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Lord Jim

Joseph Conrad

Summary

Lord Jim is the story of one man’s fight against his own past and his attempt to prove himself to the world after he has made one terrible error. This alone does not explain the appeal of Conrad’s 1900 novel. Like so many of his books it is a tale of the sea, although it is not autobiographical. The story opens with the doomed voyage of a vessel, the ship of Eastern pilgrims Patna , which Jim - the chief mate - and the rest of the crew abandon with its passengers still on board. Jim does not wish to act so wretchedly and resents his actions but does so in the horror of the moment. Put on trial, the young idealistic Jim’s tale is told by Marlow, who also narrates Heart of Darkness . Jim is stripped of his papers and is left to follow an existence avoiding his own identity and seeking anonymity as he travels the world. Marlow organises a meeting through which Jim goes to Patusan, a remote and in Conrad’s terms primitive region. Jim brings order and stability to the area with his strength of character and leadership. The arrival of the treacherous Gentleman Brown shakes the peace Jim has created and his value systems are called into question before the horror of the ending.

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