongated and pale floating very close to the ladder. Before I could form a guess a faint flash of phosphorescent light, which seemed to issue suddenly from the naked body of a man, flickered in the sleeping water with the elusive, silent play of summer lightning in a night sky. With a gasp I saw revealed to my stare a pair of feet, the long legs, a broad livid back immersed right up to the neck in a greenish cadaverous glow. One hand, awash, clutched the bottom rung of the ladder."
The man turns out to be a murderer, who has escaped by swimming from another ship anchored on the other side of the island. The captain takes him on board, and tries for four days to conceal him in his cabin without being discovered by the other officers or the steward, until he can swim ashore to another island as the ship passes it. Mr. Conrad succeeds in imparting such realism to this account of an attempt to conceal a man in a cabin a few feet long, which has to be tidied daily by the steward, that his readers' nerves are almost as much set on edge as his hero's. It is, however, in the last story, "Freya of the Seven Isles," that Mr. Conrad achieves his greatest success. In it incidents, characters, and background are woven together into the texture of a tragedy as moving as any that we know. Its elements may seem simple and familiar —two lovers, a jealous rival, and a comic father—but its true elements are different. They are passion and imagination, two gifts of which Mr. Conrad has, perhaps, a larger share than any other writer of to-day.
Previous page
