Typhoon Read online

  Produced by Judy Boss and David Widger

  [The other stories included in this volume ("Amy Foster," "Falk: AReminiscence," and "To-morrow") being already available in anothervolume, have not been entered here.]

  TYPHOON

  BY JOSEPH CONRAD

  Far as the mariner on highest mast Can see all around upon the calmedvast, So wide was Neptune's hall . . . -- KEATS

  AUTHOR'S NOTE

  The main characteristic of this volume consists in this, that all thestories composing it belong not only to the same period but have beenwritten one after another in the order in which they appear in the book.

  The period is that which follows on my connection with Blackwood'sMagazine. I had just finished writing "The End of the Tether" and wascasting about for some subject which could be developed in a shorterform than the tales in the volume of "Youth" when the instance of asteamship full of returning coolies from Singapore to some port innorthern China occurred to my recollection. Years before I had heardit being talked about in the East as a recent occurrence. It was for usmerely one subject of conversation amongst many others of the kind. Menearning their bread in any very specialized occupation will talk shop,not only because it is the most vital interest of their lives but alsobecause they have not much knowledge of other subjects. They have neverhad the time to get acquainted with them. Life, for most of us, is notso much a hard as an exacting taskmaster.

  I never met anybody personally concerned in this affair, the interest ofwhich for us was, of course, not the bad weather but the extraordinarycomplication brought into the ship's life at a moment of exceptionalstress by the human element below her deck. Neither was the story itselfever enlarged upon in my hearing. In that company each of us couldimagine easily what the whole thing was like. The financial difficultyof it, presenting also a human problem, was solved by a mind much toosimple to be perplexed by anything in the world except men's idle talkfor which it was not adapted.

  From the first the mere anecdote, the mere statement I might say, thatsuch a thing had happened on the high seas, appeared to me a sufficientsubject for meditation. Yet it was but a bit of a sea yarn after all. Ifelt that to bring out its deeper significance which was quite apparentto me, something other, something more was required; a leading motivethat would harmonize all these violent noises, and a point of view thatwould put all that elemental fury into its proper place.

  What was needed of course was Captain MacWhirr. Directly I perceived himI could see that he was the man for the situation. I don't mean tosay that I ever saw Captain MacWhirr in the flesh, or had ever come incontact with his literal mind and his dauntless temperament. MacWhirr isnot an acquaintance of a few hours, or a few weeks, or a few months. Heis the product of twenty years of life. My own life. Conscious inventionhad little to do with him. If it is true that Captain MacWhirr neverwalked and breathed on this earth (which I find for my part extremelydifficult to believe) I can also assure my readers that he is perfectlyauthentic. I may venture to assert the same of every aspect of thestory, while I confess that the particular typhoon of the tale was not atyphoon of my actual experience.

  At its first appearance "Typhoon," the story, was classed by somecritics as a deliberately intended storm-piece. Others picked outMacWhirr, in whom they perceived a definite symbolic intention. Neitherwas exclusively my intention. Both the typhoon and Captain MacWhirrpresented themselves to me as the necessities of the deep convictionwith which I approached the subject of the story. It was theiropportunity. It was also my opportunity; and it would be vain todiscourse about what I made of it in a handful of pages, since the pagesthemselves are here, between the covers of this volume, to speak forthemselves.

  This is a belated reflection. If it had occurred to me before it wouldhave perhaps done away with the existence of this Author's Note; for,indeed, the same remark applies to every story in this volume. Noneof them are stories of experience in the absolute sense of the word.Experience in them is but the canvas of the attempted picture. Each ofthem has its more than one intention. With each the question is what thewriter has done with his opportunity; and each answers the question foritself in words which, if I may say so without undue solemnity, werewritten with a conscientious regard for the truth of my own sensations.And each of those stories, to mean something, must justify itself in itsown way to the conscience of each successive reader.

  "Falk"--the second story in the volume--offended the delicacy of onecritic at least by certain peculiarities of its subject. But what is thesubject of "Falk"? I personally do not feel so very certain about it. Hewho reads must find out for himself. My intention in writing "Falk"was not to shock anybody. As in most of my writings I insist not onthe events but on their effect upon the persons in the tale. But ineverything I have written there is always one invariable intention, andthat is to capture the reader's attention, by securing his interest andenlisting his sympathies for the matter in hand, whatever it may be,within the limits of the visible world and within the boundaries ofhuman emotions.

  I may safely say that Falk is absolutely true to my experience ofcertain straightforward characters combining a perfectly naturalruthlessness with a certain amount of moral delicacy. Falk obeys the lawof self-preservation without the slightest misgivings as to his right,but at a crucial turn of that ruthlessly preserved life he will notcondescend to dodge the truth. As he is presented as sensitive enough tobe affected permanently by a certain unusual experience, that experiencehad to be set by me before the reader vividly; but it is not the subjectof the tale. If we go by mere facts then the subject is Falk's attemptto get married; in which the narrator of the tale finds himselfunexpectedly involved both on its ruthless and its delicate side.

  "Falk" shares with one other of my stories ("The Return" in the "Talesof Unrest" volume) the distinction of never having been serialized. Ithink the copy was shown to the editor of some magazine who rejected itindignantly on the sole ground that "the girl never says anything." Thisis perfectly true. From first to last Hermann's niece utters no word inthe tale--and it is not because she is dumb, but for the simple reasonthat whenever she happens to come under the observation of the narratorshe has either no occasion or is too profoundly moved to speak. Theeditor, who obviously had read the story, might have perceived that forhimself. Apparently he did not, and I refrained from pointing out theimpossibility to him because, since he did not venture to say that "thegirl" did not live, I felt no concern at his indignation.

  All the other stories were serialized. The "Typhoon" appeared in theearly numbers of the Pall Mall Magazine, then under the direction of thelate Mr. Halkett. It was on that occasion, too, that I saw for the firsttime my conceptions rendered by an artist in another medium. Mr. MauriceGrieffenhagen knew how to combine in his illustrations the effect of hisown most distinguished personal vision with an absolute fidelity to theinspiration of the writer. "Amy Foster" was published in The IllustratedLondon News with a fine drawing of Amy on her day out giving tea to thechildren at her home, in a hat with a big feather. "To-morrow" appearedfirst in the Pall Mall Magazine. Of that story I will only say thatit struck many people by its adaptability to the stage and that I wasinduced to dramatize it under the title of "One Day More"; up to thepresent my only effort in that direction. I may also add that each ofthe four stories on their appearance in book form was picked out onvarious grounds as the "best of the lot" by different critics, whoreviewed the volume with a warmth of appreciation and understanding, asympathetic insight and a friendliness of expression for which I cannotbe sufficiently grateful.

  1919. J. C.