When Jim, second mate of the Patna, decides to abandon the ship carrying hundreds of Muslim pilgrims up through the red sea, it permanently puts a damper on his reputation, as the ship, which had hit something sticking out of the water, gets safely towed to port by a small boat. Lord Jim is, simply enough, the story of a sailor who is forever haunted by a single action. I think that those who disregard Heart of Darkness may feel more fulfilled by Lord Jim, a monumental work that is also parts Don Quixote and Hamlet. I am of the opinion that Conrad’s Heart of Darkness stands in a league of its own for the very breadth nightmarish, sublime and slightly racist vision, but Lord Jim is Heart of Darkness matured, a longer work with a more even-tempered focus on that divide between community and the individual, with the concept of agency and of Western ideals being forcefully upheld around the world.
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