Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1921-05-14
JOSEPH CONRAD ON
LIFE AND LETTERS
I1e'os OF the AngloPolish Novelist Collected in Book o.
Manly Thinking Without Prejudice or Sophstcations
BY FELIX L. SCHELLING
!rslfY nf PennayIya mia

u the Untvcrsity OF PennsyiNhnH
scurc his comprehension. ''The Crime
tale. is worth half the lengthy histories
on this murder of nation the Note
on the Polish Problem sets forth with
striking brevity the plight Of what was
still at the time Of it's writing (1Ol6l
the wrath Of n remembered wrong. And
I'M "Polnnd Revisited" speaks in con-
rentrated fervor the wandcrer returning
to what was once his.
TT IS in POLAND Revisited" that Mr..
i Conrad tells how in that fateful
summer of 1914 he accepted an invi-
tation to visit Cracow, travcrsing the
North Sea and Germany just before the
declaration of war. which caught him
in Russia, from which he with difficulty
at length escaped by way Of Vienna to
Italy and back to England. It must be
gratifying to Americans to know that
was extended over him In the process.
something he forgets not to mention with
the name of Mr.. Penfeld. whose many
services to those in like plight will be
long remembered But the hold of this
paper upon the reader IL for its remi
niscences and it's descriptive touches of
that great North Sea on which Mr..
Conrad began his seafaring. AS he sits
in the train in the Liverpool station,
about to start, he recalls his first ar
rival as boy Of nineteen in London on
that spot. He had come off of one
shin and was seeking another to ship
nothing but the fragment Of a map Of
London to guide him to an obscure
"Dickenslike nook Of London he calls
IL, there to find the man who was to
place him. And he tells US that 1t
never occurred to him to seek his way
in n conveyance. Strange contrast be-
tween this foreign lad. unknown to any
one If the millions in the great sen of
humanity. and the approved, successful
author with his volumes of achievement,
his hosts of friends. his family and the
place in the world which he has made
his. Truly. some trees wax luxuriant
in the transplanting.
TWO or three absorbing papers are
L those on various aspects Of the loss
Of the Titanic. in which the expert in
the affairs of the sea. MS well as the
humanitarian. speaks out. Little could
Mr.. Conrad have known that what man
inf1icts on man was to sink this terrible
disaster into insignifcance within a
year or TWO. fbuC IL ~ III Su'H lupcl
as "Well Done or ''Tradition,' in
which the man who followed the sea for
twenty years tells Of the quality. the
simplicity. the courage of the British
merchant service which he knew so well
il Is in these that we taste the Conrad
of THE Niger Of the Narcissus. The
former Of these in its effort to explain
"this unholy fascination" of the sea.
with it's story of the one thief whom
the writer had ever met in the serv-
ice. a thief less through dishonesty than
adventure the finding of the heart Of
the seaman's loyalty in service. and the
essence of manlness in work these are
fine things. finely said. And there are
exhibits of rightness, il | may put it
so, as to autocracy. the censorship OF
plays. the after life and what not. But
the best thing about the book-and 1t
is the best thing that can be said about
book-is to find in it the revelation
of n man thinking manly without pref
udice or sophistications, literary or so
cial. If it is salt water that can thus
clear our eyes and our perceptions.
would that more Of us were baptized in
it.
NOTES ON LIFE AND LETTERS, BY
Joseph Conrad. Garden City: Doubleday
Page Co.