Almayer's Folly : A Story of an Eastern River (Modern Library Classics)

by JOSEPH CONRAD, NADINE GORDIMER | Literature & Fiction |
ISBN: 0375760148 Global Overview for this book
Registered by mdhistorian of Renton, Washington USA on 5/26/2005
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1 journaler for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by mdhistorian from Renton, Washington USA on Thursday, May 26, 2005
I hope there is a Modern Library editor or two lurking on BookCrossing.com, because Nadine Gordimer's perfunctory Introduction lent nothing to this book, and that's a terrible shame. Conrad's first novel, _Almayer's Folly_ (like _Victory_, the one I read in tandem) is set in the Malay archipelago, but this one depicts the complex interrelationships among Dutch and British colonials, their "subjects," and others caught up in the late-nineteenth, early-twentieth-century global trade. Kaspar Almayer (like Axel Heyst, another failed trader) dreams only of wealth that will ensure that he and his daughter Nina can live a peaceful life. But Nina -- rejected by white Europeans because of her Malay mother -- has her own ideas for the future. This 1895 novel is interesting not least for its complex examination of racial identity as well as its autonomous female characters. And there's some lovely writing here...

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