Conard

OUT OF THE FOG
JOSEPH CONRAD: A LIFE

By Zdzislaw Najder
(Translated by Halina Najder)
(Boydell & Brewer 745pp)
THE SEVERAL LIVES OF JOSEPH CONRAD
By John Stape
(William Heinemann 378pp)

IF EXILE AND alienation are the defining characteristics of twentieth-century literature, Joseph Conrad is the quintessential twentieth-century writer. From Roman poets to modern playwrights, many have written well in places and languages other than their own, but Conrad was more deracinated than most. The man who has been called the best French novelist in English (a  compliment also paid to Henry James and Ford Madox Ford) was a Pole from what is now the Ukraine, stripped by circumstance of his culture, his class, his family, his language, his country, and even his name. But against these blows of fate Conrad  fought back in original ways. Born in the landlocked backlands of Central Europe, he made a living for nearly twenty years working tramp steamers for the British merchant navy. Schooled in a rough and ready way of life, he changed tack at thirty-seven, started writing in English and published his first novel at thirty-eight. Remaining single until he was thirty-nine, he married a workingclass girl from London and became a family man, ending his life as a rich and respected member of the Establishment with a mansion in Kent which looks not unlike a Polish manor-house. Quite a journey.

Indian Women in Literature

Romila Thapar is an Indian historian whose principal area of study is ancient India. Thapar's major works are Asoka and the Decline of the Mauryas, Ancient Indian Social History: Some Interpretations, Recent Perspectives of Early Indian History (editor), A History of India Volume One, and Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300. In January 2005, she declined the Padma Bhushan awarded by the Indian Government. In a letter to President A P J Abdul Kalam, she said she was "astonished to see her name in the list of awardees because three months ago when I was contacted by the HRD ministry and asked if I would accept an award, I made my position very clear and explained my reason for declining it". Thapar had declined the Padma Bhushan on an earlier occasion, in 1992. To the President, she explained the reason for turning down the award thus: "I only accept awards from academic institutions or those associated with my professional work, and not state awards". She is co-winner with Peter Brown of the prestigious Kluge Prize for the Study of Humanity for 2008 which comes with a $1 million prize.

Paul Heyse.

Many famous writers from several countries have been proposed for this year's Nobel Prize in Literature. The Swedish Academy has awarded it to a writer whose nomination has been supported by more than sixty German experts on art, literature, and philosophy. His name is Paul Heyse. The name revives the memory of our youth and manhood; we still remember the literary pleasure that his novellas, in particular, gave to us. Now an old but still active man, he is a figure that the jury could not pass over if it was to express its admiration by awarding the high distinction to the most significant literary work. Nor was the jury to be swayed by considerations of age or, indeed, anything other than true merit.

Rushdie

From a novel by Salman Rushdie published in 1989 to an American civil protest called "Everyone Draw Muhammad Day" in 2010, a familiar pattern has evolved. It begins when Westerners say or do something critical of Islam. Islamists respond with name-calling and outrage, demands for retraction, threats of lawsuits and violence, and actual violence. In turn, Westerners hem and haw, prevaricate, and finally fold. Along the way, each controversy prompts a debate focusing on the issue of free speech.

Mark Twain

A man named Samuel L. Clemens traveled west with his brother, across the Great Plains, over the Rocky Mountains, and stopping in the territory of Nevada, where he got a job as a miner. That role didn't work out for him and, instead, he turned to the local newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise.  He achieved some notoriety there, later writing to his mother somewhat tongue-in-cheek as having "the widest reputation" possible on the frontier. He noted, "If I were not naturally a lazy, idle, good-for-nothing vagabond," he might even make money off it. "And I am proud to say I am the most conceited ass in the Territory." Such was Clemens's humor.

O Henry

He was born William Sydney Porter in Greensboro, North Carolina on September 11, 1862. Years later, he was coy about the year of his birth, saying nothing more specific than "about the close of the war." He was equally coy about his name; literary history would remember him as "O. Henry."

Porter kept his true identity a secret on purpose and asked that photos of himself never be circulated and provided little information about himself. "Nobody but a concentrated idiot would write over a pen-name and then tack on a lot of twaddle about himself," he wrote. As such, the true "O. Henry" was a bit mystifying. He once refused to tell an admirer whether he was male or female.

Spenser

Edmund spenser is considered to be the chilf of the renaissance and the reformation. His poetic reputation was recognized with the publication of the shepherd’s calendar (1579). This poem was inspired by Virgil and Theocritus. It is known for its richness and warm pictorial beauty. Spenser fell in love with Elizabeth, an Irish girl and wrote Amaretti (1594),  sonnets, in her honour. In 1594 he married Elizabeth, celebrating his wedding with his Epithalamion. He published Astrophel in 1595, an elegy on the death of his friend Sidney. His major poetical works The Faerie queene reveals spenser’s creative imagination at its peek. The main theme of the book is “eternal war between food and evil.” This epic is not only an allegory of love but it is also an allegory of man’s spiritual and moral life. Views of the state of Ireland 91596), his only prose work, in which he submits a plan for “pecifying the oppressed and rebellious people.”

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Introduction.

William Shakespeare was a man who absolutely changed history. He redirected the way poetry and plays were to be written for the generations to come. His outlook on the world and how to write about it were so different from that of his time, and any other time period to come. His creativity inspired love, beauty, imagination, and zaniness to flow from any paper. He wrote beautiful stage plays on which some of the most famous works in all of history come from, such as Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Macbeth. The life of William Shakespeare was that like no other, and thus his name being remembered for years and years after his death.