Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad

Jim, the young, idealistic first mate of the Petna, lost his nerve in a crisis and abandoned ship. Dogged by the shadow of his guilt he sought personal redemption in ports and trading stations throughout the East, settling finally in a remote area of Malaya, where his courage and integrity earned him the title 'Lord Jim' 'It is the earlier books - Youth Lord Jim, Typhoon, The Nigger of the 'Narcissus that we shall readn their enti ety. For when the question is asked what of Conrad will survive and where in the ranks of novelists we are to place him, these books, with their air of telling us something very old and perfectly true, which had lain hidden but is now revealed, will come to mind and make such questions and comparisons seem little futile' - Virginia Woolf The cover shows a detail from 'The Burial at Sea' by Sir F. Brangwyn, in the Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow (photo Rupert Roddam