Joseph Conrad(born Jözef Teodor Konrad Korzenio-wski, (3 December 1857 - 3 August 1924) was a Polish-born British novelist, who became a British subject in 1886. He is regarded as one of the greatest novelists in English, though he did not speak the language fluently untı'l he was in his tvventies (and then alvvays with a marked Polish accent). He vvrote stories and novels, predominantly with a nautical or seaboard setting, that depict trials of the human spirit by the demands of duty and honor.Conrad was a master prose stylist who brought a distinctly non-English tragic sensibility into English literatüre. While some of his vvorks have a strain of romanticism, he is vievved as a precursor of modernist literatüre. His narrative style and anti-heroic characters have influenced many authors.Films have been adapted from or inspired by Conrad's Victory, Lord Jim, The Secret Agent, An Outcast of the Islands, The Rover, The Shadow üne, The Duel, Heart of Dorkness, and Nostromo. VVriting in the heyday of the British Empire, Conrad drew upon his experiences in the French and later the British Merchant Navy to create short stories and novels that reflect aspects of a worldwide empire while also plumbing the depths of the human soul.
