"Typhoon" is famous as a virtuouso description of a storm at sea, and it is easy to see this novella as little more than a yarn about a dullard captain who gets lucky and his annoying, callow first mate Jukes. As usual with Conrad, second and further readings reveal a much more complex and sophisticated story than at first glance. It happens that the ship's "cargo" is not inanimate goods but a group of homebound Chinese coolies, and although very little happens during the duration of the voyage, the story's moral center revolves around the difference between the dull MacWhirr's commitment to treat the Chinese just as he would any other human being, and Jukes's self-serving and racist attitude. More subtly still, Conrad's use of the aesthetics of the sublime (as I've argued in an academic paper) links the storm at sea to the political storm on board.

Conrad took many risks in "Falk," from the inclusion of a female lead who never speaks (for which the serial press rejected the story, even in 1900) to the subject of cannibalism. The only actual cannibalism in Conrad's oeuvre is committed by a white man himself, Falk, which suggests a counterargument to readings of Conrad--rather than Marlow, the narrator of "Heart of Darkness"--as racist. Moreover, "Falk" also deploys the double-voiced, doubly distanced narration also at work in "Heart of Darkness," written just before "Falk" with the difference that in the latter the story ends by emphasizing the epistemological instability of storytelling and gossip. The reception trouble that "Heart of Darkness" has generated, as Chinua Achebe argues in his essay on the novella, "An Image of Africa," is that it lacks this "alternative frame of reference" that tells the reader how to receive the images of Africa and Africans. But reading "Falk" against "Heart of Darkness" might have given Achebe the opportunity to discover that Conrad was well aware of such an alternative frame.

The story of a doomed Eastern European castaway washed ashore in an English town who is rejected by his host community is both a scathing commentary on the insularity and hard-hearted indifference of the townspeople to the Other and a heartbreaking tale of shattering pathos. Brief but unforgettable, in the tradition of Flaubert and Maupassant whose compressed narratives heighten emotional power, "Amy Foster" is notable for its exploration of the failure of cross-cultural language and communication. It's also one of the more successful Conrad stories in my college classroom.

More on "The Secret Sharer" coming soon.

Some helpful advice -you should take some dramamine before reading Typhoon. My head is still spinning.

Expectations. That is the key to understanding and enjoying Joseph Conrad, in general, and Typhoon and Other Stories, in particular. And, initially, Conrad was regarded as much as an adventure writer as a composer of "serious literature." His works would not only appear in more upscale serial magazines but also those publications, heaven forbid, we consider "pulps" or those in the gray areas, where Conrad's stories might rub shoulders with works by Haggard, Mundy, or even Achmed Abdullah. The fact that they did so gives evidence that much of the divide cultural enforcers have placed between "literature" and "fiction" is artificial. Because another fact is that Conrad for much of his literary life and into the years beyond it, extending to the mid half of the twentieth century was not only seen as an adventure writer but marketed as one.

So it is with these stories. They serve as great examples of "literature" and also "adventure fiction." This in particular applies to "Typhoon" and "Falk." But it might also apply to "Amy Foster" and "To-morrow," as soon as the reader can wrench his head around the fact that substituting the domestic English locales in the latter two for the exotic places of the first two does not alter what Conrad is doing in his writing.

And what he is doing is exploring the peculiarities and particularities of the human psyche. In confined spaces, a ship adrift at sea, a remote sea port in Southeast Asia, or in two English coastal villages, Conrad paints a picture of people often torn and mutilated by their emotional experiences and establishes a feel that is general in scope.

Of course, it's how he tells his tales that make all the difference. Not simply the exquisite prose, but his off centering of his protagonists. Readers come to know MacWhirr through the narration of the ship's first mate, Jukes. "Typhoon" shares the same features of exposition in it as with Marlow and Jim in Lord Jim. Coincidentally or not, Conrad was working on both stories at the same time. But, then, wait. Is it really about MacWhirr? Remember, we only find out about MacWhirr what Jukes thinks is important to tell us. Perhaps, it is Jukes through whom the story comes that we are really exploring.

The same can be said of "Falk." Half of the story informs us of the troubles afflicting a young captain awaiting clearance to sail. This unnamed narrator doesn't really get to the story of Falk himself until half way through the tale. Only then do we begin to see the obsessions at work among everyone. "Amy Foster," meanwhile, positions yet another outsider, Yanko, in an English coastal village. Yanko has more in common with someone like Jim or Almayer, adrift in alien civilizations, than he does with the Englishmen who surround him. Things come to a head in the last story, "To-morrow," where all seems insane, not just one old man, and where Conrad explores the outer facades people so desperately construct to hide their inner madness from each other.

Note: I first read this book some 36 years ago, when most of my life lay in front of me. I have now reread it after the passing of many decades. In place of the adventure and action of that first reading, where it seems people need break their bonds and take control of their lives lest misfortune take root, I now think that Conrad was telling us of the futility of choices, how fate reaches into our souls, our minds, and leads where it will, despite our protestations.

"Typhoon and Other Stories" is a collection of four short-stories, with the addition of a play based on one of the stories. As in all short-story collections, some are better than others, however the quality was generally quite high:
"Typhoon:" The story of a ship going through a typhoon. As in most Conrad this is a story of thinking and doing, rather than talking. Conrad's own ship experience is evident, and he has a cast with very different personalities and opinions. 4/5
"Amy Foster:" For me "Amy Foster" was the weakest of the four stories. However, even this story has some interesting elements, and, with a Polish man being considered an "other" and outcast in England, it feels like it may have been quite personal to Conrad. 3/5
"Falk:" Another more typical Conrad story about a man who has done something he had to do, yet regrets, and has to admit to others. This story felt like a prototype or condensed version of other Conrad works. 3.5/5
"To-Morrow:" This story focused on some of the areas where Conrad is often a little weaker, a land story, a female is prominent, etc. yet it had a strong emotional impact. I think a lot of people can relate to the idea that things will get better "tomorrow." 4/5