FAQ
Jagiellonian University in Krakow

How Much Conrad in Conrad Criticism?: Conrad’s Artistry, Ideological Mediatization and Identity: A Commemorative Address on the 160th Anniversary of the Writer’s Birth

Publication date: 2018

Yearbook of Conrad Studies, 2018, Vol. 13, pp. 41 - 54

https://doi.org/10.4467/20843941YC.18.004.11239

Authors

Grażyna Maria Teresa Branny
Jesuit University Ignatianum in Krakow
, Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4169-3531 Orcid
Contact with author
All publications →

Titles

How Much Conrad in Conrad Criticism?: Conrad’s Artistry, Ideological Mediatization and Identity: A Commemorative Address on the 160th Anniversary of the Writer’s Birth

Abstract

The eponymous question of the present address as well as its main premise concern the issue of reading Conrad as opposed to the issue of Conrad’s readings. Although the writer insisted on the priority of artistic expression in his oeuvres over their thematic content, he tends to be analyzed with a view to precedence of content over form. Moreover, his application in his less known short fiction of the then novel modernist device of denegation usually ascribed to Faulkner, is hardly given its due in criticism. What distorts Conrad is, likewise, ideological mediatization of his fiction and biography. And, last but not least, comes insufficient appreciation among Western Conradians of the significance for his writings of his Polish background, and especially his borderland szlachta heritage, where also Polish criticism has been at fault. As emphasized, in comparison with Conrad’s Englishness, which comes down to the added value of his home, family, friends, and career in England as well as the adopted language, his Polishness is about l’âme: the patriotic spirit of Conrad’s ancestry, traumatic childhood experience, Polish upbringing and education, sensibilities and deeply felt loyalties deriving from his formative years in Poland. Therefore, one of the premises put forward in the present address is that perhaps Conrad should be referred to as an English writer with his Polish identity constantly inscribed and reinscribed into the content and form of his oeuvres, rather than simply an English writer of Polish descent as he is now. The three eponymous aspects are thus hardly to be ignored in Conrad studies, even if a significant part of Conrad criticism to date has done precisely that. 

References

Download references

Billy, Ted. A Wilderness of Words: Closure and Disclosure in Conrads Sort Fiction. Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech University Press, 1997.

Bobrowska, Ewelina. “A Letter to Apollo Korzeniowski (20 June, 1861)”. Scenographic Script, Joseph Conrad Museum in Berdyczev, the Ukraine.

Branny, Grażyna (M.T.). A Conflict of Values: Alienation and Commitment in the Novels of Joseph Conrad and William Faulkner. Kraków: Wydawnictwo “Sponsor”, 1997.

Branny, Grażyna (M.T.).  “What  ‘A Smile  of  Fortune’ Has  to  Hide: An  Intertextual  and  Comparative Reconsideration of the Texture and Theme of Conrads Tale” (forthcoming).

Branny, Grażyna (M.T.). “The Unfathomability of Conrads ‘Shallow Waters’ in ‘Freya of the Seven Isles’: An Intertextual Reading of Conrads Story”. Yearbook of Conrad Studies (Poland) 10 (2015): 127-150.

Brodsky, G. W. Stephen. Joseph Conrads Polish Soul: Realms of Memory and Self. Ed. G. Z. Ga- syna. Eastern and Western Perspectives Series. Ed. W. Krajka. Lublin: Maria Curie-Skłodowska University Press, 2016.

Conrad, Joseph. A Personal Record: Some Reminiscences. New York and London: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1912.

Davies, Laurence, J. H. Stape, eds. The Collected Letters of Joseph Conrad: 1920-1922. Vol. 7. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Davies, Laurence, J. H, Knowles, Owen, Moore, Gene M., eds. The Collected Letters of Joseph Conrad: Uncollected Letters and Indexes. Vol. 9. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Dudek, Jolanta. “Czesław Miłosz on Conrads Polish Stereotypes”. Yearbook of Conrad Studies (Poland) 9 (2014): 109-117.

Erdinast-Vulcan, Daphna. The Strange Short Fiction of Joseph Conrad. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Karl, Frederick R., Davies, Laurence, eds. The Collected Letters of Joseph Conrad: 1898-1902.

Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

Karl, Frederick R. The Collected Letters of Joseph Conrad: 1908-1911. Vol. 4. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

Korzeniowski, Apollo. Wstęp. In idem. Akt Pierwszy. Lwów: M. Altenborg, 1869. i-ivKott, Jan. “O laickim tragizmie” [On the Secular Tragic]. Trczość 1.2 (1945): 137-160.

Lothe, Jacob. Conrads Narrative Method. Oxford: Clarendon Press, (1989) 1991.

Mallios,  Peter  Lancelot.  Our  Conrad:  Constituting American Modernity. Stanford:  Stanford University Press, 2010.

Miłosz, Czesław. “Stereotyp u Conrada” [Conrads Stereotypes]. In Conrad żywy. Ed. W. Tarnawski. London: B. Świderski, 1957. 92-99.

Monod, Sylvère. “Heemskirk, the Dutch Lieutenant”. The Conradian 3.1 (Autumn 2006): 85-91.

Najder, Zdzisław, ed. Conrads Polish Background: Letters to and from Polish Friends. Transl. H. Carroll-Najder. London: Oxford University Press, 1964.

Najder, Zdzisław. Conrad Under Familial Eyes. Transl. H. Carroll-Najder. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.

Najder, Zdzisław. “Fidelity and Art: Joseph Conrads Cultural Heritage and Literary Program”. In Conrads Century: The Past and Future Splendour. Ed. L. L. Davis. Lublin: Maria Curie- Skłodowska University, 1998. 11-27.

Najder, Zdzisław. “Sztuka i wierność: dziedzictwo kulturowe i program literacki (Fragment)”.  In Polskość i europejskość w Josepha Conrada wizjach historii, polityki i etyki. Ed. W. Krajka. Seria  Joseph  Conrad   Polska,  Europa  Środkowo-Wschodnia   Świat.  Vol.  2.  Lublin: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii-Curie Skłodowskiej, 2013. 271-282.

Najder, Zdzisław. Życie Conrada Korzeniowskiego. Vol. 1 & 2. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Alfa, 1996. Orzeszkowa, Eliza. “Emigracja zdolności”. Kraj 16 (23 kwietnia 1899).

Pitavy, François L. “Some Remarks on Negation and Denegation in William Faulkners Absalom, Absalom!”. In Faulkners Discourse: An International Symposium. Ed. L.  Hönnighausen. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1989. 25-32.

Reid, S. W. “The Unpublished Typescript Version of ‘A Smile of Fortune’”. The Conradian 31.2 (Autumn 2006): 92-102.

Retinger, J. H. Conrad and his Contemporaries. London: Minerva, (1941) 1943.

Zabierowski, Stefan. “He was ‘one of us’: The Polish Reception of the Work of Joseph Conrad Korzeniowski”. Yearbook of Conrad Studies (Poland) 10 (2015): 171-191.

Information

Information: Yearbook of Conrad Studies, 2018, Vol. 13, pp. 41 - 54

Article type: Original article

Authors

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4169-3531

Grażyna Maria Teresa Branny
Jesuit University Ignatianum in Krakow
, Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4169-3531 Orcid
Contact with author
All publications →

Jesuit University Ignatianum in Krakow
Poland

Published at: 2018

Article status: Open

Licence: CC BY-NC-ND  licence icon

Percentage share of authors:

Grażyna Maria Teresa Branny (Author) - 100%

Article corrections:

-

Publication languages:

English