HONOURS ASSIGNMENT III

Q. Conrad's narrative technique in the novella 'Youth'

Until the end of the nineteenth century travel literature narrative customarily adopted a dual
identity where; there was the author, and the author who took on the role of the travel narrative,
but as travel literature as a genre further developed with numerous changes regarding plot,
themes, this technique came to a downfall, not only the themes, the narrative technique also
changed substantially. The narrative change was two-fold – the distancing of the author from the
text and the beginning of a chronological ordering of the events occurring in the text. One of the
initiators of this change was Joseph Conrad whose works were autobiographical in nature and
were based on his experience as a sailor when he was enlisted in the Russian army. His novels or
novellas made a mark in literature and were published in the last two decades of the nineteenth
century and the first decade of the twentieth century. Conrad uses a “Frame Narrative”:
a story within a story. In a frame narrative, the text's beginning and ending occur in roughly the
same time and place, but the bulk of the action unfolds through a series of flashbacks. The real
action is in the reconstruction of a character or characters' memories. In this essay I’m going to
critically analyze Conrad’s narrative technique on the basis of impressionism. Such focus will
help us understand the novella in a much more precise and detailed manner.

In Youth, as in Conrad’s other stories, Marlow is the recurring hero. In the beginning of the
novella, the ‘I’ narrative i.e., the authorial narrative changes to Marlow’s narrative. According to
Bruss, the Frame technique which has been diligently implemented has both confounded and
intrigued the readers. Aside from the use of a frame narrative, Conrad does not engage in any
particularly complex literary techniques. The frame narrative establishes Marlow's rhetorical
situation as an experienced raconteur, telling a tale for other middle-aged men, listeners who are
both successful and former mariners. Such an entangled narrative relationship counting the
author’s involvement leads Conrad to present an impressionistic narrative where Conrad presents
his material through two Marlows, the former who is a young twenty year old Marlow on the
Judea where he is much less disciplined and inexperienced and the latter denotes a middle-aged
Marlow who’s much more disciplined and is void of the romantic notions of his past self. The
award in such a perspective ultimately puts the elder Marlow in the point of convergence: as the
unnamed narrator does his best to recount the exact episodes, while when Marlow orally
reminisces the episode, and can indulge in loose episodic recounting of crisis, in impulsive and
lazy sentimentality which he had endured during his duty on Judea which implies the
impressionistic introspection. Such a way of recounting is used because it establishes the elder
Marlow vital in the novella as it assists him to direct as much irony to his present and to his past
self. The importance of Marlow’s reminiscence in front of the unnamed narrator and his former
friends from the Merchant Navy gives the author the chance to establish the fact that the episode
that is being presently recounted happened in the past, in a different time zone which in turn,
helps Marlow sound less self-serving. As the novella proceeds Marlow’s self-depreciating stance
towards his past self becomes blaringly obvious which offers the reader an impressionistic view
of the now matured Marlow. Krieger suggests that due to Marlow’s playful skepticism towards
his past self negates any appreciation of the Younger Marlow which seems quite a solid
conclusion. But as simple as the before mentioned statement seems, ‘the-narrator-within-a-
narrator’ narrative is more complex as it also implies that Marlow has matured enough so as to
allocate double-self irony (irony directed at both past and present selves) which in turn also
makes the implication that all his scoffing towards his past-self presents an impressionistic
perspective and in addition, is a way to heighten the dramatic effect of the story as because
compared to his other works, such as ‘Heart of Darkness’(1902) in which he produces
melodramatic plethora of suggestive implications, in Youth he doesn’t mis-present the scenes he
described. Youth is free of such implications and describes the voyage in a way which neither
obscures the grim reality of the voyage nor voids the romantic glow, that the young Marlow has
experienced.

For example, “This could have occurred nowhere but in England, where men and sea
interpenetrate, so to speak- the sea entering into the life of most men, and the men knowing
something or everything about the sea, in the way of amusement, of travel, or of bread winning.”
is a fine example of a typical impressionistic statement as the narrator in this case presents not
the total and solid reality but a rather impressionistic presentation of the reality which Marlow
chooses to retain based on his frame of mind. Although Marlow’s obvious skepticism implies
that he is unappreciative of his experience as the second mate on Judea, he later indicates to his
how important was the voyage on Judea, to his career as a seaman, which implies the graveness
and the seriousness of his understanding towards his past experiences which is subtly depicted by
how confident and able he is when he narrates the episode of his Judea experience.

In the novella, the Author uses one phrase, “Pass the bottle” to remind the reader that the
narration is happening in one part of time while the actual story occurred in another place in a
different time zone which again implies that while indulging several times in the bottle Marlow
attains a certain magnitude of relaxation which allows him to fall into a sentimental valley of
appreciation of youth as an older Marlow. The rather rhapsodic element of this appreciation can
be seen in the below excerpt:

Oh, the glamour of youth! Oh, the fire of it, more dazzling than the flames of the burning ship [
the Judea], throwing a magic light on the wide earth, leaping audaciously to the sky, presently to
be quenched by time, more cruel, more pitiless, more bitter than the sea? and like the flames of
the burning ship surrounded by an impenetrable night”

The above excerpt quintessentially captures the preciousness of youth, which is dearer than the
maturity acquired through the voyage, implication that this youth can be recovered in the easy
emotional sentimentality of middle age. Although Marlow knows that it’s impossible. The device
– easy emotional sentimentality is a tool used to heighten the dramatic effect in the text, but at
the same time it denotes the heavy impressionistic element in the narrative.

In Conclusion, the narrative while implying that Marlow demeans his voyage on Judea as the
Second mate with excessive direction of self-irony and that this is, in addition, a method to
increase the element of drama in the novella, also implies that this narrator-within-a-narrator
technique used by the author presents Marlow with an opportunity to introspect and retrospect
his time as a sailor, quintessentially reviewing or painting a mental picture of himself in his mind
which is affected by his current thoughts which is highly impressionistic in its essence.

REFERENCES

"Youth - Literary Techniques" Beacham's Encyclopedia of Popular Fiction Ed. Kirk H.

Beetz. Vol. 11. Gale Cengage 2001 eNotes.com 2 Oct, 2019
http://www.enotes.com/topics/youth/in-depth#in-depth-techniques

”Joseph Conrad, Youth (London: J. M. Dent and Sons, 1923 PP 1, 30).

“Paul S. Bruss, Conrad’s “Youth”: Problem of Interpretation (College Literature, Vol. 1, No. 3
The Johns Hopkins University Press, (Fall, 1974), pp. 220-222 )