Finished this last night. It's a short novel of 110 pages in the Oxford World's Classics paperback edition I read, a nice edition with an interesting introduction and other material. It's a classic, of course, and a wonderful story that I enjoyed enormously.
It is narrated by an older man who has been a sea captain, looking back on his first command, a sailing ship he takes over in Bangkok, after the death of her previous captain. (The story was written in 1915 and is apparently closely based on events experienced by Conrad himself in the late 1880s.) A theme is stated at the book's outset: the transition from youth to early maturity. The narrator begins by describing his departure from a previous sea officer's position, an apparently imprudent decision he attributes to a young man's restlessness. 15 or 20 pages are given to the circumstances in which he obtains his first command, with the assistance of a well-disposed older sea officer who helps him defeat the intrigues of lesser men who want the post to go to someone else. At this point the young man seems to be impulsive and not very perceptive, whatever his other qualities. The voyage out of Bangkok in his new ship turns into an ordeal, becalmed with a sick and dying crew; an extreme experience, vividly described, full of strong images and odd symbolic characters.
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