This short novel follows the crew of the sailing ship Narcissus on a voyage from Bombay to London. Among them is James Wait, a seriously ill Black sailor whose presence unsettles the men, stirring up sympathy, suspicion and resentment. Storms, hardship and quarrels test the crew's loyalty to each other and to their officers. Conrad draws on his own years at sea to portray the ship as a small society under strain. The title uses a racial slur of its era, and the book is often read for its sea writing and its study of solidarity, fear and the fragility of group feeling.
Quotes
The ship, a fragment detached from the earth, went on lonely and swift like a small planet.
Goodbye brothers! You were a good crowd. As good a crowd as ever fisted with wild cries the beating canvas of a heavy foresail; or tossing aloft, invisible in the night, gave back yell for yell to a westerly gale.
Chapter FIVE · Project Gutenberg #17731 (opens in a new tab)