Reviews for John Clare in Context

The average rating for John Clare in Context based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-07-14 00:00:00 Christian Mensing This book leaves me feeling as though I've had a long and rewarding conversation with Joseph Conrad. I'm in the process of reading all his books in the order in which they were written, and with each of his novels I've become more and more impressed with this man's mastery of his adopted language - English - and his astute perception of humanity and a great variety of its members. In this book I found what I had hoped to find in his earlier autobiographical Mirror of the Sea, before being somewhat disappointed to learn that it focused almost exclusively on the general experience of sea life, and otherwise contained very little of his story before and after his life at sea. In contrast, this autobiography provided satisfying answers as to how this young Polish man from a landlocked region of eastern Europe came to be one of the most respected English writers of maritime literature. Perhaps most rewarding of this presentation was the deeper respect I felt for this man concerning his attitude about life and mankind. Throughout are comments indicating his continual awareness of his mortality, and that he and the other memorable characters he has met and/or used in his fiction are only passing phenomena. His story about the inspiration for, and the precarious survival of the manuscript of his first novel - Almayer's Folly - is especially rich in clues to his unique abilities of perception and expression, and to the good fortune leading to its publication - good fortune both for him and posterity.

Review # 2 was written on 2019-04-01 00:00:00 Rhonda Terry I started reading this book believing it would be a stock standard autobiography. Well, it wasn't. And Joseph Conrad himself tells you that it wouldn't be so. However, what you do get is memories of people and periods in Conrad's life that shaped and developed the man. This doesn't tell the man's life story but it does tell the story of his life. I was grateful also for the stories of Conrad's uncle as well and of the genesis of his first novel, Almeyer's Folly. This book is a must for Joseph Conrad aficionados like me.