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    Lord Jim
    Lord Jim
    Lord Jim
    Audiobook15 hours

    Lord Jim

    Written by Joseph Conrad

    Narrated by Ric Jerrom

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    Jim, the first mate aboard a small steamer named the Patna, travels from port to port in the Pacific Ocean. When the ship hits floating wreckage, Jim and the crew are forced to abandon it, leaving hundreds of ethnic travellers on board. However, Jim’s reprehensible actions are soon discovered by the court and he is compelled to face his guilt and redeem himself – a journey that leads him to a remote exotic location where he is revered as Lord Jim (‘Tuan Jim’). Through beautifully evocative descriptions and ponderous philosophical prose, Conrad delivers a powerful novel about one man’s struggle to reconcile who he would like to be with who he actually is.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNaxos Audiobooks
    Release dateApr 15, 2015
    ISBN9781843798859
    Author

    Joseph Conrad

    Polish-born Joseph Conrad is regarded as a highly influential author, and his works are seen as a precursor to modernist literature. His often tragic insight into the human condition in novels such as Heart of Darkness and The Secret Agent is unrivalled by his contemporaries.

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    Reviews for Lord Jim

    4.5/5

    31 ratings15 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Reading Joseph Conrad sometimes feels downright intimidating. Every one of his stentences is so erudite, so perfectly formed, and so detailed that it's hard to even imagine how he -- or anyone else -- might improve on it. Conrad just might be the platonic ideal of an English-language prose stylist, and he's so good that he can be scary. At the same time, I'm glad that there are plenty of authors who don't write like him. His stuff can be dense and slow; I suspect that some authors could reel off three novels and two short stories in the space it takes Conrad to get things exactly right in one. "Lord Jim," then, is vintage Conrad. It's dense and weighty and immaculately written -- each one of its chapters seems so perfectly self-contained might as well be a short story in itself. It covers much of the same ground, in a sort of roundabout way, that he would revisit in his more widely read "Heart of Darkness." At the center is Jim himself, a curiously hollow character whose likable exterior conceals an eerie emptiness and makes him particularly unsuited for life in the East. It's often been said that it's this concern with interiority that marks Conrad as a modernist writer, and I'd agree. In a sense, though, the novel's most original and intriguing modernist figure is Stien, an organized, perceptive mentor to the book's narrator who, in my eyes, bears a striking resemblence to Sigmund Freud. This is all the more astonishing when one considers that "Lord Jim" was written at about the time that "The Interpretation of Dreams" was published. "Lord Jim" has many of the pleasures that you find in other Conrad novels -- the author's familiarity with the exclusive fraternity of experienced seamen makes one the reader feel part of a privileged circle, and there are some lovely period details for readers who find the age of sail, or the age of empires, romantic and exciting."Lord Jim," like many of Conrad's books, is told through a complex and effective narrative frame and it's an undeniable pleasure to spend some time with Marlowe, his favorite narrator, who is at once one of the most charming and the most throughtful men who ever sailed the fictional seas. There are, I admit, some equally familiar Conrad problems in "Lord Jim," too. Women and non-Europeans are portrayed mostly passive or pitiful and, as sordid as Jim's tale is, I'm not sure that the project of empire as a whole is really ever put up for debate. Still, it'd be difficult to argue that "Lord Jim" isn't a prose masterpiece and a good -- perhaps even great -- novel. It is recommended to patient readers in search of a book that is both challening and curiously engrossing.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 3/5
      Lord Jim is a tale of honor lost and regained — a sort of adventure on the high seas with unsavory pirates and official Inquiries and almond-eyed damsels in distress. The narrator turns over the meaning of honor as he describes Jim's life, alternately sympathizing and feeling aversion, and never coming to a judgment, about Jim in particular and about honor in general. Jewel's misery and appeals to fight are challenges to this particular brand of honor (although since she's female and non-white, and this is 1900, her challenge is pretty feeble).Jim has a stubborn insistence in his own redemption by sticking it out. He seems to regard answering for his actions as both the most excruciating punishment and the only way to live with himself. While the external drama regarding society's official judgment of him plays out, he is concerned only with the personal — explaining himself to one sympathetic listener, appearing every day at the Inquiry, answering to Doramin.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      A good book and perhaps disturbing in that it chronicles a man with a romantic view on life and himself, but when the finger points to him he falls short. Perhaps there is a bit of Jim in all of us. Superbly written narrative, it is hard to believe that English isn't his first language.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 3/5
      In a similar way to "Nostromo" which I recently read, I struggled through the first half of the book. Things seemed to move very slowly as Conrad introduced his characters. Several chapters would pass in one conversation, and I would stop reading for a day or two, then pick it up again and assume one character was a part of the conversation, only to find out at the end of the chapter that it was another character. A little frustrating, but worth it because I really enjoyed the last half of the book, (again like Nostromo). What I like most about this book is the depth to which Conrad thinks through each characters personality and individual motivation in the plot. Its really a lesson in human pschychology, and group dynamics.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      A retro read. It was one of the most thought provoking and influential books of my youth. On human nature, nature of honour, romantic dreams, and how we don’t know what fabric we are made of until we are tried. Still very good, even though some episodes could have been shorter.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      I really like Joseph Conrad's writing style; English is his third language and yet his vocabulary constantly outstrips my own. He describes people and events in a very unique manner, as some other reviewers on here have already mentioned. It's fascinating to experience..With that said, Lord Jim felt somehow inferior to the rest of his stories, in my mind. A bit too... long. Such a simple story and yet it takes him ages to get around to the point so that I gradually lose interest. Yes, intriguing subject matter: what IS honor, and conscience, and one's duty to mankind? Also, if the reader identifies as a romantic, his musings about Jim's needs and behavior definitely perks one up as well... But, in the end, simply too much. Needs condensing. I also don't like that it's in the form of a narrative told by the character Marlowe, either. Takes away from the overall feel of the story, reminds one that it IS just a story. Feels less real. The ending? Just sad, in my opinion. Of course I don't always mind unhappy endings but this one didn't justify itself. All in all, 3 1/2 stars, and not a book I'll keep on my shelf.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 3/5
      Hard to go through the narrative form of the story. The first 30 chapters are tedious and the tale flows slowly for my taste. Conrad dives into many details and goes hence and forth in time. This book demanded from me a great deal of concentration. In spite of this, the "finale" was a compensation for all this.
    • 5/5
      Some restless notes:1) Structure of writing. Sophisticated/complicated structure of narration is imho the first problem reader has to deal with. Although the story is in principle quite simple, it is divided into several layers and it is sometimes difficult to switch from one to another without getting lost. But once you accustome yourself to the text, it becomes readable :). This makes the text „thick“ (at least in my case, the book exhausted me a lot more than other ones and after reading 10 pages I had the feeling like having read 30. It was somehow similar to Mann’s Doctor Faustus, you have to dwell on it, because it does not allow you to go further without thorough understanding.)2) It seems to be tedious, from time to time. The interpretation implicit in the text itself (author’s intention maybe) is unclear, which - again - makes the book more complicated. But it has a great advantage: on one hand, Marlow (the narrator) is uncompromisingly strict to Jim, on the other he tries to understand Jim‘s motives and even justifies him. And this gives the text fabulous tension; you are confronted with two polar standpoints, but none has the priority, the „truth“.3) That leads me to the final question: is Lord Jim a novel about redemption (honour lost and regained), or about selfishness? It is not to be decided „once and forever“, nor the „right“ answer is to be found. With my personal preferences and opinions, I would insist, that Jim could not act differently; one’s personal „existence“ (Existenz in Karl Jaspers‘ conception) is the base layer he is responsible for and everything else is to be derived from it. Jim could not act differently :).
    • 3/5
      I am writing this review fresh after finishing Lord Jim. This was a dense book . . . so many layers and themes to digest. The narration of the story was clever and at the same time very distracting. All of the shifts in perspective made the story difficult to navigate. All in all worth reading and recommended, but it is unlikely I will tackle this work again.
    • 5/5
      "He's one of us". Should you be familiar with Marlow, Tuan Jim, Stein, Conrad himself; you know very well what this means. Lord Jim is a story of a hero fallen, a hero risen, and a hero sacrificed. Perhaps hero is to strong a word. A man. Marlow meets Jim whilst he is in the courts relating the story of the Patna--the ship which Jim and several other dubious characters abandoned in fear--a failure of their duty. This haunts Jim eternally--he runs from his past incessantly. Marlow is the guiding hand of wisdom in Jim's life. Eventually Jim comes to Patusan, where he finds a redemption of sorts, Love, and all else he has ever dreamed for. Conrad's prose is as deep as the waters his words are masterfully set forth upon. Marlow's encounter with the aging Stein was simply stunningly and hauntingly beautiful. The glimpse into Steins past reminds me of a shining chivalrous character of Tennyson or MacDonald. It is a fitting fate that Jim's wife, Jewel, should end up residing with Stein. Absorb this, Conrad's experience of letters, and have your conscious and unconscious irreparably altered for the better.
    • 5/5
      If you love a sea story you can't resist this. Has it all, handsome white,young sailor, British empire, starcrossed lovers, swashbuckling, wonderful descriptions. Loved it, old as the tale is.
    • 4/5
      Here's another one that I read, wrote a paper on, and don't really remember much about. This Guardian list is not only giving me a lot of books to read, but a surprising number to reread.
    • 5/5
      I have been slowly re-reading this book through the month of November. Lord Jim has always been a touchstone novel for me. The first time I read it, I was chilled right through. This seemed to me the way my life was likely to go wrong: indulging my imagination with haze of possible heroism while funking, decisively, the one time I was truly tested. Coming back, years later, none of that power is lost. And I am more conscious of jsut how impossibly fine a writer Conrad is. I suspect one reason it has been slow going for me is that I have in my professional life become adept at the semi-skim mode of reading. Fast, quick, and 95%. You can't read Conrad that way. 12.03.06, and follwing. Recommended more than almsot anything.
    • 5/5
      My first Conrad. Sure I've known of heart of darkness but only through Brando's work in Apocalypse Now.

      Really well written and I found myself mulling over some of the descriptive phrases and passages with wonder.

      Oh to be a writer like this.

      Now onto other works by this superb author.

      The narration was exemplary so will also seek out more done by this teller of tales.

      Enjoy.
    • 4/5
      I managed to fake my way through a superficial reading of this book in a high school Humanities class, unwilling to deal with the dense writing style. Shifting points of view that are largely un-signaled, conversations nested within conversations, sentences occupying the better part of a page, and manners of speech full of fragments and digressions were more work than I was willing to put in at the time. Yet, the central story has stuck with me more than most books from that time, encouraging a return.In doing so, I’ve found a story that is well worth the effort one expends to read it. The first half of the book is a bit extended, and the language requires close attention. Several times I found myself suddenly saying, “Who is speaking? What are they speaking about?” as a moment’s inattention let me lose track of who ‘I’ was. Yet the building of the rich characters and the understanding of the natures of their internal struggles is necessary and rewarding. The second half caught me up and was finished in almost a single sitting.Others I’ve talked to have characterized this as a novel about redemption—Jim struggling to redeem himself from a disgraceful act and succeeding in a final act of heroism. That is not how I view this book. I would characterize this as a novel about egoism, the destruction of a man and his works because he cannot accept that it is not all about him. In Jim, we see a young man who allows his entire life to be destroyed because he does not live up to his romantic ideal of himself when he unthinkingly jumps to a lifeboat from a ship he believed to be sinking. Far from resolving to strive to do better in the future, let alone to atone for it, he removes himself from society, fleeing embarrassed should anyone learn of his history. He even partially rejects his confessor and friend, Marlow the narrator, because he knows Jim’s story. In the end, Jim’s sense of himself as a heroic figure, his unwillingness to consider the needs of those other than himself, ironically result in the destruction of all the good he has done to those close to him and to his community.