Joseph Conrad and The Modern Age Essay -- Literary Analysis

The 20th Century stands out not except as an age of growth or refinement, but one of secure transc give the sackent recreation. This new era, presenting the world with radical new ideas and invention, ushered in appalling changes and previously unheard of notions and theory over the views of man. This new phase of kindness brought about the conception and birth of Modernism. Joseph Conrad in particular rushed out front to slam a door on the square-toed Age and end the century of optimism, reproving the human races ideologies on virtue and purity with the more than atheistical realities of the bleakness of real human nature and the power of ill circumstance. Conrads novel Lord Jim cleaved into the supporting pillars raised by previous Victorian value and set a foundation for his notions of High Modernism his characters and their reactions to half-hearted situations, and even the situations themselves, present the absence of the divine and holy to take the skeptical stance th at men, imperfect as they are, face an existential existence.Through his reverse Conrad unabashedly declares that human nature, in agreement with Robert Stevensons concept for The Curious trip of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, is composed of a dual nature. Rather than focus on such(prenominal) grandiose descriptions of good and evil however, Conrad tackles a subtler and more base exploration of the human spirit. Jim as his prime example, Conrad makes to show that humanity is an enigmatic enigma of strength and weakness (Wester 3314). In the case of Jim, whose struggle is not the wave-particle duality of good and evil so much as it is a question of the integrity of his character, a much more complicated war is fought in which he must face the perils of human weakness and walk a balanced line between ... ...hose who would visit into it.Works CitedConrad, Joseph. Lord Jim. forward-looking York Barnes & Noble Books, 2004. Print.Guerard, Albert J. Conrad The Novelist. Twentieth-Century l iterary Criticism. Ed. Sharon Hall. Vol. 6. Detroit Gale look Company. 1982. Print.Morf, Gustav. The Polish Heritage of Joseph Conrad. Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Laurie DeMauro. Vol. 43. Detroit Gale Research Company. 1992. Print.Powys, T. F.. Lord Jim. Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Laurie DeMauro. Vol. 43. Detroit Gale Research Company. 1992. Print.Sadoff, Ira. Sartre and Conrad Lord Jim as Existential Hero. Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Laurie DeMauro. Vol. 43. Detroit Gale Research Company. 1992. Print.Wester, Janet. Lord Jim. Masterplots. Ed. Laurence Mazzeno. Fourth ed. Vol. 6. Pasadena Salem Press, 2011. Print.