Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad by George Charles Beresford [Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsDespite this choice, Conrad's assumption of a British identity was complex. Conrad's writing, at least, was never inherently 'English', but is rather littered with figures who cross national borders, de-stabilize accepted identities, and embrace the heterogeneity of global cultures -- all this despite the occasional ideological misgiving that have since provoked accusations of racism and pro-imperialism. Conrad's career in the maritime industry took him across seas to numerous continents, and his travels across a globalized world provided him with a huge reservoir of experience upon which he drew when he turned to his writing career in the second half of his life, from the 1890s until he died in 1924. Conrad's novels, short stories and novellas are set in locations as various as South America, the Belgian Congo, Russia, London, and Singapore, and many never move beyond the deck of the ship upon which his characters are enrolled. However, it is interesting to note that Conrad's two careers, maritime and literary, never really overlapped -- Conrad only started writing after he had almost entirely given...