This is very interesting collection of three short stories all related to the certain parts of human life.

Youth

Title says it all - young Marlowe (also a lead character in Heart of Darkness) gets his first command as a result of disastrous event when coal transported by his ship catches fire and explodes. Whole story though just emanates the energy of the youth that sees nothing as an obstacle and is eager to prove itself. Conrad manages to capture the way of life on high seas, relations among the crew and everyday life of the seaman to the smallest detail.

Heart of Darkness

Marlowe, now older and wiser (middle age) decides to join the European company for tour in Africa, running a steamer carrying ivory from impenetrable jungle to the European companies collection station. This is rather wordy story and it takes a while to go through it. People Marlowe meets are all strange people who might be very proper back in civilization but in the wilderness they seem to have lost their compass. Driven by greed they tend to look at all around them (natives and other company men) as an obstacle. So when he finally meets mysterious Mr. Kurtz who placed himself as a ruler of several native tribes, great man of whom company has greatest expectations, he sees how far can man fall when not in control of his wits. Like most people at the time Kurtz came to Africa as a missionary to spread "light" among the natives. But in the process he slowly lost his way starting to treat his surroundings and natives as his own fiefdom, waging brutal wars and killing men, women and children sometimes out of whim. Soon his madness takes its toll and Kurtz slowly spirals into illness of body (mind being lost for a while now) and finally gets saved by Marlowe only to die at the very end of journey down the river.

I understand there is lots of controversy around this story but as far as I can see it Conrad very successfully presented two things.

First is utter horror and acts of colonial companies extracting natural wealth using natives as a workforce and treating them in horrible ways. The way greed controls the people in power (when is it ever enough?) eats through the core of very people working for the company. Even if they are not inherently bad under the influence and temptations of wealth (so much ivory) they become brutes and very much total opposite of what they think of themselves (remember this is period where developed world (Europe and Americas) treated all the exotic locals of Africa and Asia as dark places to which they need to bring the light).

Second is the very fact that in each of us we have a savage sitting. By savage I mean part of us that is ready to do heinous things, kill , maim, destroy. Civilization is maybe there to help us keep it under control but when in wild it is very clear how weak man is. When confronted with might and beauty of nature unprepared souls get overwhelmed and start their slow spiral into madness. For Kurtz, very capable orator, man capable of rallying other men for his cause, contact with natives, their very nature and fear he can exploit for his means, places him in the place of absolute power. More than enough to consume anyone. It is very short step from genius to madman but also from civilized to utmost barbaric.

The End of the Tether

Third story is very sad story of an ultimate sacrifice. What is devoted father (old age) ready to do for his child, his daughter. After losing his wife and losing his savings old captain decides to spend rest of his days making money to help his daughter that is in very bad financial state. Father will forgo his pride and opinions [especially about his son in law] because he knows hard times strike a man down from time to time and nobody can be blamed for it. He gathers strength to do his best to help his daughter. Even if it means working for a complete maniac of ship-owner and having a back-stabbing first officer.
Very touchy and ultimately very sad story with a happy ending.

All three stories impressed me much. They might be too wordy for modern times and pages might seem just so full of words that you have a feeling you will drown in them. But as a stories they are very humane and very down to earth and this is great part of their charm.

Recommended to all who like a good story. ( )

This was a nice combination of stories. ( )

This is a collection of three novels written by Joseph Conrad. I enjoyed the third story the most. The End of the Tether has an interesting twist at the end of the story. The Heart of Darkness is interesting but I found it less meaningful. Youth was rather mediocre. ( )

I bought this book for Heart of Darkness, and as this famous piece is so short (less than 70 pages), the publishers pads it with two other short stories - Youth, and The End of the Tether. Heart of Darkness is a compelling piece of writing. It is famous for portraying the atrocities of the colonial regime in the Congo (the darkness refers equally to the Belgians as to the dark continent)) but the surprise for me was the quality of the writing.
The story is told aloud by a story-teller, as in Lord Jim, which is a clunky way of structuring the writing, but Conrad makes it work. While an expose, it is not a polemic. The awful bits are told, almost as aside. No effort is made to comment. The reader is being told a different story - the Congo seems to be the background. But of course, the Belgian regime is really the core of the book, and the apparent structure just a device. It works so well.
The other stories are good to read, but not up to the standard of Heart of Darkness. Tether is over written, too embellished - the story drowns in words in a way that is a total contrast to Heart of Darkness.
Great stuff. Read May 2014. ( )

my recent reading of the poisonwood bible definitely enhanced my reading of this book (for context) because it talks about nearly the same situation - white colonization of the congo, and the ravaging of the land and people by the whites, as well as their lack of understanding of the native people. i had to keep in mind, while reading, that it was written in 1899 and it's not fair to judge a writer by today's standards for social justice. i recognize that it might be easier for me to say that as a white person, i can somehow justify the use of the n word in this book. but i also wonder at his purpose for his depiction of the native people, if he was drawing attention to the injustice or perpetuating it. it certainly seems that his intention is to show the destruction of the land and people. i'm just not sure if he does this from a place of true understanding of the congolese or not. he does say "The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much." for me, though, the writing was a bit dense and hard to get through, with awkward sentence structure, but at the same time the language was fantastic. in retrospect i actually wish i'd read this book aloud. it's so short that it's possible to do this, and i think the language comes through better that way.

my favorite 2 quotes, one for content and one for language:

"'I don't like work - no man does - but I like what is in the work, - the chance to find yourself. Your own reality - for yourself, not for others - what no other man can ever know.'"

"'The sun was low; and leaning forward side by side, they seemed to be tugging painfully uphill their two ridiculous shadows of unequal length, that trailed behind them slowly over the tall grass without bending a single blade.'" ( )