" In Conrad there is no such sweet bait for
the fair and sentimental. The sedentary multipara, curled up in her
boudoir on a rainy afternoon, finds nothing to her taste in his grim
tales. The Conrad philosophy is harsh, unyielding, repellent. The Conrad
heroes are nearly all boors and ruffians. Their very love-making has
something sinister and abhorrent in it; one cannot imagine them in the
moving pictures, played by tailored beauties with long eye-lashes. More,
I venture that the censors would object to them, even disguised as
floor-walkers. Surely that would be a besotted board which would pass
the irregular amours of Lord Jim, the domestic brawls of Almayer, the
revolting devil's mass of Kurtz, Falk's disgusting feeding in the
Southern Ocean, or the butchery on Heyst's island. Stevenson's "Treasure
Island" has been put upon the stage, but "An Outcast of the Islands"
would be as impossible there as "Barry Lyndon" or "La Terre." The world
fails to breed actors for such roles, or stage managers to penetrate
such travails of the spirit, or audiences for the revelation thereof.
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