Joseph Conrad - Man and Writer in the "House of Darkness"

Joseph Conrad - Man and Writer in the "House of Darkness" Joseph Conrad grew up in the Polish Ukraine, a large, fertile plain between Poland and Russia. It was a divided nation, with four languages, four religions, and a number of different classes. A fraction of the Polish-speaking inhabitants, including Conrad's family, belonged to the szlachta, a hereditary class below the aristocracy, which combined qualities of gentry and nobility. They had the political power, despite …

…passenger aboard the Thames ship, who does nothing in our eyes except play dominoes. Both together constitute a crew of gentility, which contrasts with the crew from Marlow's Congo ship. Narrator: an unnamed passenger aboard the Thames ship, he provides a structure for Marlow's story, and is a stand-in for audience perspective and participation. He was once a sailor, and he seems to be very affected by Kurtz's tale, due to a somewhat romantic nature.