Common Themes in Secret Sharer, Heart of Darkness, and Shadow Line

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Common Themes in The Secret Sharer, Heart of Darkness, and The Shadow Line

Joseph Conrad's stories The Secret Sharer, Heart of Darkness, and The Shadow Line share a number of themes. All three stories deal with a process of maturing that involves the loss of youthful illusions, a process usually precipitated by an actual "trial" that challenges the protagonist's professional skills as well as his assumptions about his identity and sanity. In successfully dealing with the crisis, the protagonist reconstructs his identity and develops moral ideas rooted in acknowledgement of his own and others' human weaknesses and thus of men's necessary interdependence.

Each story is related from the point-of-view of one narrator: Marlow in Heart of Darkness and an unnamed captain in his first command in both The Secret Sharer and The Shadow Line. All exhibit a naive or idealized view of the world. Marlow chooses to go to the Congo because, since a boy, that part of Africa had always "charmed him." When the narrator of The Shadow Line unexpectedly wins the command of a ship as a replacement for a newly deceased captain, he looks forward to going "out to sea. The sea-which was pure, safe and friendly" (96). Likewise, the narrator of The Secret Sharer prematurely delights in "the great security of the sea" (23).

All three narrators are also solitary figures. The two new captains are isolated by virtue of their position; they cannot become intimate with their men without the risk of losing their respect, and Marlow is culturally isolated in the African jungle.

Each narrator encounters an actual physical trial. The new captain in The Shadow Line finds, when at sea and with a crew afflicted by tropical fevers, that the "mad" fo...

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... stress. At the same time, by being temporarily seduced by, then by examining and separating out the mistakes of their doubles, the narrators draw new conclusions and incorporate new knowledge not only about themselves but about the responsibilities and realities of their chosen roles. Marlow announces that he "remained loyal to Kurtz to the last" (149), and the captain of The Shadow Line admits survival would not have been possible without his dedicated crew who are "worthy of [his] undying regard" (120). An inkling of these signs of a maturity that acknowledges men's interdependence can also be found in the unnamed captain's last gesture toward Leggatt in his gift of the white hat. This expression of compassion for Leggatt's "mere flesh" saves the ship and indicates he has emerged from his self-absorbed isolation to begin to learn to lead his men.

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