four candles

Joseph Conrad to John Galsworthy

Pent Farm

1st Sept. 1904.

Dearest Jack!

Finished!* finished! on the 30th in Hope's house in Stanford in Essex, where I had to take off my brain that seemed to turn to water.

For a solid fortnight, I've been sitting up. And all the time horrible toothache. On the 27th had to wire for dentist (couldn't leave the work) who came at 2 and dragged at the infernal thing which seemed rooted in my very soul. The horror came away at last, leaving however one root in the gum. Then he grubbed for that till I leapt out of the chair. Thereupon old Walton said: "I don't think your nerves will stand any more of this."

I went back to my MS at six p.m. At 11:30 something happened--what it is, I don't know. I was writing, and raised my eyes to look at the clock. The next thing I know I was sitting (not lying) on the concrete outside the door. When I crawled in I found it was nearly one. I managed to get upstairs and said to Jessie: "We must be off to-morrow." I took 30 drops of chlorodyne,--and slept till 7. Sydney went off on his bike to Ashford at 8:30, and at 10 the motor car was in the yard: a 12 h.p. Darracq. I sat by the man's side like a corpse. Between Canterbury and Faversham he said to me, "You look ill, sir, shall I stop?" Sittingbourne I remember as a brandy and soda. Good road. Steady 24 miles an hour. In Chatham, street crowded, packed. Going dead slow knocked down a man,--old chap, apparently a bricklayer. Crowd around cursing and howling. Helped him to my front seat and I standing on step got him to the hospital in 10 minutes. No harm. Only shaken. Saw him all comfy in bed for the rest of the day.

In Rochester, Hope waiting for us. Had something to eat,--and tasted it too, for the first time in 10 days. On crossing the river, began to revive on the ferry. Jessie very good and Borys quite a man watching over Mama's "poor leg" and warning off porters with luggage. At five, in sight of Stanford-le-Hope Railway station, petrol gave out. Man ran on and ran back with two gallon tin.

That night I slept. Worked all day. In the evening dear Mrs. Hope (who is not used to that sort of thing) gave me four candles and I went on. I finished at 3. Took me another half-hour to check the numbering of the pages, write a letter to P. and so on.

I had not the heart to write to you that same night nor yet the next day. Wasn't sure I would survive. But I have survived extremely well. I feel no elation. The strain has been too great for that. But I am quite recovered and ready for work again. There can be no stoppage till end of November when the Sketches'll be finished.** And then, I fancy, something will have to be done to get away.

I was with Pinker yesterday talking matters over. If I had known your Hampstead address I would have wired you. There is wanting to the finish of this undertaking the sanction of your presence and voice.

Drop me a line. Come down if you can! But I hardly dare to suggest that.

I don't know how you are, how everybody is.

I'll write to you soon. Love from all.

* Nostromo.

** The Sea Sketches: viz: The Mirror of the Sea.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 333-35.

nervous force

Joseph Conrad to H. G. Wells

Pent Farm
30 Nov. '03.

My Dear H. G.,
Indeed I did not expect you in this awful weather, especially as Jessie reported you with a cold.

I was laid by the knee (this time) the day after we travelled up together. I did not feel particularly bright even then, or else I would have succumbed to your blandishments and stayed for a dinner and a chat in town.

Things are bad with me--there's no disguising the fact. Not only is the scribbling awfully in arrears but there's no "spring" in me to grapple with it effectually. Formerly in my sea life, a difficulty nerved me to the effort; now I perceive it is not so. However, don't imagine I've given up, but there is an uncomfortable sense of losing my footing in deep waters.

Romance's gone into 2nd ed: I hear. That, no doubt, does not mean much, but still it is better than any of my other books did do. Is Men in the Moon doing well for you--I mean really well? After all, my dear boy, for all our faith in our good intentions and even in our achievements, a paper success (as I call it) is not a strong enough tonic. I say so because for me, writing--the only possible writing--is just simply the conversion of nervous force into phrases. With you too, I am sure, tho' in your case it is the disciplined intelligence which gives the signal--the impulse. For me it is a matter of chance, stupid chance. But the fact remains that when the nervous force is exhausted the phrases don't come--and no tension of will can help.

Don't imagine I am grumbling. I had ten times the luck I deserved. All this talk is very stupid but it comforts me to worry you a little.

Our love to all your house. I am touched by Archer's Repentance (Would do as title for short story). It strikes me, my dear Wells, that, in your quiet, almost stealthy way, you are doing a lot for me; if it were not for you a lot of people would not know of my existence, anything palpable, and still less of my involved form of narrative. I will be delighted to meet Prof. York Powell. Don't forget to send to me Metchnikov's book. I am really curious to see that.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 321.

the revealing life

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

Pent Farm,

Stanford, Near Hythe,

Kent.

12. Nov. 1900.

Dearest E.

You are great and good.

Yes! you've put your finger on the plague spot. The division of the book* into two parts which is the basis of your criticism demonstrates to me once more your amazing insight; and your analysis of the effect of the book puts into words precisely and suggestively the dumb thoughts of every reader--and my own.

Such is indeed the effect of the book; the effect which you can name and others can only feel. I admit I stood for a great triumph and I have only succeeded in giving myself utterly away. Nobody'll see it, but you have detected me falling back into my lump of clay I had been lugging up from the bottom of the pit, with the idea of breathing big life into it. And all I have done was to let it fall with a silly crash.

For what is fundamentally wrong with the book--the cause and the effect--is want of power. I do not mean the 'power' of reviewers' jargon. I mean the want of illuminating imagination. I wanted to obtain a sort of lurid light out (of) the very events. You know what I have done--alas! I haven't been strong enough to breathe the right sort of life into my clay--the revealing life.

I've been satanically ambitious, but there's nothing of a devil in me, worse luck. The Outcast is a heap of sand, the Nigger a splash of water, Jim a lump of clay. A stone, I suppose will be my next gift to the impatient mankind--before I get drowned in mud to which even my supreme struggles won't give a simulacrum of life. Poor mankind! Drop a tear for it--but look how infinitely more pathetic I am! This pathos is a kind of triumph no criticism can touch. Like the philosopher who crowed at the Universe I shall know when I am utterly squashed. This time I am only very bruised, very sore, very humiliated.

This is the effect of the book upon me; the intimate and personal effect. Humiliation. Not extinction. Not yet. All of you stand by me so nobly that I must still exist. There is You, always, and never dismayed I had an amazing note from Lucas. Amazing! This morning a letter came from Henry James. Ah! You rub in the balm till every sore smarts--therefore I exist. The time will come when you shall get tired of tending true and most well-intentioned sham--and then the end'll come too.

But keep up! keep up! Let me exhort you earnestly to keep up! as long as you can.

I send you the H J. letter. A draught from the Fountain of Eternal Youth. Wouldn't you think a boy had written it? Such enthusiasm! Wonderful old man, with his record of wonderful work! It is, I believe, seriously intended (the latter) as confidential. And to you alone I show it--keep his secret for us both. No more now. I've read Petersburg tales** Phew! That is something! That is many things and the only thing it is written! It is. That work is genuine, undeniable, constructed and inhabited. It hath foundation and life. I hope the writer will deign to recognize my most fraternal welcome!

Yours ever

J. C.

PS Pray send the James autograph back--registered. Our great love to you three. We must meet soon.

*Lord Jim

**Petersburg Tales, by Olive Garnett (Heinemann, 1900.)

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.171-73.

a cairn over a dead hero

Joseph Conrad to John Galsworthy

Pent Farm

Friday [ab. 20th July 1900]

Dearest Jack,

We are off in an hour--at last, and shall be back on the 16 or 17 Aug. to give their holidays to various children.

I've written to Blackwood mainly for the purpose of insinuating amongst other matters that a quick decision as to your story would be welcome. He has your address, but hurry of any sort is not in the tradition of the "House."

Meldrum professes great admiration for the M. of D.* It is evident to me he has been struck plumb-centre, and I am glad to find him discriminative. This does not settle the question of publication, but his opinion has a certain weight with Mr. B'wood.

The end of L. J.** has been pulled off with a steady drag of 21 hours. I sent my wife and child out of the house (to London) and sat down at 9 a. m. with a desperate resolve to be done with it. Now and then I took a walk round the house, out at one door in at the other. Ten-minute meals. A great hush. Cigarette ends growing into a mound similar to a cairn over a dead hero. Moon rose over the barn, looked in at the window and climbed out of sight. Dawn broke, brightened. I put the lamp out and went on, with the morning breeze blowing the sheets of MS. all over the room. Sun rose. I wrote the last word and went into the dining-room. Six o'clock I shared a piece of cold chicken with Escamillo*** (who was very miserable and in want of sympathy, having missed the child dreadfully all day). Felt very well, only sleepy: had a bath at seven and at 1:30 was on my way to London.

Same day we journeyed to Slough and saw the children. They are improved, very much liked, very happy. That's a success. From there we rushed straight on to the poor Hopes, where we slept two nights. Yesterday morning check from B'wood arrived and to-day we are off to join the disconsolate and much enduring Hueffer. Address: 4 rue Anglaise, Bruges.

I am still well. Jessie too. Notwithstanding the heat. Borys in great form but exceedingly naughty except when actually travelling, when he is simply angelic.

That is all that will go on this piece of paper.

Our love.

*John Galsworthy's A Man of Devon. [Published by Blackwood in 1901 using Galsworthy's pseudonym John Sinjohn]

**Lord Jim. The writing of the novel had been finished on the 16th.

***His dog.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 295-96.

let this be written

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

Good Friday in sorrow and tribulation

[1899]

Dearest Garnett,

hat do you think of me? Think I love you though I am a dumb dog or no better than a whining dog. There's not a spark left in me. I am overwhelmed and utterly flattened. Hueffers are gone-- yesterday. So is McClure who came for the night. A decent little chap I say if I got to die for it!

Is trying to ram the Rescue into the Atlantic Monthly but the R is not finished yet--not yet--not yet.

"I'll be your banner" says little McClure--this is better than a kick on the shin bone I guess; but the spirit suffers.

Give our love to your restored household. Restored to you--I mean. H. said you reproached him for his fleeting sojourn here. It is not conclusive evidence but if so learn that our friends cannot save us from the effects of our own folly.

Are you angry with me?

If so learn that I am so hardened by adversity that your anger glides off me as a dart glances off a turtle's back, and I still continue to radiate affection on you--my affection which is not so offensive as Wells' Martian's Heat-ray--but nearly as warm.

It won't set the Thames on fire tho'. Nothing of mine will. I think of you with gentle melancholy as of one who has put his money on the wrong horse. I am literally lame. Gout. Brought on by--by--by agitation, exasperation, botheration you know; those things you laugh at and bite your thumbs at--O' Lord! And I write! I write! I write! Certainly. Write quick. Not quick enough to make up for the frightful leeway. But I write.

And a propos of writing. Have you seen pt. III of H of D?* My dear fellow I daren't send you my MS. I feel it would worry you. I feel my existence alone worries you enough. This is not conceit; quite the contrary.

But drop me word of pt. III. Fact is I am not worthy to take up your thought. The more I write the less substance do I see in my work. The scales are falling off my eyes. It is tolerably awful. And I face it, I face it but the fright is growing on me. My fortitude is shaken by the view of the monster. It does not move; its eyes are baleful; it is as still as death itself--and it will devour me. Its stare has eaten into my soul already deep, deep. I am alone with it in a chasm with perpendicular sides of black basalt. Never were sides so perpendicular and smooth, and high. Above, your anxious head against a bit of sky peers down--in vain--in vain. There's no rope long enough for that rescue.

Why didn't you come? I expected you and fate has sent Hueffer. Let this be written on my tombstone.

Ever yours

CONRAD

*Heart of Darkness, Black wood's Magazine, February, March and April, 1899.

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.152-54.

homme du monde

Joseph Conrad to John Galsworthy

Pent Farm

Sunday evening [Feb. 11, 1899].

Dearest Jack,

Yes, it is good criticism. Only I think that to say Henry James does not write from the heart is maybe hasty. He is cosmopolitan, civilized, very much homme du monde and the acquired (educated if you like) side of his temperament,--that is,--restraints, the instinctive, the nurtured, fostered, cherished side is always presented to the reader first. To me even the R. T.* seems to flow from the heart because and only because the work, approaching so near perfection, yet does not strike cold. Technical perfection, unless there is some real glow to illumine and warm it from within, must necessarily be cold. I argue that in H. J. there is such a glow and not a dim one either, but to us used, absolutely accustomed, to unartistic expression of fine, headlong, honest (or dishonest) sentiments the art of H. J. does appear heartless. The outlines are so clear, the figures so finished, chiselled, carved and brought out that we exclaim,--we, used to the shades of the contemporary fiction, to the more or less malformed shades,--we exclaim,--stone! Not at all. I say flesh and blood,--very perfectly presented,--perhaps with too much perfection of method.

The volume of short stories entitled, I think, The Lesson of the Master contains a tale called "The Pupil," if I remember rightly, where the underlying feeling of the man,--his really wide sympathy,--is seen nearer the surface. Of course he does not deal in primitive emotions. I maintain he is the most civilized of modern writers. He is also an idealizer. His heart shows itself in the delicacy of his handling. Things like "The Middle Years" and "The Altar of the Dead" in the vol. entitled Terminations would illustrated my meaning. Moreover, your cousin admits the element of pathos. Mere technique won't give the elements of pathos. I admit he is not forcible,--or let us say, the only forcible thing in his work is his technique. Now a literary intelligence would be naturally struck by the wonderful technique, and that is so wonderful in its way that it dominates the bare expression. The more so that the expression is only of delicate shades. He is never in deep gloom or in violent sunshine. But he feels deeply and vividly every delicate shade. We cannot ask for more. Not everyone is a Turgeniev. Moreover Turgeniev is not civilized. (therein much of his charm for us) in the sense H. J. is civilized. Satis. Please convey my defence of the Master with my compliments. My kindest and grateful regards to Mrs Sauter and love to the boy. The finishing of "H. of D"** took a lot out of me. I haven't been able to do much since.

*The Real Thing and Other Tales (1893)

**The Heart of Darkness had just been completed.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 270-71.

confined in books

Joseph Conrad to H. G. Wells

Pent Farm

23rd Dec. 1898.

My Dear Wells,

We called yesterday by an act of inspiration, so to speak, and with the neglect of common civilities did so at 2:45 p.m., for which we were very properly punished by not finding you at home. We would have waited but we'd left the baby in the gutter (there was a fly under him tho') and the days are too short to allow of camping in a friend's drawing room. So we went despondently. And by the by, there was an Invisible Man (apparently of a jocose disposition) on your doorstep, because when I rang (modestly), an invisible finger kept the button down (or in, rather) and the bell jingling continuously to my extreme confusion (and the evident surprise of your girl). I wish you would keep your creations in some kind of order, confined in books or locked up in the cells of your brain, to be let out at stated times (frequently, frequently of course!) instead of letting them wander about the premises, startling visitors who mean you no harm--anyhow my nerves can't stand that kind of thing--and now I shan't come near you till next year. There!

Coming back we found your card. We haven't cards. We ain't civilized enough--not yet. But the wishes for the health, happiness and peace of you both I am writing down here in mine and my wife's name are formulated with primitive sincerity, and the only conventional thing about them is the time of their voicing prescribed by the superstitions of men. Thus are we the slaves of a gang of fools unable to read your work aright and unwilling to buy a single entire edition of any of mine. Verily they deserve to have the Heat-Ray turned upon them*--but I suppose it would be unseasonable just now. Conventions stand in the way of most meritorious undertakings.

Has Henley come down here after all? When you favour me with a missive let me know how he is, if you know.

*Allusion to The War of the Worlds.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 263.

swear words issue

Joseph Conrad to H. G. Wells

Friday [end of Nov.] '98.

Pent Farm

My Dear Wells,

I did not nourish robust hopes of seeing you on Sat., the weather was infamous. I have been laid up also, with a kind of gout entertainment which lasted 3 days and of course I can only hobble now it is over. As to struggling over darkling hills, I thought I made it plain enough there are wheels--not of chance,* but of certitude. Of course our carcasses, for the sake of their inhabitants, require careful handling, but at all events I am telling you that I shall be (on wheels) at Sandling Junction on Sat. at 12:30 to remove Pugh.** Thereafter same wheels could take you back at five or six. Bringing P. to lunch is another matter. As I tell you, one of my propellers is damaged and done up in flannel--an obscene sight--not to speak of the pain and impiety, for swear words issue from my lips at every step I take. I don't think I really could undertake a journey to Sandgate either to-morrow or on Sunday. I go to the station because P. is a stranger and may starve or otherwise perish in the fields like any other beast unless he is taken care of. But I shall not leave the fly, and I intend to hoot like a sick Martian outside the station.*** He is sure to be interested by such a remarkable noise and thus he shall find me.

Re Henley. There is a furnished house in Hythe standing isolated at the Sandgate end of Hythe High Street. A red brick thing, rather large. It would do at a pinch--perhaps.

If you have a copy of the Invisible Man send to me. I lent mine to a god-fearing person who stole it. Thus wags the world. I ain't cadging for a gift--it's a loan I want and I will try my best not to steal.

Really, why shouldn't you both come? I take all the transport arrangements upon myself on this end. They won't fail. At your end you have omnibuses, if you are not too high-toned to use them. And you may be home at six--and that is virtuous enough. Well, well, I don't want to be a nuisance, I throw out a suggestion like the angler his hook--the rest is with fate--and the gullibility of the fish. Let me also mention that with Mrs. Wells to take care of you you can't come to any harm. On the other hand, Mrs. Wells with your support can affront for a few hours our shabby, wretched, rural bohemianism with a fair chance of surviving the adventure. And we will leave it at that.

*Allusion to H. G. Wells's Wheels of Chance.
**Edwin Pugh, author of Tony Drum-a Cockney Boy (Heinemann, 1898).
***Allusion to H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, which had just been published in book form.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 256-57.

a deficiency of courage

Joseph Conrad to H. G. Wells

6th Sept. 1898.

The Cearne.*

My Dear Sir,

I am profoundly touched by your letter--and [E. V.] Lucas whom I expect to see this evening shall have my warmest thanks for his share in procuring me this unexpected piece of real good fortune.

A few days ago I heard with great concern the news of your illness. It saddened me the more because for the last two years (since your review of the Outcast in Saturday Review compelled me to think seriously of many things till then unseen) I have lived on terms of close intimacy with you, referring to you many a page of my work, scrutinizing many sentences by the light of your criticism. Your are responsible for many sheets torn up and also for those that remained untorn and presently meeting your eye have given me the reward of your generous appreciation.

It has been treasured, and if two letters I wrote to you in that time were never sent it is only a further proof of our intimacy. I had obtained so much from you that it was unnecessary to presume further. And, indeed, there was perhaps a deficiency of courage. I am no more valorous than the rest of us. We all like in our audacities to feel something solid at our backs. Such a feeling is unknown to me. This confession is induced by honesty, which you will take for what it is worth. To be dishonest is a dangerous luxury for most of us, I fancy, and I am sure it is so for me.

As to the flaws of "Youth"** their existence is indisputable. I felt what you say myself--in a way. The feeling however which induced me to write that story was genuine (for once) and so strong that it poked its way through the narrative (which it certainly defaces) in a good many places. I tell you this in the way of explanation simply. Otherwise the thing is unjustifiable.

Looking at your letter, so dim in the sunlight, I cannot help thinking what a lucky day it was for me when in 1880 I shipped in the Palestine. And it was a gloomy, rainy day too. Well. Peace to its ashes. Only four years ago poor old Beard*** ran after me outside the South West India Dock gates. He was a little greyer, a little more twisted and gnarled. He was very grimy and had a chocolate coloured muffler round his throat. He told me he had piloted a foreigner down the North Sea. His eyes were perfectly angelic. This is not a sentimental exaggeration but an honest attempt to convey the effect. He was so bent that he was always looking upwards, so to speak. In the poky bar of a little pub he told me "Since my wife died I can't rest." He had not been able to snatch her in his arms that time. He said he was glad I "got on" and did not allude to our voyage towards Bangkok. I should think he can rest where he is now.

Yes. The story should have been ended where you say or perhaps at the next paragraph describing the men sleeping in the boats. I am afraid I am wearying you not a little, but it has been such a pleasure to talk to you a bit that I gave rein to my ferocious selfishness for once. I would like to hear how your recovery progresses and when you are going back to work. May it be soon! I--for one--cannot have enough of your work. You have done me good. You have been doing me good every day for many months past. Some day you will perhaps deny me--cast me out--but it will be too late. I shall be always yours.

*Joseph Conrad was then at Edward Garnett's.

**"Youth" had just been published in Blackwood's Magazine.

***The Late captain of the Palestine.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 248-49.

inconceivable tenuity

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

29th Sept 1898

DEAREST G.

I got back today. Nothing decisive happened in Glasgow, my impression however is that a command will come out of it sooner or later--most likely later, when the pressing need is past and I had found my way on shore. I do not regret having gone. Mclntyre is a scientific swell who talks art, knows artists of all kinds--looks after their throats, you know. He has given himself a lot of trouble in my interest and means to hammer away at it till I do get something.

All day with the ship-owners and in the evening dinner, phonograph, X rays, talk about the secret of the Universe and the nonexistence of, so called, matter. The secret of the universe is in the existence of horizontal waves whose varied vibrations are at the bottom of all states of consciousness. If the waves were vertical the universe would be different. This is a truism. But, don't you see, there is nothing in the world to prevent the simultaneous existence of vertical waves, of waves at any angles; in fact there are mathematical reasons for believing that such waves do exist. Therefore it follows that two universes may exist in the same place and in the same time--and not only two universes but an infinity of different universes--if by universe we mean a set of states of consciousness. And, note, all (the universes) composed of the same matter, matter, all matter being only that thing of inconceivable tenuity through which the various vibrations of waves (electricity, heat, sound, light etc.) are propagated, thus giving birth to our sensations--then emotions--then thought. Is that so?

These things I said to the Dr while Neil Munro stood in front of a Rontgen machine and on the screen behind we contemplated his backbone and his ribs. The rest of that promising youth was too diaphanous to be visible. It was so--said the Doctor--and there is no space, time, matter, mind as vulgarly understood, there is only the eternal something that waves and an eternal force that causes the waves--it's not much--and by the virtue of these two eternities exists that Corot and that Whistler in the dining room upstairs (we were in a kind of cellar) and Munro's here writings and your Nigger* and Graham's politics and Paderewski's playing (in the phonograph) and what more do you want?

What we wanted (apparently) was more whisky. We got it. Mrs Mclntyre went to bed. At one o'clock Munro and I went out into the street. We talked. I had read up the Lost Pibroch** which I do think wonderful in a way We foregathered very much indeed and I believe Munro didn't get home till five in the morning. He turned up next day and burned incense before me, and saw me into the train after a dinner at the Art Club (not to speak of the whisky).

This is the true and faithful report of our gestes in Glesga. I returned to the bosom of my family at 1 pm today and wrote to Hueffer at once to clinch the matter (there's no matter) of Pent Farm (which is only a vain and delusive appearance). I hope I may get it. If I don't I shall vanish into space (there's no space) and the vibrations that make up me, shall go to the making of some other fool.

I feel less hopeless about things and particularly about the damned thing called the Rescue. Tomorrow I write but this evening I feel nervy. When I feel sure of Pent Farm I shall be comparatively happy.

If we get fixed there you must come and stay with us a good long time when your wife is in France. This is what I am looking forward to now. Look ever forward, ever forward. What a sell! For me to look forward is folly--but then it's good. Don't you throw cold water on my vision. There's no reason why you should. We shall work. By heavens and earth we shall work!

We three send our love to you three.

Ever yours

Joseph Conrad

*He refers to his own book The Nigger of the Narcissus .

**The Lost Pibroch and other Sheiling Stories by Neil Munro ( 1896), this author's first collection.

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.142-44.

vibrant de ligne

Joseph Conrad to R. B. Cunninghame Graham

Saturday 30th July, '98.

TRES CHER AMI,
This morning I had the Aurora* from Smithers, No. 2 of the 500 copies.

C'est tout simplement, magnifique, yet I do not exactly perceive what on earth they have been making a fuss about.

I am afraid Henley is a horrible bourgeois. Who drew the frontispiece? I can't imagine anybody whose name I know. Is it an English drawing? It does not look like it. I notice variations in the text as I've read it in the typewritten copy. This seems the most finished piece of work you've ever done. Il y a une note, une resonnance la-dedans, vibrant de ligne en ligne. C'est tres fort. No one will see it.

I've read the little book three times, this morning,--and behold! I am disgusted with what I write. No matter.

Blackwood's Magazine for this month has an appreciation of F. M. Kelly's edition of Don Quixote. Very fair. Nothing striking, but distinct recognition.

I do like the attitude of the Maga [Blackwood's Magazine] on the Spanish business.

Viva l'Espana! Anyhow.

Do you believe in a speedy peace? Write me all you know, I would like to see the thing over and done with, though, mind, I think that Spain is perfectly invulnerable now and may keep the Yanks capering around for an indefinite time.

When do you start for Morocco?

I've been seedy,--in my head,--in my idiotic cabeza. I feel lazy (always did) and sleepy. When I've written a page, I feel it ought to be sold to the ten-cent paper man in New York. This is all it's good for.

C'est Zolaesque ce que je viens d'ecrire, hein? But look at the circumlocution. If you want to know how I exactly feel towards my work put the above into plain Zola language and it will give you a faint idea then.

Assez. Toujours le votre.
Mes devoirs a Madame votre femme.

*Aurora la Cujini, a Realistic Sketch in Seville by R. B. Cunninghame Graham (London: Leonard Smithers, 1898).

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 241-42.

the necessity of style

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

29th March. [1898]

My Dear Garnett.

I am ashamed of myself. I ought to have written to you before, but the fact is I have not written anything at all. When I received your letter together with Part II of R. I was in bed--this beastly nervous trouble. Since then I've been better but have been unable to write. I sit down religiously every morning, I sit down for eight hours every day--and the sitting down is all. In the course of that working day of 8 hours I write 3 sentences which I erase before leaving the table in despair. There's not a single word to send you. Not one! And time passes--and McClure waits--not to speak of Eternity for which I don't care a damn. Of McClure however I am afraid.

I ask myself sometimes whether I am bewitched, whether I am the victim of an evil eye? But there is no "jettatura" in England--is there? I assure you--speaking soberly and on my word of honour--that sometimes it takes all my resolution and power of self control to refrain from butting my head against the wall. I want to howl and foam at the mouth but I daren't do it for fear of waking that baby and alarming my wife. It's no joking matter. After such crises of despair I doze for hours still half conscious that there is that story I am unable to write. Then I wake up, try again--and at last go to bed completely done-up. So the days pass and nothing is done. At night I sleep. In the morning I get up with the horror of that powerlessness I must face through a day of vain efforts.

In these circumstances you imagine I feel not much inclination to write letters. As a matter of fact I had a great difficulty in writing the most commonplace note. I seem to have lost all sense of style and yet I am haunted, mercilessly haunted by the necessity of style. And that story I can't write weaves itself into all I see, into all I speak, into all I think, into the lines of every book I try to read. I haven't read for days. You know how bad it is when one feels one's liver, or lungs. Well I feel my brain. I am distinctly conscious of the contents of my head. My story is there in a fluid in an evading shape. I can't get hold of it. It is all there to bursting, yet I can't get hold of it no more than you can grasp a handful of water.

There! I've told you all and feel better. While I write this I am amazed to see that I can write. It looks as though the spell were broken but I hasten, I hasten lest it should in five minutes or in half an hour be laid again.

I tried to correct Part II according to your remarks. I did what I could--that is I knocked out a good many paragraphs. It's so much gained. As to alteration, rewriting and so on I haven't attempted it--except here and there a trifle--for the reason I could not think out anything different to what is written. Perhaps when I come to my senses I shall be able to do something before the book comes out. As to the serial it must go anyhow. I would be thankful to be able to write anything, anything, any trash, any rotten thing--something to earn dishonestly and by false pretences the payment promised by a fool.

That's how things stand today; and tomorrow would be more mysterious if it were not so black! I write you a nice cheery letter for a good-bye:* don't I, dear old fellow. That's how we use our friends. If I hadn't written I would have burst.

Good luck to you and buon' viaggio signore. Think of me sometimes. Are you going to Milan? It's 24 years since I saw the Cathedral in moonlight. Tempi passati I had young eyes then. Don't give all your time to the worship of Boticelli. Somebody should explode that superstition. But there, you know better. It is good of you to think of the boy. He is bigger every day. I would like to make a bargeman of him: strong, knowing his business and thinking of nothing. That is the life my dear fellow. Thinking of nothing! O' bliss. I had a lunch with Blackwood good old smoothbore. Also Cunning: Graham came down to see me the day before dining with your father. Has been in bed since but writes every second day. Recommend my short stories to your friend. Have you seen the Nigger notice in Literature of last week Amazing. Jess sends her best love.

Vale frater

Yours ever

J. C.

*Edward Garnett was off to Italy on holiday.

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.130-32.

tragic with your courage

Joseph Conrad to R. B. Cunninghame Graham

Sunday Feb. 1898.

Cher Ami,

I've got a bad wrist: that's why I did not write sooner. I gave it complete rest. Much better now.

The "Impenitent Thief" has been read more than once. I've read it several times alone and I've read it aloud to my wife. Every word has found a home. You and your ideals of sincerity and courage and truth are strangely out of place in this epoch of material preoccupations. What does it bring? What's the profit? What do we get by it? These questions are the root of every moral, intellectual or political movement. Into the noblest cause, men manage to put something of their baseness: and sometimes when I think of you here, quietly, you seem to me tragic with your courage, with your beliefs and your hopes. Every cause is tainted: and you reject this one, espouse that other one as if one were evil and the other good, while the same evil you hate is in both, but disguised in different words. I am more in sympathy with you than words can express, yet if I had a grain of belief left in me I would believe you misguided. Your are misguided by the desire of the Impossible,--and I envy you. Alas! what you want to reform are not institutions,--it is human nature. Your faith will never move that mountain. Not that I think mankind intrinsically bad. It is only silly and cowardly. Now you know that in cowardice is every evil,--especially, that cruelty so characteristic of our civilization. But, without it, mankind would vanish. No great matter truly. But will you persuade humanity to throw away sword and shield? Can you persuade even me,--who write these words in the fulness of an irresistible conviction? No, I belong to the wretched gang. We all belong to it. We are born initiated, and succeeding generations clutch the inheritance of fear and brutality without a thought, without a doubt, without compunction, in the name of God.

These are the thoughts suggested by the man who wrote an essay on the "Impenitent Thief." Forgive their disconnected impertinence. You'll have to forgive me many things, if you continue to know me on the basis of sincerity and friendship.

I wanted to say a word of so about the technique of the essay but I can't. A la prochaine, donc!

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 229-30.

a bedraggled, silly dove

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

Wednesday.
[February 2, 1898]

Dearest Garnett.

his is a free evening before I go into harness again to pull out of the mire, out of the slough of despond that damned and muddy romance.* I am getting on and it is very very bad. Bad enough I sometimes think to make my fortune.

The news I want you to know are:

1st. The Cranes have invited the lot of us man woman and child to stay with them ten days from 19th February and I've accepted, for I feel that if there is no break I will go crazy or go out altogether.

2nd. Harris keeps quiet like a man in hiding. Graham blasphemes and curses.

3rd. I've gone and done it. I write for the press ! ! ! ! ! I've sent to the Outlook an unconceivably silly thing about A. Daudet. "Words! words! words!" Apparently that's what they want. They asked for more. Today I've sent another silly thing about Kipling. It took me one and a half days to write 1500 words. I can do this kind of thing quicker than the muddy romance. Damn! I've lost the last shred of belief in myself. I simply dare not send you the MS. But ultimately I shall. It is unredeemed trash. Are you near enough to Crane to be invaded? My wife shall want to show the blessed baby to your wife. I hate babies. Will you manage to see me while I am there? Do you object to reading 100 pages of my handwriting? It feels like a lot of wheels in my head. Withdrawn.

I am sending you here a bit of the Sat. Rev. Symons criticising trans: of Annunzio mentions Kipling and myself as you can see.

Frankly--is the remark true?

That the Voynich book** sells does not surprise me. Some people will take it as an attack on the Popish religion. La betise humaine est capable de tout.

It is bad with me when the thought does not unfold itself easily when talking to a friend. I feel I am boring you with this letter and yet don't wish to stop. I can't say half the things I want to say.

I want to hear you speak--I do. I want to come in contact with your thought.

I am again thinking of attacking Pawling. Something must be done and that soon. With a book half written I can talk better to the man. He is a good fellow. I should not like him to curse the day he set eyes on me. If he feels so sure of Scribners why not accept my proposal on a business basis: Acquire from me my serial rights. The risk will be great enough to prove his good will and friendship anyhow. As to asking him to, plainly speaking, pension me I don't think I can. Moreover do you think he would care to keep a private author on the staff? I won't do anything without giving you information in time for a last word of advice. For after all you are the serpent and I am a bedraggled, silly dove.

Jess sends her love she intends to write tomorrow to your wife. Everybody here is in rude health at which I am sorry because of the enormous appetites which is so expensive and the stores running low at that.
Ever yours
JPH. Conrad.

*The Rescue.
**The Gadfly.

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.130-32.

by a hair's breadth

Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett

Monday evening

[January 24, 1898.]

Dear Garnett,

I have your letter and the proofs.* You are the best of fellows to go through all that disgusting kind of toil for me. And my ingratitude is so complete, is so black that I can by no means be ashamed of it. This morning for half an hour or perhaps a little less I disliked you with the utmost cordiality and sat brooding about some way to do you a serious mischief. But now at 5 pm I feel I could bear the sight of you without showing any unholy emotion.

Yes. Seriously. You are right in everything even in the suggestion to let the story** go as it is. It shall go and be hanged to it. It is bad and in sober truth I can't bear the sight of it any more. Let it go. No one will notice it particularly, and even if someone arose to solemnly curse it, the story and the curse would be forgotten before the end of the week.

My very sincere thanks to Mrs Garnett for saying a good word--the only good word--for the woman. Tell her please that as to the story I think it is as false as a sermon by an Archbishop. Exactly. Another man goes out than the man who came in. T'other fellow is dead. You have missed the symbolism of the new gospel (that's what the Return is) altogether and you call yourself a critic! The only weak point in the story is the slamming of the street door at the end. I ought to have stopped on the "not even a foot-step on the thick carpet . . . as though no sooner outside he had died and his body had vanished together with his soul" and then in leaded type "He never returned."

That would have made the newspaper boys sit up. They would have wanted to know where he went to, how he got downstairs; they would have made guesses at it they would have called it realism, naturalism, or new humour. I've missed fame by a hair's breadth. And then we could have hired some chinaman of letters to explain that the whole story is transcendental symbolico-positivist with traces of illuminism. I've missed my best chance. Enough fooling. It strikes me I am "taking up your valuable time"

Ever yours

J. Conrad

Jess sends her love to Mrs Garnett and desires me to state that the baby is a very fine baby. I disclaim all responsibility for that statement. Do you really think the volume* will do?

*Of Tales of Unrest.

** The Return.

-from Letters from Joseph Conrad 1895-1924 edited with introduction and notes by Edward Garnett (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill) p.128-130.

la douceur des Ombres

[Joseph Conrad to Angele Zagorska]

20.12.1897.
Stanford-le-Hope

My Dear Angele,*

I know that you do not forget my existence and I know also that this is not due to my merit, but to your goodness. Silence may be a sin, but it is not always a mortal one; there are circumstances when one may obtain pardon. Naturally, I think that my sins deserve forgiveness. Du reste tout le monde pense de meme, au point de vue personnel bien entendu. In all sincerity I may add in earnest that there is in me so much of the Englishman, the sailor and the adventurer, that I do not care to write--even to my nearest and dearest relatives--when things do not go well. This is the reason for my long silence. I do not want to count the months. I prefer to ask you to forget them. We have lived another year. Autant de gagne! Therefore we must wish one another happiness--ce bonheur dont personne ne connait le premier mot--and wish it sincerely with all our hearts; try to forget that man's wishes are seldom fulfilled.

I write here words of affection, words that vanish when once spoken--but the feeling remains. May the next year bring you health, peace and the realization of your dreams--without disenchantment. And if you think that this is not possible--I shall tell you that my wishes do reflect, if not the possibility, at least my feelings for you all.

My wife joins me in my wishes. She knows you all--comme les enfants connaissent les personnages de Contes de Fees, and like children eager for stories, she is always ready to listen, and I, (a real story-teller), am always ready to relate. In this way you live two lives. Over there, at Lublin, where life is hard, no doubt--and here in Stanford, Essex, on the banks of the Thames--under the spell of my words: for the one you have never seen, vous avez la douceur des Ombres et la splendeur de l'Inconnu!

I have worked during the whole year. I have finished two volumes. One came out a fortnight ago and the other is ready for the press. Voila. And while waiting I live in a state of uncertainty. I enjoy a good reputation but no popularity. And as to money I have none, either. Triste. But things are going better at present. That I shall some day attain material success there is no reason to doubt. But that requires time and meanwhile???

The worst is that my health is not good. Les nerfs, les nerfs! Uncertainty torments me. It is very foolish, no doubt--mais que voulez-vous l'homme est bete.

And this is how I battle with time. At my age ce n'est pas drole. I fear that "before the sun rises, the dew will have destroyed the eyesight". . . .**

*The original of this letter is in Polish.

** Polish proverb.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 216-17.

Brackets Within Brackets

[Joseph Conrad to R. B. Cunningham Graham]

6th Dec. 1897
Stanford-le-Hope,
Essex.

My Dear Sir,
I am horribly ashamed of myself. I ought to have written last week to thank you for the Stevenson. My inadequate excuse is I've been strangely seedy--nothing very tangible, but for nearly a week I have thought not at all and eaten very little,--and didn't see the use of doing anything. This may seem to you an impertinent excuse but I assure you it is a very sad and fiendish,--well, indisposition, and too real for words. I throw myself on your mercy. I shook myself at the sight of your letter and now what between shame and pleasure I am able to sit here like a galvanized corpse to write this flat and miserable apology.

The Xmas at Sea is all that you said. I was glad of the book and still more of your thought. I was glad to know I haven't been seen,--and forgotten. Only,--parce que c'est vous! There are people from whom I would beg on my knees the favour of an eternal oblivion. Would I get it? Croyez-vous qu'on se retrouve, la-bas? To me "la-bas" appears sometimes as a big hole,--a kind of malefactors' cavern--very crowded (think how long mankind has been in the habit of dying!) with perspiring shades,--a moral perspiration of squeezed spirits exhaling the unspeakable meanness, the bareness, the lies, the rapacity, the cowardice of souls that on earth have been objects of barter and valued themselves at about two-and-six. But this is morbid,--and I sat down intending to produce a good impression! I take it all back and declare my belief in lilies, gold harps,--and brimstone, like my Podmore in the "Narcissus."

. . . No man can escape his fate! You shall come here and suffer hardships, boredom and despair. It is written! It is written! You,--as a matter of fact,--have written it yourself (at my instigation.--very rash of you) and I shall be inexorable like destiny and shall look upon your sufferings with the idiotic serenity of a benevolent Creator (I don't know that the ben: Crea: is serene:--but if he is (as they say) then he must be idiotic) looking at the precious mess he as made of his only job. This letter reminds me of something I used to know years ago: Algebra,--I think. Brackets within brackets and imbecility raised to the nth power.

I heard of the H. & S. play through G. B. S. in the S. R. More Algebra. Do you understand? I allude in this luminous way to Admiral Guinea. I haven't seen a play for years, but I have read this one. And that's all I can say about it. I have no notion of a play. No play grips me on the stage or off. Each of them seems to me an amazing freak of folly. They are all unbelievable and as disillusioning as a bang on the head. I greatly desire to write a play myself. It is my dark and secret ambition. And yet I can't conceive how a sane man can sit down deliberately to write a play and not go mad before he has done. The actors appear to me like a lot of wrong-headed lunatics pretending to be sane. Their malice is stitched with white threads. They are disguised and ugly. To look at them breeds in my melancholy soul thoughts of murder and suicide,--such is my anger and my loathing of their transparent pretences. There is a taint of subtle corruption in their blank voices, in their blinking eyes, in the grimacing faces, in the false light, in the false passion, in the words that have been learned by heart. But I love a marionette-show. Marionettes are beautiful,--especially those of the old kind with wires, thick as my little finger, coming out of the top of the head. Their impassibility in love, in crime, in mirth, in sorrow,--is heroic, superhuman, fascinating. Their rigid violence when they fall upon one another to embrace or to fight is simply a joy to behold. I never listen to the text mouthed somewhere out of sight by invisible men who are here to-day and rotten to-morrow. I love the marionettes that are without life, that come so near to being immortal!

Here's the end of paper. It is to-morrow already and high time for me to go to bed,--to dream, perchance to sleep. You must forgive the writer, the letter, the mistakes of spelling, the obscurity of the grammar,--the imbecility of the nth power. Forgive! Forgiveness has been invented to prevent massacres.

P. S. I haven't yet had St. Therese.* Expect it next week. I have looked lately again at the scenery article,--and am confirmed in my opinion that your wife has said what is really fundamental, essentially true in the matter, and said it charmingly. Sorry to hear of Hudson's illness. A lovable man, a most lovable man.

*Santa Teresa: Her Life and Times by Gabriela Cunninghame Graham (London: Black, 1897) 2 vols. [Gabriela de la Balmondiere, Chilean poet and wife to R. B. Cunninghame Graham.]

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page, 1927) p. 212-214.

Strangely Hopeless

[Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett]

5th Dec., 1897.

My Dear Garnett,

. . .I had Crane* here last Sunday. We talked and smoked half the night. He is strangely hopeless about himself. I like him. The two stories are excellent. Of course, "A Man and Some Others" is the best of the two but the boat** thing interested me more. His eye is very individual and his expression satisfies me artistically. He certainly is the impressionist and his temperament is curiously unique. His thought is concise, connected, never very deep--yet often startling. He is the only impressionist and only an impressionist. Why is he not immensely popular? With his strength, with his rapidity of action, with that amazing faculty of vision--why is he not? He has outline, he has colour, he has movement, with that he ought to go very far. But--will he? I sometimes think he won't. It is not an opinion--it is a feeling. I could not explain why he disappoints me--why my enthusiasm withers as soon as I close the book. While one reads, of course he is not to be questioned. He is the master of his reader to the very last line--then--apparently for no reason at all--he seems to let go his hold. It is as if he had gripped you with greased fingers. His grip is strong but while you feel the pressure on your flesh you slip out from his hand--much to your own surprise. This is my stupid impression and I give it to you in confidence. It just occurs to me that it is perhaps my own self that is slippery. I don't know. You would know. No matter.

My soul is like a stone within me. I am going through the awful experience of losing a friend. Hope*** comes every evening to console me but he has a hopeless task. Death is nothing--and I am used to its rapacity. But when life robs one of a man to whom one has pinned one's faith for twenty years the wrong seems too monstrous to be lived down. Yet it must. And I don't know why, how, wherefore. Besides there are circumstances which make the event a manifold torment. Some day I will tell you the tale. I can't write it now. But there is a psychological point in it. However this also does not matter.

* Joseph Conrad and Stephen Crane met, in London, for the first time, two months before.

** "The Open Boat."

*** His friend G. F. W. Hope.

-from Joseph Conrad: Life and Letters edited by G. Jean-Aubry (Garden City, New York: Doubleday Page, 1927) p. 211.

Jamesian Struggles

[Joseph Conrad to Edward Garnett]

13th Feb. 1897

Dear Garnett,

I had this morning a charming surprise in the shape of The Spoils of Poynton sent to me by Henry James, with a very characteristic and friendly inscription on the flyleaf.* I need not tell you how pleased I am. I have already read the book. It is as good as anything of his -- almost -- a story of love and wrong-headedness revolving around a household of artistic furniture. It's Henry James and nothing but Henry James. The delicacy and tenuity of the thing are amazing. It is like a great sheet of plate glass -- you don't know it's there till you run against it. Of course I do not mean to say it is anything as gross as plate glass. It is only as pellucid as clean plate glass. The only fault I find is its length. It's just a trifle too long. Personally I don't complain, as you may imagine, but I can imagine with pain the man in the street trying to read it! And my common humanity revolts at the image of his suffering. One could almost see the globular lobes of his brain painfully revolving and crushing, mangling the delicate thing. As to his exasperation, it is a thing impossible to imagine and too horrible to contemplate.

I send you some thirty pages of MS. ** I am heartily ashamed of them and am afraid that this instinct of shame is right. I feel more of a humbug than ever -- and yet I lay my shame bare to you because you wish it. My wife is this moment reading reverently James' book, and trying honestly to distinguish its head from its tail. Her reverence is not affected. It is a perfectly genuine sentiment inspired by me: but her interest is, I suspect, affected for the purpose of giving me pleasure. And she will read every line! 'Pon my word it's most touching and only women are capable of such delicately penetrating sacrifices. I do nothing but yawn and tear my hair.

J. Conrad

*The inscription was: 'To Joseph Conrad in dreadfully delayed but very grateful acknowledgement of an offering singularly generous and beautiful. Henry James. Feb. 11, 1897.'

**Very probably a part of his short story "Karain".

-from Joseph Conrad : life and letters, v.1 / ed. G. Jean-Aubry.

New York : Doubleday-Page, 1927.

A Disgusting Inkpot

[Joseph Conrad to Family]



Stanford-le-Hope, Essex
20.12.1896

To Charles and Angele Zagorska

My Dearest Charles and Angele,

This is the first Christmas I shall be able to spend with my wife. Now that I am no longer alone, on behalf of two of us -- so to speak -- I send you our sincerest wishes for your happiness, peace and successes great and small; for it is the latter which for most of us go to make up the joys of life. And we both send the same to our darling Aunt, whilst asking her -- at this time, when families are united at least in thought -- to remember us in her heart for she has known those whose memory is the guide of our lives.

I had the intention of coming home for the holiday -- home, that is to say, to you. It was a vague and uncertain plan, although a fervent wish. I did not tell you about it. I hardly dared myself think of it. Nevertheless, it is a cruel disappointment. There will be no holidays for me this year -- but I comfort myself with the thought that another year will follow and also other years -- and that dreams come true sometimes (not often). Meanwhile one must work, for we cannot live on praise, neither my wife nor myself. I used to write and to write ceaselessly, but now the sight of an inkpot and a penholder fill me with rage and disgust -- and yet I am still writing! Do not be angry with my long periods of silence. I will describe my state of mind to you; I do not wish to fill your ears with my lamentations. You can be sure that if I had something to be pleased with, I would hasten to manifest my joy to you. I boldly commend myself to your affection. I hope that this is not effrontery. I kiss the hands of cousin Angele, I embrace her and kiss my little cousins, after the fashion of a seaman, on both cheeks,

With all my heart I remain your devoted brother,

K. Korzienowski

[ Joseph Conrad was born on December 3, 1857]

-from Joseph Conrad : life and letters, v.1 / ed. G. Jean-Aubry
New York : Doubleday-Page, 1927.