Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski in 1857 in Berdychiv, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire) was a Polish-British novelist and short story writer. Orphaned at a young age, he left Poland for France and later joined the British merchant marine, becoming a master mariner. His seafaring experiences deeply informed his fiction. After settling in England, he taught himself English and began writing in his late thirties. His major works include 'Heart of Darkness' (1899), 'Lord Jim' (1900), 'Nostromo' (1904), and 'The Secret Agent' (1907). Conrad's narrative innovations, including the use of frame stories and unreliable narrators, profoundly influenced modernist literature. He is celebrated for his psychological depth, moral ambiguity, and critique of colonialism. Conrad died in 1924 in England.