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Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad Quotes

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Famous Joseph Conrad Quotes

“There can be no life without faith and love--faith in a human heart, love of a human being! That touch of grace, whose help once in life is the privilege of the most undeserving, flung open for him the portals of beyond, and in contemplating there the certitude immaterial and precious he forgot all the meaningless accidents of existence: the bliss of getting, the delight of enjoying; all the protean and enticing forms of the cupidity that rules a material world of foolish joys, of contemptible sorrows. Faith!--Love!--the undoubting, clear faith in the truth of a soul--the great tenderness, deep as the ocean, serene and eternal, like the infinite peace of space above the short tempests of the earth. It was what he had wanted all his life--but he understood it only then for the first time. It was through the pain of losing her that the knowledge had come. She had the gift! She had the gift! And in all the world she was the only human being that could surrender it to his immense desire.”

LoveLifeDesireFaith
Book:The Return
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“We return to face our superiors, our kindred, our friends--- those whom we obey, and those whom we love; but even they who have neither, the most free, lonely, irresponsible and bereft of ties, --- even those for whom home holds no dear face, no familiar voice, --- even they have to meet the spirit that dwells within the land, under its sky, in its air, in its valleys, and on its rises, in its fields, in its waters and its tress--- a mute friend, judge, and inspirer. Say what you like, to get its joy, to breathe its peace, to face its truth, one must return with a clear conscience. All this may seem to you sheer sentimentalism; and indeed very few of us have the will or capacity to look consciously under the surface of familiar emotions. There are the girls we love, the men we look up to, the tenderness, the friendships, the opportunities, the pleasures! But the fact remains that you must touch your reward with clean hands, lest it turn to dead leaves, to thorns, in your grasp.”

FreedomIndividuality
Book:Lord Jim
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“There are the girls we love, the men we look up to, the tenderness, the friendships, the opportunities, the pleasures! But the fact remains that you must touch your reward with clean hands, lest it turn to dead leaves, to thorns, in your grasp.”

HopeGriefDespairDepressionExpectationsDisappointmentNostalgiaVanityHeartacheRegretsFutilitySinsUnrestPointlessnessFalling ShortBittersweet MemoriesHaunted PastWhy The World Needs JesusAshes In The MouthDark HistorySmoke In The Eyes
Book:Lord Jim
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“She had said he had been driven away from her by a dream,--and there was no answer one could make her--there seemed to be no forgiveness for such a transgression. And yet is not mankind itself, pushing on its blind way, driven by a dream of its greatness and its power upon the dark paths of excessive cruelty and of excessive devotion. And what is the pursuit of truth, after all?”

TruthHumanityFallFearFireGraceMankindPrideAmbitionDrivenHuman ConditionSelf LoathingHauntedSelf HateSelf MotivatedAmbitious PeopleAmbitious MindsIdlesness
Book:Lord Jim
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“A work that aspires, however humbly, to the condition of art should carry its justification in every line...To snatch in a moment of courage, from the remorseless rush of time, a passing phase of life is only the beginning of the task. The task approached in tenderness and faith is to hold up unquestioningly, without choice and without fear, the rescued fragment before all eyes and in the light of a sincere mood. It is to show its vibration, its colour, its form; and through its movement, its form, and its colour, reveal the substance of its truth -- disclose its inspiring secret: the stress and passion within the core of each convincing moment. In a single-minded attempt of that kind, if one be deserving and fortunate, one may perchance attain to such clearness of sincerity that at last the presented vision of regret or pity, of terror or mirth, shall awaken in the hearts of the beholders that feeling of unavoidable solidarity; of the solidarity in mysterious origin, in toil, in joy, in hope, in uncertain fate, which binds men to each other and all mankind to the visible world.”

Art
Author:Joseph Conrad
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“And because you not always can keep your eyes shut there comes the real trouble--the heart pain--the world pain. I tell you, my friend, it is not good for you to find you cannot make your dream come true, for the reason that you not strong enough are, or not clever enough. . . . Ja! . . . And all the time you are such a fine fellow too! Wie? Was? Gott im Himmel! How can that be? Ha! ha! ha!" ’The shadow prowling amongst the graves of butterflies laughed boisterously.”

HeartacheLost SoulsBroken DreamsBad ReputationBroken SpiritHeart Pain
Book:Lord Jim
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“The mind of man is capable of anything-because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future. What was there after all? Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valour, rage-who can tell?-but truth-truth stripped of its cloak of time. Let the fool gape and shudder-the man know, and can look on without a wink. But he must at least be as much of a man as these on the shore. He must meet the truth with his own true stuff-with his own inborn strength.”

InspirationalHuman Nature
Book:Heart of Darkness and the Secret Sharer
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“Es extraño lo lejos que están las mujeres de la realidad. Viven en un mundo propio que jamás ha existido y que nunca podrá existir. Es demasiado hermoso y, si quisieran construirlo, se vendría abajo antes de la primera puesta de sol. Cualquiera de las malditas cosas con las que los hombres llevamos conviviendo sin problemas desde el día de la creación se pondría de por medio y lo desharía en pedazos.”

FeminismHuman Nature
Book:El corazón de las tinieblas
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“All my moral and intellectual being is penetrated by an invincible conviction that whatever falls under the dominion of our senses must be in nature and, however exceptional, cannot differ in its essence from all the other effects of the visible and tangible world of which we are a self-conscious part. The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries as it is—marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state. No, I am too firm in my consciousness of the marvelous to be ever fascinated by the mere supernatural which . . . is but a manufactured article, the fabrication of minds insensitive to the intimate delicacies of our relation to the dead and to the living, in their countless multitudes; a desecration of our tenderest memories; an outrage on our dignity.”

PhilosophyReligionHumanismNaturalism
Author:Joseph Conrad
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“We were wanderers on a prehistoric earth, of an earth that wore the aspect of an unknown planet. We could have fancied ourselves the first of men taking possession of an accursed inheritance, to be subdued at the cost of profound anguish and of excessive toilo. But suddenly, as we struggled round a bend, there would be a glimpse of rush walls, of peaked grass-roofs, a burst of yells, a whirl of black limbs, a mass of hands clapping, of feet stamping, of bodies swaying, of eyes rolling, under the droop of heavy and motionless foliage. The steamer toiled along slowly on the edge of a black and incomprehensible frenzy. The prehistoric man was cursing us, praying to us, welcoming us - who could tell? We were cut off from the comprehension of our surroundings; we glided past like phantoms, wondering and secretly appalled, as sane men would before an enthousiastic outbreak in a madhouse.”

HumanityForest
Book:Heart of Darkness
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“«[...] Il massimo che ci si possa aspettare è una certa conoscenza di se stessi - che arriva troppo tardi - una raccolta di rimpianti inestinguibili. Io ho combattuto con la morte. È la lotta meno emozionante che possiate immaginare. Si svolge in un grigiore impalpabile, senza terreno sotto i piedi, con il vuoto attorno, senza spettatori, senza incitamenti, senza gloria, senza la grande smania di vittoria, senza la grande paura della sconfitta, in un'atmosfera malsana di tiepido scetticismo, senza credere più di tanto nel vostro diritto, né, tantomeno, in quello del vostro avversario. Se questa è la forma della suprema saggezza, allora la vita è un enigma più grande di quanto alcuni di noi non credano.»”

AdventureLife PhilosophyHorrorConrad
Book:Cuore di tenebra
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“We wander in our thousands over the face of the earth, the illustrious and the obscure, earning beyond the seas our fame, our money, or only a crust of bread; but it seems to me that for each of us going home must be like going to render an account. We return to face our superiors, our kindred, our friends--those whom we obey, and those whom we love; but even they who have neither, the most free, lonely, irresponsible and bereft of ties,--even those for whom home holds no dear face, no familiar voice,--even they have to meet the spirit that dwells within the land, under its sky, in its air, in its valleys, and on its rises, in its fields, in its waters and its trees--a mute friend, judge, and inspirer.”

HomeHumanityFamilyMankindReturnGhostsOld FriendsReunionBittersweetHomecomingHome TownProdigal DaughtersProdigal SonsStomping Grounds
Book:Lord Jim
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“Do you see him? Do you see the story? Do you see anything? It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream--making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream-sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is the very essence of dreams..." "...No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the sensation of any epoch of one's existence--that which makes its truth, its meaning--its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream--alone.”

LanguageLonelinessEmpathy
Book:Heart of Darkness
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“how can you imagine what particular region of the first ages a man's untrammelled feet may take him into by the way of solitude--utter solitude without a policeman--by the way of silence--utter silence, where no warning voice of a kind neighbour can be heard whispering of public opinion? These little things make all the great difference. When they are gone you must fall back upon your own innate strength, upon your own capacity for faithfulness”

LonelinessSolitudeEthicsInner Strength
Book:Heart of Darkness
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“It does not matter; there’s many a heavenly body in the lot crowding upon us of a night that mankind had never heard of, it being outside the sphere of its activities and of no earthly importance to anybody but to the astronomers who are paid to talk learnedly about its composition, weight, path--the irregularities of its conduct, the aberrations of its light--a sort of scientific scandal-mongering.”

HopeStarsSkyInfiniteAstronomyFirmamentLightsAstral BodiesPsalm 19 1
Book:Lord Jim
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“I am stupid, am I not? What more can I want? If you ask them who is brave--who is true--who is just--who is it they would trust with their lives?--they would say, Tuan Jim. And yet they can never know the real, real truth....”

SecretAnxietyBurdenHypocrisyPtsdHauntingCowardlyAnxiety DisordersHauntedGuilty ConscienceSelf HateWounds To The HeartEmotional WoundsMonsters Of MenWounded SoulsSinful NatureMonster Under The BedWhy We Need Jesus
Book:Lord Jim
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“If we could only get rid of consciousness. What makes mankind tragic is not that they are the victims of nature, it is that they are conscious of it. To be part of the animal kingdom under the conditions of this earth is very well--but as soon as you know of your slavery, the pain, the anger, the strife--the tragedy begins. We can't return to nature, since we can't change our place in it. Our refuge is in stupidity [...] There is no morality, no knowledge, and no hope; there is only the consciousness of ourselves which drives us about a world that [...] is always but a vain and floating appearance.”

PainHopeNatureConsciousnessKnowledgeMankindMoralityConsciousTragedyAngerSlaveryAppearanceStupidityVainTragicRefugeStrifeVictimsAnimal Kingdom
Author:Joseph Conrad
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“There too he had been treated with revolting injustice. His struggles, his privations,his hard work to raise himself in the social scale, had filled him with such an exalted conviction of his merits that it was extremely difficult for the world to treat him with justice— the standard of that notion depending so much upon the patience of the individual. The Professor had genius, but lacked the great social virtue of resignation.”

HumilityIndignation
Book:The Secret Agent
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