ABSTRACT
This book contains a dazzling series of essays about Joseph Conrad. I have read them with immense interest. They have changed my understanding of Conrad in manifold ways. They have made me see. They have also sent me back to Conrad’s books with an eager desire to re-read for myself, with fresh eyes, some works I have not read for a long time, for example, Victory and “Typhoon.” It is an honor to be allowed to have a word here at the beginning. A foreword is preliminary in the etymological sense of coming before the threshold. A foreword is a word that comes before the real words. It prepares the reader for them. It opens the door to hearing them, as from an anteroom outside the room where the concert is going on. I will try to obey the laws of this genre.
