The Portable Conrad

I received your three letters together on my return from Stanley Falls, where I went as a supernumerary on board the vessel Roi des Belges in order to learn about the river. [ . . . ] I cannot find words sufficiently strong to make you understand the pleasure your charming (and above all kind) letters have given me. They were as a ray of sunshine piercing through the grey clouds of a dreary winter day; for my days here are dreary. No use deluding oneself! Decidedly I regret having come here. I even regret it bitterly. With all of a man’s egoism I am going to speak of myself. I cannot stop myself. Before whom can I ease my heart if not before you?! [ . . . ]

Everything here is repellent to me. Men and things, but men above all. And I am repellent to them, also. From the manager in Africa who has taken the trouble to tell one and all that I offend him supremely, down to the lowest mechanic, they all have the gift of irritating my nerves—so that I am not as agreeable to them perhaps as I should be. The manager is a common ivory dealer with base instincts who considers himself a merchant although he is only a kind of African shop-keeper. His name is Delcommune. He detests the English, and out here I am naturally regarded as such. I cannot hope for either promotion or salary increases while he is here. Besides, he has said that promises made in Europe carry no weight here if they are not in the contract. Those made to me by M. Wauters are not. In addition, I cannot look forward to anything because I don’t have a ship to command. The new boat will not be completed until June of next year, perhaps. Meanwhile, my position here is unclear and I am troubled by that. So there you are! As crowning joy, my health is far from good. Keep it a secret for me—but the truth is that in going up the river I suffered from fever four times in two months, and then at the Falls (which is its home territory), I suffered an attack of dysentery lasting five days. I feel somewhat weak physically and not a little demoralized; and then, really, I believe that I feel home-sick for the sea, the desire to look again on the level expanse of salt water which has so often lulled me, which has smiled at me so frequently under the sparkling sunshine of a lovely day, which many times too has hurled the threat of death in my face with a swirl of white foam whipped by the wind under the dark December sky. I regret all that. But what I regret even more is having tied myself down for three years. The truth is that it is scarcely probable I shall see them through. Either someone in authority will pick a groundless quarrel in order to send me back (and, really, I sometimes find myself wishing for it), or I shall be sent back to Europe by a new attack of dysentery, unless it consigns me to the other world, which would be a final solution to all my distress! And for four pages I have been speaking of myself! I have not told you with what pleasure I have read your descriptions of men and things at home. Indeed, while reading your dear letters I have forgotten Africa, the Congo, the black savages and the white slaves (of whom I am one) who inhabit it. For one hour I have been happy. Know that it is not a small thing (nor an easy thing) to make a human being happy for an entire hour. [ . . . ]

Seeking a practical remedy to the disagreeable situation which I have made for myself, I conceived of a little plan—still up in the air—in which you could perhaps help me. It appears that this company, or another affiliated with it, will have some ocean-going vessels (or even has one already). Probably that great (or fat?) banker who rules the roost where we are concerned will have a large interest in the other company. If someone could submit my name for the command of one of their ships (whose home port will be Antwerp) I would be able to get away for a day or two in Brussels when you are there. That would be ideal! If they wanted to call me home to take command, I would naturally pay the cost of coming back myself. This is perhaps not a very practicable idea, but if you return to Brussels in the winter, you could learn through M. Wauters what the chances are. Isn’t that so, dear little Aunt?

[ . . . ] I urge you by all the gods to keep secret from everybody the state of my health, or else my uncle will certainly hear of it. I must finish. I leave within an hour for Bamou, by canoe, to select trees and have them felled for building operations at the station here. I shall remain encamped in the forest for two or three weeks, unless ill. I like the prospect well enough. I can doubtless have a shot or two at some buffaloes or elephants. I embrace you most warmly. I shall write a long letter by the next mail.

Once again I am posting to you my masterpiece (this time the second one). Last year I sent three copies of my novel to Poland. Two of them reached their destinations. The third one, destined for you and your wife—presumably did not. I am trying again, hoping that this time both the book and the letter will reach you.

At the same time, I announce solemnly (as the occasion demands) to dear Aunt Gabrynia and to you both that I am getting married. No one can be more surprised at it than myself. However, I am not frightened at all, for as you know, I am accustomed to an adventurous life and to facing terrible dangers. Moreover, I have to avow that my betrothed does not give the impression of being at all dangerous. Jessie is her name; George her surname. She is a small, not at all striking-looking person (to tell the truth alas—rather plain!) who nevertheless is very dear to me. When I met her a year and a half ago she was earning her living in the City as a “Typewriter” in an American business office of the “Caligraph” company. Her father died three years ago. There are nine children in the family. The mother is a very decent woman (and I do not doubt very virtuous as well). However, I must confess that it is all the same to me, as vous comprenez?—I am not marrying the whole family. The wedding will take place on the 24th of this month and we shall leave London immediately so as to conceal from people’s eyes our happiness (or our stupidity) amidst the wilderness and beauty of the coast of Brittany where I intend to rent a small house in some fishing village—probably in Plouaret or Pervengan (near St. Malo). There I shall start working on my third opus, for one has to write in order to live. A few days ago I was offered the command of a sailing vessel—the idea had pleased my Jessie (who likes the sea) but the terms were so unsatisfactory that in the end I refused. The literary profession is therefore my sole means of support. You will understand, my dear Karol, that if I have ventured into this field it is with the determination to achieve a reputation—in that sense I do not doubt my success. I know what I can do. It is therefore only a question of earning money—“Qui est une chose tout à fait à part du mérite littéraire.” [“Which is a matter quite apart from literary merit.”] That I do not feel too certain about—but as I need very little I am prepared to wait for it. I feel fairly confident about the future.

I hope that on the day of my wedding all of you—who are my whole family—will join me in your thoughts. I kiss the hands of my dear Aunt and ask for her blessing. I commend myself to your heart and to that of your wife,

Your letter reached me just as I was preparing to write to you. What I said in my incoherent missive of last week was not for the purpose of arguing really. I did not seek controversy with you—for this reason: I think that we do agree. If I’ve read you aright (and I have been reading you for some years now) You are a most hopeless idealist—your aspirations are irrealisable. You want from men faith, honour, fidelity to truth in themselves and others. You want them to have all this, to show it every day, to make out of these words their rule of life. The respectable classes which suspect you of such pernicious longings lock you up and would just as soon have you shot—because your personality counts and you can not deny that you are a dangerous man. What makes you dangerous is your unwarrantable belief that your desire may be realized. This is the only point of difference between us. I do not believe. And if I desire the very same things no one cares. Consequently I am not likely to be locked up or shot. Therein is another difference—this time to your manifest advantage.

There is a—let us say—a machine. It evolved itself (I am severely scientific) out of a chaos of scraps of iron and behold!—it knits. I am horrified at the horrible work and stand appalled. I feel it ought to embroider—but it goes on knitting. You come and say: “this is all right; it’s only a question of the right kind of oil. Let us use this—for instance—celestial oil and the machine shall embroider a most beautiful design in purple and gold.” Will it? Alas no. You cannot by any special lubrication make embroidery with a knitting machine. And the most withering thought is that the infamous thing has made itself; made itself without thought, without conscience, without foresight, without eyes, without heart. It is a tragic accident—and it has happened. You can’t interfere with it. The last drop of bitterness is in the suspicion that you can’t even smash it. In virtue of that truth one and immortal which lurks in the force that made it spring into existence it is what it is—and it is indestructible!

It knits us in and it knits us out. It has knitted time space, pain, death, corruption, despair and all the illusions—and nothing matters. I’ll admit however that to look at the remorseless process is sometimes amusing. [ . . . ]

I am ashamed of myself. I ought to have written to you before but the fact is I have not written anything at all. When I received your letter together with part IId of R[escue] I was in bed—this beastly nervous trouble. Since then I’ve been better but have been unable to write. I sit down religiously every morning, I sit down for eight hours every day—and the sitting down is all. In the course of that working day of 8 hours I write 3 sentences which I erase before leaving the table in despair. There’s not a single word to send you. Not one! And time passes—and McClure waits—not to speak of Eternity for which I don’t care a damn. Of McClure however I am afraid.

I ask myself sometimes whether I am bewitched, whether I am the victim of an evil eye? But there is no “jettatura” in England—is there? I assure you—speaking soberly and on my word of honour—that sometimes it takes all my resolution and power of self control to refrain from butting my head against the wall. I want to howl and foam at the mouth but I daren’t do it for fear of waking that baby and alarming my wife. It’s no joking matter. After such crises of despair I doze for hours till half conscious that there is that story I am unable to write. Then I wake up, try again—and at last go to bed completely done-up. So the days pass and nothing is done. At night I sleep. In the morning I get up with the horror of that powerlessness I must face through a day of vain efforts.

In these circumstances as you imagine I feel not much inclination to write letters. As a matter of fact I had a great difficulty in writing the most commonplace note. I seem to have lost all sense of style and yet I am haunted, mercilessly haunted by the necessity of style. And that story I can’t write weaves itself into all I see, into all I speak, into all I think, into the lines of every book I try to read. I haven’t read for days. You know how bad it is when one feels one’s liver, or lungs. Well I feel my brain. I am distinc[t]ly conscious of the contents of my head. My story is there in a fluid—in an evading shape. I can’t get hold of it. It is all there—to bursting, yet I Can’t get hold of it no more than you can grasp a handful of water.

There! I’ve told You all and feel better. While I write this I am amazed to see that I can write. It looks as though the spell were broken but I hasten, I hasten lest it should in five minutes or in half an hour be laid again.

I tried to correct Part II according to Your remarks. I did what I could—that is I knocked out a good many paragraphs. It’s so much gained. As to alteration, rewriting and so on I haven’t attempted it—except here and there a trifle—for the reason I could not think out anything different to what is written. Perhaps when I come to my senses I shall be able to do something before the book comes out. As to the serial it must go anyhow. I would be thankful to be able to write anything, anything, any trash, any rotten thing—something to earn dishonestly and by false pretenses the payment promised by a fool.

That’s how things stand to-day; and to-morrow would be more mysterious if it were not so black! I write You a nice cheery letter for a good-bye: don’t I, dear old fellow. That’s how we use our friends. If I hadn’t written I would have burst. [ . . . ]

[ . . . ] I think that to say Henry James does not write from the heart is maybe hasty. He is cosmopolitan, civilised, very much “homme du monde” and the acquired (“educated” if you like) side of his temperament that is—restraint the instinctive, the nurtured, fostered, cherished side is always presented to the reader first. To me even the R[eal]. T[hing]. seems to flow from the heart because and only because the work approaching so near perfection yet does not strike cold. Technical perfection unless there is some real glow to illumine and warm it from within must necessarily be cold. I argue that in H. J. there is such a glow and not a dim one either, but to us used, absolutely accustomed, to unartistic expression of fine, headlong, honest (or dishonest) sentiments the art of H. J. does appear heartless. The outlines are so clear the figures so finished, chiselled, carved and brought out that we exclaim—we, used to the Shades of the contemporary fiction, to the more or less malformed shades—we exclaim—Stone! Not at all. I say flesh and blood—very perfectly presented—perhaps with too much perfection of method. The volume of short stories entitled I think “The lesson of the Master” contains a tale called “The Pupil” if I remember rightly where the underlying feeling of the man—his really wide sympathy—is seen nearer the surface. Of course he does not deal in primitive emotions. I maintain he is the most civilised of modern writers. He is also an idealiser. His heart shows itself in the delicacy of his handling. Things like The Middle years and The altar of the dead in the vol entitled Terminations would illustrate my meaning. [ . . . ] I admit he is not forcible—or, let us say, the only forcible thing in his work is his technique. Now a literary intelligence would be naturally struck by the wonderful technique and that is so wonderful in its way that it dominates the bare expression. The more so that the expression is only of delicate shades. He is never in deep gloom or in violent sunshine. But he feels deeply and vividly every delicate shade. We can not ask for more. Not every one is a Turgeniew. Moreover Turg: is not civilised (therein much of his charm for us) in the sense H. J. is civilised. Satis. [ . . . ]

[ . . . ] Now with this idiotic [Boer] war there will be a bad time coming for print. All that’s art, thought, idea will have to step back and hide its head before the intolerable war inanities. [ . . . ] The whole business is inexpressibly stupid—even on general principles; for evidently a war should be a conclusive proceeding while this noble enterprise (no matter what it’s first result) must be the beginning of an endless contest. It is always unwise to begin a war which to be effective must be a war of extermination; it is positively imbecile to start it without a clear notion of what it means and to force on questions for immediate solution which are eminently fit to be left to time. From time only one solution could be expected—and that one favourable to this country. The war brings in an element of incertitude which will be not eliminated by military success. There is an appalling fatuity in this business. If I am to believe Kipling this is a war undertaken for the cause of democracy. C’est a crever de rire. [It’s enough to make you die laughing.] However, now the fun has commenced, I trust British successes will be crushing from the first—on the same principle that if there’s murder being done in the next room and you can’t stop it you wish the head of the victim to be bashed in forthwith and the whole thing over for the sake of your own feelings. [ . . . ]

Directly on my return I sit down to thank you for your very kind and patient hearing. That the occasion was painful to me (it is always painful to be “asking”) makes your friendly attitude the more valuable: and to say this is the primary object of my letter. But there is something more.

I admit that after leaving you I remained for some time under the impression of my “worthlessness”; but I beg to assure you that I’ve never fostered any illusions as to my value. You may believe me implicitly when I say that I never work in a self satisfied elation, which to my mind is no better than a state of inebriety unworthy of a man who means to achieve something. That—labouring against an anxious tomorrow, under the stress of an uncertain future, I have been at times consoled, re-assured and uplifted by a finished page—I’ll not deny. This however is not intoxication: it is the Grace of God that will not pass by even an unsuccessful novelist. For the rest I am conscious of having pursued with pain and labour a calm conception of a definite ideal in a perfect soberness of spirit.

[ . . . ] I’ve rejected the idea of worthlessness and I’ll tell you, dear Mr. Blackwood, on what ground mainly. It is this: that, given my talent [ . . . ] the fundamental and permanent failure could be only the outcome of an inherent worthlessness of character. Now my character is formed: it has been tried by experience. I have looked upon the worst life can do—and I am sure of myself, even against the demoralising effect of straitened circumstances.

I know exactly what I am doing. Mr. George Blackwood’s incidental remark in his last letter that the story is not fairly begun yet is in a measure correct but, on a large view, beside the point. For, the writing is as good as I can make it (first duty), and in the light of the final incident, the whole story in all its descriptive detail shall fall into its place—acquire its value and its significance. This is my method based on deliberate conviction. I’ve never departed from it. I call your own kind self to witness and I beg to instance Karain—Lord Jim (where the method is fully developed)—the last pages of Heart of Darkness where the interview of the man and the girl locks in—as it were—the whole 30000 words of narrative description into one suggestive view of a whole phase of life and makes of that story something quite on another plane than an anecdote of a man who went mad in the Centre of Africa. And Youth itself (which I delight to know you like so well) exists only in virtue of my fidelity to the idea and the method. The favourable critics of that story, Q amongst others remarked with a sort of surprise “This after all is a story for boys yet - - - - -”

Exactly. Out of the material of a boys’ story I’ve made Youth by the force of the idea expressed in accordance with a strict conception of my method. And however unfavourably it may affect the business in hand I must confess that I shall not depart from my method. I am at need prepared to explain on what grounds I think it a true method. All my endeavours shall be directed to understand it better, to develop its great possibilities, to acquire greater skill in the handling—to mastery in short.

[ . . . ] It is not the haphazard business of a mere temperament. There is in it as much intelligent action guided by a deliberate view of the effect to be attained as in any business enterprise. Therefore I am emboldened to say that ultimate and irretrievable failure is not to be my lot. I know that it is not necessary to say to You but I may just as well point out that I must not by any means be taken for a gifted loafer intent on living upon credulous publishers. Pardon this remark—but in a time when Sherlock Holmes looms so big I may be excused my little bit of self-assertion.

I am long in my development. What of that? Is not Thackeray’s penny worth of mediocre fact drowned in an ocean of twaddle? And yet he lives. And Sir Walter, himself, was not the writer of concise anecdotes I fancy. And G. Elliot—is she as swift as the present public (incapable of fixing its attention for five consecutive minutes) requires us to be at the cost of all honesty, of all truth, and even the most elementary conception of art? But these are great names. I don’t compare myself with them. I am modern, and I would rather recall Wagner the musician and Rodin the Sculptor who both had to starve a little in their day—and Whistler the painter who made Ruskin the critic foam at the mouth with scorn and indignation. They too have arrived. They had to suffer for being “new.” And I too hope to find my place in the rear of my betters. But still—my place.

Believe me, dear Mr Blackwood in all trust and confidence yours

[ . . . ] It is an extraordinary thing that the conscience of Europe which seventy years ago has put down the slave trade on humanitarian grounds tolerates the Congo State to day. It is as if the moral clock had been put back many hours. And yet nowadays if I were to overwork my horse so as to destroy its happiness of physical wellbeing I should be hauled before a magistrate. It seems to me that the black man—say, of Upoto—is deserving of as much humanitarian regard as any animal since he has nerves, feels pain, can be made physically miserable. But as a matter of fact his happiness and misery are much more complex than the misery or happiness of animals and deserving of greater regard. He shares with us the consciousness of the universe in which we live—no small burden. Barbarism per se is no crime deserving of a heavy visitation; and the Belgians are worse than the seven plagues of Egypt insomuch that in that case it was a punishment sent for a definite transgression; but in this the Upoto man is not aware of any transgression, and therefore can see no end to the infliction. It must appear to him very awful and mysterious; and I confess that it appears so to me too. The amenities of the “middle passage” in the old days were as nothing to it. The slave trade has been abolished—and the Congo State exists to-day. This is very remarkable. What makes it more remarkable is this: the slave trade was an old established form of commercial activity; it was not the monopoly of one small country established to the disadvantage of the rest of the civilized world in defiance of international treaties and in brazen disregard of humanitarian declarations. But the Congo State created yesterday is all that and yet it exists. This is very mysterious. One is tempted to exclaim (as poor Thiers did in 1871) “Il n’y a plus d’Europe.” But as a matter of fact in the old days England had in her keeping the conscience of Europe. The initiative came from here. But now I suppose we are busy with other things; too much involved in great affairs to take up cudgels for humanity, decency and justice. But what about our commercial interests? These suffer greatly as Morel has very clearly demonstrated in his book. There can be no serious attempt to controvert his facts. Or [it] is impossible to controvert them for the hardest of lying won’t do it. That precious pair of African witch-men seem to have cast a spell upon the world of whites—I mean Leopold and Thys of course. This is very funny.

And the fact remains that in 1903, seventy five years or so after the abolition of the slave trade (because it was cruel) there exists in Africa a Congo State, created by the act of European Powers where ruthless, systematic cruelty towards the blacks is the basis of administration, and bad faith towards all the other states the basis of commercial policy.

I do hope we shall meet before you leave. Once more my best wishes go with you on your crusade. Of course You may make any use you like of what I write to you. Cordially Yours

The book [Nostromo] is finished; it has been finished for a couple of days now, but I have been too tired too flat to write to you at once. The last month I worked practically night and day; going to bed at three and sitting down again at nine. All the time at it, with the tenacity of despair.

What the book is like I don’t know. I don’t suppose it’ll damage me; but I know that it is open to much intelligent criticism. For the other sort I don’t care. Personally I am not satisfied. It is something—but not the thing I tried for. There is no exultation, none of that temporary sense of achievement which is so soothing. Even the mere feeling of relief, at having done with it, is wanting. The strain has been too great; had lasted too long.

But I am ready for more. I don’t feel empty, exhausted. I am simply joyless—like most men of little faith. [ . . . ]

Thanks for the money. The book I think is a book to produce some sensation. I don’t say it is good but I say it is the best I could do with the subject. In the 2 months of the boy’s illness I managed to write into it some 26-28000 words. After that I imagine I can do anything; for you can have no idea of my mental state all that time. Besides the anxiety for the child there was the tearing awful worry of the circumstances.

We must end this damnable outing now as soon as possible. I have been trying to think out everything. I can’t come back to the Pent unless all that’s owing there is paid, as I told you before. I’ll send you a list here. A hundred will do I fancy to cover it all except the income tax.

After getting back to the Pent the great thing will be to get away from there as soon as possible, and make a fresh start.

There will be the house hunting. Perhaps we may get something near Ashford to make the moving less expensive. If You hear of any inexpensive sort of house in the country near London make a note of it for us.

We have been calculating everything and we have arrived at a budget £664 a year counting the house for £50. In this Borys’ schooling is included. He can’t go yet to Beaumont but perhaps we could place him as day boy somewhere. There is a school in Ashford which would do for six or nine months or so. But these are details. Adding to the above sum £126 for (alas!) the doctor (better be prepared for that infernal side of my existence) we arrive at £800 for the 12 months. If we can do with less so much the better but I dare not say less. [ . . . ]

I think I can say safely that the Secret Agent is not the sort of novel to make what comes after more difficult to place. Neither will it I fancy knock my prices down. Chance itself will be altogether different in tone and treatment of course, but it will be saleable I believe. By the end of Sept you will have a really considerable lot of it to show. Of course it will not be on popular lines. Nothing of mine can be, I fear. But even Meredith ended by getting his sales. Now, I haven’t Meredith’s delicacy and that’s a point in my favour. I reckon I may make certain of the support of the Press for the next few years. The young men who are coming in to write criticisms are in my favour so far. At least all of whom I’ve heard are. I don’t get in the way of established reputations. One may read everybody and yet in the end want to read me—for a change if for nothing else. For I don’t resemble anybody; and yet I am not specialised enough to call up imitators as to matter or style. There is nothing in me but a turn of mind which whether valuable or worthless can not be imitated.

It has been a disastrous time. You must help me settle down now on an economical basis. It will cost something to do that but that once done 3 years of close sitting will do the trick. I’ll be then 52 and not worn out yet as a writer. Without exaggeration I may say I feel renovated by my cure here—and considering the adverse circumstances this seems a good sign. I am anxious to get back and drive on.

We could start from here on the 10th. I would like to start on that date. To fetch me home after settling here I will require £80. The sooner you let me have that the better. [ . . . ]

You must not treat me as a journeyman joiner. Am I to understand that if the book is not finished by say 10-15 then You will drop me on the 15^th of Aug^t. I don’t inquire whether it is You can’t or won’t. From the practical point of view it amounts to the same thing.

Hall Caine takes two years to write his books. J.C. may be allowed some time. If your idea is that my stuff is unsaleable then all I can say is that I haven’t made it so. If I must starve or beg I won’t do it here. That’s all I have to say really. Consider whether it would be good policy (from a practical point of view) to drive me away. This is nothing but a statement of the case. Don’t take it in any other spirit. I have no vice to prevent me working and I am willing as soon as practicable to get away into a most economical hole imaginable and write there night and day. I can’t believe that my reputation has gone to pieces suddenly.

I do hope you are not too disgusted with me for not thanking you for the “Karamazov” before. It was very dear of you to remember me; and of course I was extremely interested. But it’s an impossible lump[?] of valuable matter. It’s terrifically bad and impressive and exasperating. Moreover, I don’t know what D stands for or reveals, but I do know that he is too Russian for me. It sounds to me like some fierce mouthings from prehistoric ages. I understand the Russians have just “discovered” him. I wish them joy.

Of course your wife’s translation is wonderful. One almost breaks one’s heart merely thinking of it. What courage! What perseverance! What talent of—interpretation let us say. The word “translation” does not apply to your wife’s achievements. But indeed the man’s art does not deserve this good fortune. Turgeniew (and perhaps Tolstoï) are the only two really worthy of her. Give her please my awestruck and admiring love. One can be nothing less but infinitely grateful to her whatever one may think of or feel about D. himself. [ . . . ]

My wife wanted to write herself the letter of thanks for the lovely apples; but our boy has just left us after his first leave from France and she does not feel equal to talk about him on paper—and yet she feels that she would have to write of him. So I am deputed to tell you how much we have appreciated your gift and then to tell you something of the boy.

He celebrated his 19^th birthday with us. He said to me: “I am a veteran. When we, the first batch of youngsters, were appointed to the heavy batteries as Mechanical Transport Officers it was an altogether new thing. Nobody could teach us then because nobody knew the practical conditions and the way to go about that work. We had to learn all this by ourselves under shell-fire and sometimes under machine-gun fire. And we have all done pretty well.”

One could see he was fairly pleased with himself and extremely proud of his men. He had a year of continuous duty all along the line right from Ypres to the Somme. He has been gassed a little in the early days—a sort of welcome from Fritz. He managed to get in as many side-shows as possible—has flown in action, has squatted in observation posts; went sniper-hunting, had a joy ride in a tank the first time they went over the German lines. But what seems to afford him the greatest satisfaction is having been knocked down by the same shell-concussion with General Gough. The boy had just put the last gun of the battery in position, then got his lorry back on the road and was waiting for a bit because the landscape ahead was full of German shells. He saw a general’s car come along from the direction of Pozières. It pulled up opposite him and the general got out, apparently to speak to him. Just at that moment a H.Z. shell landed on the car’s forewheel blew the whole thing to smithereens and flung the general covered with his drivers blood and shreds of flesh under B’s lorry. B had been flung there too; the lorry (an American—Peerless) was half demolished and of the two men with B one was killed and the other had his hand blown off. B and the general crawled from under the wreck together. The Gen: was a horrible sight. He said to B: “For Goodness’ sake lets get out of this.” And B said: “Certainly Sir” and pointed out to him an enormous shell-crater quite near the road. So they crawled along over there taking the wounded man with them. In that crater there were a good many people some dead and some alive and luckily two stretcher-bearers who bandaged the man’s arm. Meantime B wiped the general down with some rags he found lying about, the best way he could; and then they both sat in that hole for an hour and a half shivering and shaking from the shock. Later the Gen. got away down a trench and B went back to his battery where he helped around generally till the evening, when his junior officer arrived with an ammunition convoy with which B returned to the replenishing station. But before daybreak he was back with the battery with another ammunition convoy. And now said B “whenever the Gen: sees me on the roads he waves his hand to me, though I am certain he doesn’t know my name.”

We found B matured very much. What struck me most was a sort of good-tempered imperturbable serenity in his manner, speech and thoughts—as if nothing in the world could startle or annoy him any more. He looks wonderfully robust and has developed a respectable moustache. He gave us every minute of his leave; wouldn’t hear of going to town except for a day and a half with his mother to call on the more intimate of our circle of friends. We got on extremely well together. We talked not only of War but of the other two W’s also. Where the fellow got his taste for wine I can’t imagine. As to Women, Cunninghame Graham who went on purpose to meet him in the salon of a very distinguished lady (the world says that she is his last flame. About time. C.G. is sixty-five if a day) wrote to me with great glee that he found the boy “très dégourdi” and that he thought he “will be un homme a femmes like You and I, for he has a way with them.” My wife who gave a lunch party has also observed that aptitude and was very much amused. She has indeed snatched a fearful joy during these 10 days. Her fortitude is admirable but I am anxious about her health. She sends you her most friendly regards. What a war-letter I have written!

I have just read your letter to Jessie, who is immensely flattered and pleased at her friendly correspondence with J.Q. Speaking of that same lady I will tell you that the surgeons entertain good hopes of mending her thoroughly in the course of 6 to 8 months. And meantime a cleverly devised apparatus which she has to wear on her damaged limb has relieved her from the pain from which she has suffered for the last 14 years. She can look forward to the future now with renewed confidence.

My outlook too has been altered for the better in consequence. This thing has been like a nightmare oppressing our life for a long stretch of years.

Thank you very much for the books. Monahan I like. E[zra] P[ound] is certainly a poet but I am afraid I am too old and too wooden-headed to appreciate him as perhaps he deserves. The critics here consider him harmless; but as he has, I believe, a very good opinion of himself I don’t suppose he worries his head about the critics very much. Besides he has many women at his feet; which must be immensely comforting. But I am very grateful to you for sending me that bibliographically valuable copy.

Whatever happens Russia is out of the war now. The great thing is to keep the Russian infection, its decomposing power, from the social organism of the rest of the world. In this Poland will have to play its part on whatever lines her future may have to be laid. And at the same time she will have to resist the immense power of germanism which would be death too, but in another shape. Whether that nation over-run, ruined and shaken to the very foundations of its soul will rise to this awful task I really don’t know. What assistance she will be able to get from the Western world nobody can tell. Never was there such a darkness over a people’s future, and that, don’t forget, coming after more than a century of soul grinding oppression in which apart from a few choice spirits the Western world took no interest. Fine words have been given to it before. And the finer the words the greater was always the deception. One evening in August in 1914 in a dimly lit, big room I spoke to a small group of Poles belonging to the University and the political life of the town of Cracow. One of the things I said was: “Rest assured that whoever makes peace in six months (that was all the talk then—that the war couldn’t last) England will go on for ten years if necessary.” But I had also the courage to tell them: “Have no illusions. If anybody has got to be sacrificed in this war it will be you. If there is any salvation to be found it is only in your own breasts, it is only by the force of your inner life that you will be able to resist the rottenness of Russia and the soullessness of Germany. And this will be your fate for ever and ever. For nothing in the world can alter the force of facts.”

And if I had to speak to them to-morrow I would repeat these very words. I don’t remember now what Mr Wilson said in his latest utterance. There is an awful air of unreality in all the words that are being flung about in the fact of such appalling realities. For the closer they are looked into the more appalling they are. And the tragedy of the situation for all the hearts, that are not the Devils’ or the Angels’ but those of Men truly worthy of the name, is this: that they can’t contemplate either Peace or War otherwise than with an equal dread.

That is the tragedy—the inner anguish—the bitterness of lost lives, of unsettled consciences and of spiritual perplexities. Courage, endurance, enthusiasm, the hardest idealism itself, have their limits. And beyond those limits what is there? The eternal ignorance of mankind, the fateful darkness in which only vague forms can be seen which themselves may be no more than illusions.

In this enormous upheaval of Forces and Consciences all Hopes and all Fears are on an equality. Either can lead mankind equally astray. And there is nothing in the world to hold on to but the work that has to be done on each succeeding day. Outside that there is nothing to lay hold of but what each man can find in himself. [ . . . ]

Believe me dear Quinn

It is very much like You to write at once as you have written, and indeed tho’ not surprised I am deeply touched by your sympathetic understanding of my actual feelings as to P[inker]’s death.

Gradually since 1914 an intimacy developed between us in a strange way. He seemed to think that he had earned the right of laying his innermost thoughts and feelings before me. A peculiar but in its way a touching assertion of the right of good service and—no other word will do—of devotion.

The notice in the Times is perfectly true. He had a pride in his work and in his power to help people in ways that from a cold business point of view could not be justified to common prudence.

As to the new situation created by his death it may be for me a little awkward for a time. In any case it must be a loss for no one would be able to conduct my affairs as he did. But my affairs too are nearing their end—in a manner of speaking. But I feel that we all in this house have lost a personality that counted in our lives for stability and support.

Our dear love to You.

I forgive you your “horrible” letter. (You will notice how characteristic of Conrad is this proceeding of answering letters by the end. That is the fault that critics found with my novels. They called it “indirect method.” Funny lot, the critics.)

I am brilliant this morning. Some day I will begin a novel like this—with a word in quotes and then a long parenthesis.

The lack of response from the public does not surprise me. And I don’t think it surprises very much Messrs. Chatto & Windus. The more honour to them in risking that shot for which no great prize can be obtained. As to you, it is clear that you have done this for love—and there is no more to be said.

In the volumes you sent me I was much more interested and fascinated by your rendering than by Proust’s creation. One has revealed to me something and there is no revelation in the other. I am speaking now of the sheer maîtrise de langue; I mean how far it can be pushed—in your case of two languages—by a supreme faculty akin to genius. For to think that such a result could be obtained by mere study and industry would be too depressing. And that is the revelation. As far as the maîtrise de langue is concerned there is no revelation in Proust. [ . . . ]

Now as to Marcel Proust, créateur, I don’t think he has been written about much in English, and what I have seen of it was rather superficial. I have seen him praised for his “wonderful” pictures of Paris life and provincial life. But that has been done admirably before, for us, either in love, or in hatred, or in mere irony. One critic goes so far as to say that P.’s great art reaches the universal and that in depicting his own past he reproduces for us the general experience of mankind. But I doubt it. I admire him rather for disclosing a past like nobody else’s, for enlarging, as it were, the general experience of mankind by bringing to it something that has not been recorded before. However, all that is not of much importance. The important thing is that whereas before we had analysis allied to creative art, great in poetic conception, in observation, or in style, his is a creative art absolutely based on analysis. It is really more than that. He is a writer who has pushed analysis to the point when it became creative. All that crowd of personages in their infinite variety through all the gradations of the social scale are made to stand up, to live, and are rendered visible to us by the force of analysis alone. I don’t say P. has got no gift of description or characterization; but to take an example from each end of the scale: Francoise, the devoted servant, and le baron de Charlus—a consummate portrait—how many descriptive lines have they got to themselves in the whole body of that immense work? Perhaps, counting the lines, half a page each. And yet no intelligent person can doubt for a moment their plastic and coloured existence. One would think that method (and P. has no other, because his method is the expression of his temperament) may be pushed too far, but as a matter of fact it is never wearisome. There may be here and there among those thousands of pages a paragraph that one might think over subtle, a bit of analysis pushed so far as to vanish into nothingness. But those are very few, and all minor, instances. The intense interest never flags because one has got the feeling that the last word is being said upon a subject much studied, much written about and of undying interest—the last word of its time. Those that have found beauty in Proust’s work are perfectly right. It is there. What amazes one is its inexplicable character. In that prose so full of life there is no reverie, no emotion, no marked irony, no warmth of conviction, not even a marked rhythm to charm our fancy. It appeals to our sense of wonder and gains our assent by its veiled greatness. I don’t think there ever has been in the whole of literature such an example of the power of analysis and I feel pretty safe in saying that there will never be another.