Analysis on The Use of The Setting of Place As A Foreshadow of The Story in Joseph Conrad's 'An Outcast of The Islands'.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ………………………………………
i
TABLE OF CONTENTS ………………………………………..
ii
ABSTRACT ………………………………………………………
iii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study …………………………………..
Statement of the Problem ………………………………….
Purpose of the Study ……………………………………….
Methods of Research ………………………………………
Organization of the Thesis …………………………………
1
3
3
4
4
CHAPTER TWO: DISCUSSION ……………………………….
5
CHAPTER THREE: CONCLUSION …………………………..
15
BIBLIOGRAPHY ………………………………………………...
18
APPENDICES
Synopsis of An Outcast of the Islands ……………………..
Biography of the Author …………………………………...
19
20
ii
Maranatha Christian University
ABSTRACT
Penelitian ini disusun sebagai analisa akan pengaruh dari setting tempat
terhadap perkembangan cerita dalam novel An Outcast of the Islands karangan
Joseph Conrad. Penggunaan setting tempat secara umum dalam karya sastra
bermanfaat untuk menciptakan atmosfir, yang merupakan mood yang muncul
dalam diri pembaca, seperti perasaan terharu, takut, sedih, dan lain sebagainya.
Dalam An Outcast of the Islands, pengaruh atmosfir ini dimanfaatkan oleh
Joseph Conrad untuk menciptakan unsur foreshadowing yang merupakan
petunjuk bagi para pembaca untuk memiliki gambaran samar akan apa yang
terjadi pada kelanjutan cerita berikutnya. Atmosfir dalam novel ini juga menjadi
foreshadow untuk akhir cerita, karena baik atmosfir maupun plot cerita memiliki
kesamaan perkembangan unsur yang menjadi semakin gelap dan mencekam.
Dengan mengembangkan fungsi atmosfir yang tercipta dari latar belakang
tempat di dalam novel ini sebagai foreshadow terhadap jalan cerita, Joseph
Conrad mampu menciptakan rasa penasaran dalam diri pembaca sehingga mereka
semakin terfokus pada cerita dalam novel ini serta membuat unsur setting dan plot
untuk saling mendukung satu sama lain. Hal ini dikarenakan oleh pengaruh
gambaran yang samar-samar akan kejadian berikutnya dalam novel ini akan
mendukung efektivitas dari elemen suspense dan surprise yang merupakan bagian
dari plot dalam novel ini.
iii
Maranatha Christian University
APPENDICES
Summary of An Outcast of the Islands
Willems was bound to spend his life inside the Malay Archipelago. When
he was young, he runs away from home, and is raised later by the great Rajah
Laut Tom Lingard. For several years, Willems becomes Lingard’s understudy. He
learns a lot about trading from the master of the islands himself, but learns
nothing about the true honour-principles of the captain.
Several years later, Willems leaves Lingard to serve for Hudig, a trading
post owner, as a successful clerk. During this time, Willems becomes more
ambitious and arrogant about his achievements. He maintains his pride by
corrupting a small amount of Hudig’s fortune to feed his worshipper, and he falls
hard when his act is found out. In a minute count, Willems loses everything that
he has, his wife and child, his property, and his racial, moral superiority among
the people he knows.
Fortunately, Lingard found him again, and sheltered Willems in his secret
port, Sambir, a place he owns as a sole trader there, since there’s no one who is
able to find the passage way to reach it besides himself. Every trader around the
archipelago dream is to be able to land there, but it seems only Lingard who
knows the way, and he doesn’t wish to share the knowledge with anyone else. The
19
Maranatha Christian University
one thing that the Rajah Laut forgets is Willems’ mental condition after his
economical breakdown. There in Sambir, Willems often quarrels with Almayer,
another one of Lingard’s protégé, and it makes Willems often leaves the hut
where they live and accidentally meets Aíssa, a daughter of a blind Asian expirate.
Willems and Aíssa fall in love with each other. And since love is blind, the
‘blind’ Aíssa is used by Abdulla, who is a West Asian trader, to persuade the
‘blind’ Willems, to show him Lingard’s secret passage way. Through no difficulty
at all, Abdulla manages to use both of them for his advantage. After Willems
takes him to Sambir, he becomes the second trader there. However, with his same
religion and skin color as the townsfolk, Abdulla may become number one there
in no time.
And as for Willems, he is forced to pay his act of treachery to Lingard, and
he pays it hard. Willems has to stay in a remote island far from any trading
activities for the rest of his life as Lingard’s prisoner. He is left alone as a white
among the colored, and alone as a treacherous beast, locked away from the whites,
to suffer as an outcast together with Aíssa, before finally his life ends even more
tragic by being killed by Aíssa.
Biography of Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was born in 3 December 1857 as Józef Teodor Konrad
Nalęcz Korzeniowski in Ukraine, Poland. He lost both of his parents at his early
ages. He lost his mother when he was 7 years old, and his father when he was 11.
As he grew older, he became more and more interested with a life on the sea, and
20
Maranatha Christian University
he began his sailing journey at the age of 16, leaving Poland for France. From
1878, he spent his 20 years-life to come as a sailor under the flag of the British
Merchant Navy.
During his service on deck, he sailed to many places around the Asiatic
oceans, and paid several visit to Australia. He had landed on the grounds of
Calcutta, Java, Borneo, and other towns with many different ships. Conrad wrote
his first novel when he was 31 years old, and it was published six years later. His
first novel is about the adventures around Java, Celebes, and Borneo, Almayer’s
Folly. It is the first of his trilogy, followed by An Outcast of the Islands and The
Rescue several years later. He also wrote several other novels, which are Tales of
Unrest, Lord Jim, Nostromo, and Heart of Darkness.
Joseph Conrad died of a heart attack when he was 66 years old in 1924. He
died one year after he declined honorary degree from Cambridge, and several
months after he declined knighthood. He was buried in Canterbury.
21
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
As a fiction writer, Joseph Conrad achieves numerous credits from
critics for his ability. A.C. Ward states that Conrad’s prose was considered a
“distinguished work” and of a “recognizable quality”. (Ward 279). Moreover,
Gavin Young, a literary critic who traces Conrad’s journey in the past claims that
‘I could see how skillfully he [Conrad] had laid a fresh layer of history on the
places he had written about’ (Young 3). When in his era during the late 19th
Century until the early 20th Century the European colonization is rapidly
spreading, Conrad becomes a bridge to send a message to the English society
about what the European explorers have met and have become especially in the
foreign islands through his early novels. Therefore, ‘Conrad is not only one of the
greatest novelists who wrote in English, but he is particularly important for
understanding twentieth-century British culture.’ (Schwarz xiii).
For my thesis writing, I choose Conrad’s An Outcast of the Islands, which
is set in the 1896. As An Outcast of the Islands is his second novel, I assume that
1
Maranatha Christian University
the work may still be reliable to present the originality of his writing that has not
been much influenced by the society’s demands and critics. It ‘reflect[s] his state
of mind and reveal[s] his values’ (Schwarz 3) as it shows ‘the complexity of his
temperament [which] is implicit in the very styles . . . [that] are modernistic in
their black comedy or absurdity.’ (Watts xxvi). By using this book, I hope I will
be able to make an analysis on a fiction that concerns with the problems faced by
European traders in the tropical islands.
In the novel, I find that Conrad spends many pages to give a clear
description of the setting of place, ‘One of the striking features of An Outcast of
the Islands is the descriptive richness: repeatedly the narrator’s view moves from
some figure in the foreground to the surrounding natural vista.’ (Watts xix). It
makes me interested to know why Conrad portrays a lot about the settings and
what it is used for.
To make a clear definition of the term of the element of setting of place in
a literary work, I agree with Murphy’s statement in Understanding Unseen that
‘the setting of the novel is the background against which the characters live out
their lives.’ (Murphy 141).
In accordance with the theory mentioned above, Conrad applies the setting
of place to introduce the natural tropical surroundings (as the background of the
story) to the readers who are not well acquainted with it in order to help them
create a vivid portrayal of the place in mind. Moreover, he also uses it to create a
certain atmosphere to the readers. Atmosphere is ‘… a kind of mood or emotional
aura suggested primarily by the setting and helping to establish the reader’s
expectations.’ (Kenney 41). By using this technique, Conrad may manipulate the
2
Maranatha Christian University
unfamiliar aspect to help creating a strong atmosphere, and used for other purpose
as well.
Through the element of the setting of place, I believe that Conrad also
intends to use the element of the setting of place as a tool of foreshadow for the
story by describing it intensely. ‘The term ‘foreshadowing’ is used whenever
specific details necessary to implement a later event are planted in the reader’s
attention early.’ (Eastman 13). Subsequently, the element of the setting of place
becomes an element that presents functions more than what it is supposed to
serve.
Statement of the problem
Through An Outcast of the Islands, I would try to analyze several problems:
1. How is the element of the setting of place portrayed in the novel?
2. How does the setting of place used as a foreshadow of the story?
3. Why does the author use the setting of place as a foreshadowing?
Purpose of the Study
The analysis is constructed in sequences:
1. To acknowledge the portrayal of the setting of place in the novel.
2. To relate the description of the setting of place as a foreshadow of the story.
3. To observe the effects created from the use of the setting of place as a
foreshadowing.
3
Maranatha Christian University
Method of Research
I first start my research through library research. As the analysis is an intrinsic
analysis, I focus myself on searching in several sources that provides the data
involved for my study.
Organization of the Thesis
The thesis proposal is organized as several linked-chapters. The first chapter
consists of Background of the Study, Statement of the Problem, Method of
Research, and Organization of the Thesis. The second chapter contains the
Analysis on the use of the setting of place as a foreshadow of the story in Joseph
Conrad’s An Outcast of the Islands and the Conclusion from the analysis. The last
chapter includes an Appendix, Biography of Joseph Conrad as the writer of the
novel, and the Synopsis of the novel.
4
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER THREE
CONCLUSION
I believe that many people would agree with the fact that in An Outcast of
the Islands, Joseph Conrad presents the readers with clear and detailed
descriptions of the setting of place, just as Cedric Watts states that ‘One of the
striking features of An Outcast of the Islands is the descriptive richness.’ (Watts
xix). However, the argument may still lies in the question of why is it ‘striking’?
My analysis in the previous chapter is an alternative point of view towards the
argument.
As Conrad depicts the setting of place to create an atmosphere that flows
according with the plot-sequences in the novel, I believe that he uses each
atmosphere as a foreshadow for the following story and for the end of the story
since both finally conveys mostly the same gloomy and dark atmosphere. By
doing so, Conrad is able to sustain the elements of suspense and surprise in the
novel through the setting descriptions. His goal is not merely to give the readers
clear portrayal of the setting of place in a tropical forest, but more as to create the
elements of ‘Setting and plot [to] reinforce each other.’ (Kennedy 15).
15
Maranatha Christian University
In An Outcast of the Islands, Conrad tends to describe the setting of place
through a monotonous way. Constantly the author presents the descriptions by
using the third person omniscient point of view, which makes the narrator’s
‘knowledge and prerogatives… unlimited.’ (Perrine 175), and Conrad usually
uses the words ‘It is’ in the beginning of the setting descriptions and ‘sombre’ in
several descriptions. I believe that the readers will be bored with such
monotonous explanations of the setting of place for it feels like re-opening the
previous pages repeatedly and read the same portrayal of the setting of place in
the novel. However, by using the atmosphere built by the setting of place as a
foreshadow for the story Conrad is able to avoid the boredom caused from the
monotonous descriptions for the readers because there are some objectives planted
in their mind, which are to find out the likelihood of the atmosphere and to try to
realize what it is used for.
I assume that by using such technique of creating a foreshadow of the
story through the descriptions of the setting of place, Conrad is trying to invite his
readers to be more involved with the story. Through the setting descriptions,
Conrad wants the readers to build their own expectations towards the following
story before they even read it.
The likelihood of the atmospheres created and the connections between the
setting of place and the following story will make the readers to be fond of
reading both parts. It seems to me that Conrad tries to let the readers guess the
following story as well as the end of the story and find out whether their guesses
are the same or different from the story told in the novel. It is not a matter of
16
Maranatha Christian University
guessing right or wrong, but more as his way to make the readers more interested
in the novel.
As for my own personal experience while reading the novel, I do not
instantly find out the purpose that Conrad intents to share with the readers through
such use of the setting of place. However, the intense and many descriptions of
the setting of place will eventually create questions upon even the inexperienced
reader of what is Conrad’s intention by doing so. It is not easy to find the answer,
yet it is very noticeable that makes it impossible for us not to realize it.
17
Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Text:
Conrad, Joseph. An Outcast of the Islands. London: Everyman, 1996.
References:
Watts, Cedric, ed. Intro: An Outcast of the Islands. London: Everyman, 1996.
Murphy, M.J. Understanding Unseen. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1972.
Kenney, William. How to Analyze Fiction. New York: Monarch Press, 1996.
Eastman, Richard M. A Guide to the Novel. San Francisco: Chandler Publishing
Co., 1965.
Ward, A.C. Illustrated History of English Literature. Vol. 3. Essex: Longmans,
1955.
Schwarz, Daniel R. Conrad: Almayer’s Folly to Under Western Eyes. London:
The Macmillan Press Ltd., 1980.
Young, Gavin. In Search of Conrad. Hammondsworth: Penguin Group, 1991.
Gordan, John D. Conrad: The Making of a Novelist. London: Harvard University
Press, 1940.
Perrine, Laurence. Story and Structure. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich,
Inc., 1974.
18
Maranatha Christian University
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ………………………………………
i
TABLE OF CONTENTS ………………………………………..
ii
ABSTRACT ………………………………………………………
iii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study …………………………………..
Statement of the Problem ………………………………….
Purpose of the Study ……………………………………….
Methods of Research ………………………………………
Organization of the Thesis …………………………………
1
3
3
4
4
CHAPTER TWO: DISCUSSION ……………………………….
5
CHAPTER THREE: CONCLUSION …………………………..
15
BIBLIOGRAPHY ………………………………………………...
18
APPENDICES
Synopsis of An Outcast of the Islands ……………………..
Biography of the Author …………………………………...
19
20
ii
Maranatha Christian University
ABSTRACT
Penelitian ini disusun sebagai analisa akan pengaruh dari setting tempat
terhadap perkembangan cerita dalam novel An Outcast of the Islands karangan
Joseph Conrad. Penggunaan setting tempat secara umum dalam karya sastra
bermanfaat untuk menciptakan atmosfir, yang merupakan mood yang muncul
dalam diri pembaca, seperti perasaan terharu, takut, sedih, dan lain sebagainya.
Dalam An Outcast of the Islands, pengaruh atmosfir ini dimanfaatkan oleh
Joseph Conrad untuk menciptakan unsur foreshadowing yang merupakan
petunjuk bagi para pembaca untuk memiliki gambaran samar akan apa yang
terjadi pada kelanjutan cerita berikutnya. Atmosfir dalam novel ini juga menjadi
foreshadow untuk akhir cerita, karena baik atmosfir maupun plot cerita memiliki
kesamaan perkembangan unsur yang menjadi semakin gelap dan mencekam.
Dengan mengembangkan fungsi atmosfir yang tercipta dari latar belakang
tempat di dalam novel ini sebagai foreshadow terhadap jalan cerita, Joseph
Conrad mampu menciptakan rasa penasaran dalam diri pembaca sehingga mereka
semakin terfokus pada cerita dalam novel ini serta membuat unsur setting dan plot
untuk saling mendukung satu sama lain. Hal ini dikarenakan oleh pengaruh
gambaran yang samar-samar akan kejadian berikutnya dalam novel ini akan
mendukung efektivitas dari elemen suspense dan surprise yang merupakan bagian
dari plot dalam novel ini.
iii
Maranatha Christian University
APPENDICES
Summary of An Outcast of the Islands
Willems was bound to spend his life inside the Malay Archipelago. When
he was young, he runs away from home, and is raised later by the great Rajah
Laut Tom Lingard. For several years, Willems becomes Lingard’s understudy. He
learns a lot about trading from the master of the islands himself, but learns
nothing about the true honour-principles of the captain.
Several years later, Willems leaves Lingard to serve for Hudig, a trading
post owner, as a successful clerk. During this time, Willems becomes more
ambitious and arrogant about his achievements. He maintains his pride by
corrupting a small amount of Hudig’s fortune to feed his worshipper, and he falls
hard when his act is found out. In a minute count, Willems loses everything that
he has, his wife and child, his property, and his racial, moral superiority among
the people he knows.
Fortunately, Lingard found him again, and sheltered Willems in his secret
port, Sambir, a place he owns as a sole trader there, since there’s no one who is
able to find the passage way to reach it besides himself. Every trader around the
archipelago dream is to be able to land there, but it seems only Lingard who
knows the way, and he doesn’t wish to share the knowledge with anyone else. The
19
Maranatha Christian University
one thing that the Rajah Laut forgets is Willems’ mental condition after his
economical breakdown. There in Sambir, Willems often quarrels with Almayer,
another one of Lingard’s protégé, and it makes Willems often leaves the hut
where they live and accidentally meets Aíssa, a daughter of a blind Asian expirate.
Willems and Aíssa fall in love with each other. And since love is blind, the
‘blind’ Aíssa is used by Abdulla, who is a West Asian trader, to persuade the
‘blind’ Willems, to show him Lingard’s secret passage way. Through no difficulty
at all, Abdulla manages to use both of them for his advantage. After Willems
takes him to Sambir, he becomes the second trader there. However, with his same
religion and skin color as the townsfolk, Abdulla may become number one there
in no time.
And as for Willems, he is forced to pay his act of treachery to Lingard, and
he pays it hard. Willems has to stay in a remote island far from any trading
activities for the rest of his life as Lingard’s prisoner. He is left alone as a white
among the colored, and alone as a treacherous beast, locked away from the whites,
to suffer as an outcast together with Aíssa, before finally his life ends even more
tragic by being killed by Aíssa.
Biography of Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was born in 3 December 1857 as Józef Teodor Konrad
Nalęcz Korzeniowski in Ukraine, Poland. He lost both of his parents at his early
ages. He lost his mother when he was 7 years old, and his father when he was 11.
As he grew older, he became more and more interested with a life on the sea, and
20
Maranatha Christian University
he began his sailing journey at the age of 16, leaving Poland for France. From
1878, he spent his 20 years-life to come as a sailor under the flag of the British
Merchant Navy.
During his service on deck, he sailed to many places around the Asiatic
oceans, and paid several visit to Australia. He had landed on the grounds of
Calcutta, Java, Borneo, and other towns with many different ships. Conrad wrote
his first novel when he was 31 years old, and it was published six years later. His
first novel is about the adventures around Java, Celebes, and Borneo, Almayer’s
Folly. It is the first of his trilogy, followed by An Outcast of the Islands and The
Rescue several years later. He also wrote several other novels, which are Tales of
Unrest, Lord Jim, Nostromo, and Heart of Darkness.
Joseph Conrad died of a heart attack when he was 66 years old in 1924. He
died one year after he declined honorary degree from Cambridge, and several
months after he declined knighthood. He was buried in Canterbury.
21
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
As a fiction writer, Joseph Conrad achieves numerous credits from
critics for his ability. A.C. Ward states that Conrad’s prose was considered a
“distinguished work” and of a “recognizable quality”. (Ward 279). Moreover,
Gavin Young, a literary critic who traces Conrad’s journey in the past claims that
‘I could see how skillfully he [Conrad] had laid a fresh layer of history on the
places he had written about’ (Young 3). When in his era during the late 19th
Century until the early 20th Century the European colonization is rapidly
spreading, Conrad becomes a bridge to send a message to the English society
about what the European explorers have met and have become especially in the
foreign islands through his early novels. Therefore, ‘Conrad is not only one of the
greatest novelists who wrote in English, but he is particularly important for
understanding twentieth-century British culture.’ (Schwarz xiii).
For my thesis writing, I choose Conrad’s An Outcast of the Islands, which
is set in the 1896. As An Outcast of the Islands is his second novel, I assume that
1
Maranatha Christian University
the work may still be reliable to present the originality of his writing that has not
been much influenced by the society’s demands and critics. It ‘reflect[s] his state
of mind and reveal[s] his values’ (Schwarz 3) as it shows ‘the complexity of his
temperament [which] is implicit in the very styles . . . [that] are modernistic in
their black comedy or absurdity.’ (Watts xxvi). By using this book, I hope I will
be able to make an analysis on a fiction that concerns with the problems faced by
European traders in the tropical islands.
In the novel, I find that Conrad spends many pages to give a clear
description of the setting of place, ‘One of the striking features of An Outcast of
the Islands is the descriptive richness: repeatedly the narrator’s view moves from
some figure in the foreground to the surrounding natural vista.’ (Watts xix). It
makes me interested to know why Conrad portrays a lot about the settings and
what it is used for.
To make a clear definition of the term of the element of setting of place in
a literary work, I agree with Murphy’s statement in Understanding Unseen that
‘the setting of the novel is the background against which the characters live out
their lives.’ (Murphy 141).
In accordance with the theory mentioned above, Conrad applies the setting
of place to introduce the natural tropical surroundings (as the background of the
story) to the readers who are not well acquainted with it in order to help them
create a vivid portrayal of the place in mind. Moreover, he also uses it to create a
certain atmosphere to the readers. Atmosphere is ‘… a kind of mood or emotional
aura suggested primarily by the setting and helping to establish the reader’s
expectations.’ (Kenney 41). By using this technique, Conrad may manipulate the
2
Maranatha Christian University
unfamiliar aspect to help creating a strong atmosphere, and used for other purpose
as well.
Through the element of the setting of place, I believe that Conrad also
intends to use the element of the setting of place as a tool of foreshadow for the
story by describing it intensely. ‘The term ‘foreshadowing’ is used whenever
specific details necessary to implement a later event are planted in the reader’s
attention early.’ (Eastman 13). Subsequently, the element of the setting of place
becomes an element that presents functions more than what it is supposed to
serve.
Statement of the problem
Through An Outcast of the Islands, I would try to analyze several problems:
1. How is the element of the setting of place portrayed in the novel?
2. How does the setting of place used as a foreshadow of the story?
3. Why does the author use the setting of place as a foreshadowing?
Purpose of the Study
The analysis is constructed in sequences:
1. To acknowledge the portrayal of the setting of place in the novel.
2. To relate the description of the setting of place as a foreshadow of the story.
3. To observe the effects created from the use of the setting of place as a
foreshadowing.
3
Maranatha Christian University
Method of Research
I first start my research through library research. As the analysis is an intrinsic
analysis, I focus myself on searching in several sources that provides the data
involved for my study.
Organization of the Thesis
The thesis proposal is organized as several linked-chapters. The first chapter
consists of Background of the Study, Statement of the Problem, Method of
Research, and Organization of the Thesis. The second chapter contains the
Analysis on the use of the setting of place as a foreshadow of the story in Joseph
Conrad’s An Outcast of the Islands and the Conclusion from the analysis. The last
chapter includes an Appendix, Biography of Joseph Conrad as the writer of the
novel, and the Synopsis of the novel.
4
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER THREE
CONCLUSION
I believe that many people would agree with the fact that in An Outcast of
the Islands, Joseph Conrad presents the readers with clear and detailed
descriptions of the setting of place, just as Cedric Watts states that ‘One of the
striking features of An Outcast of the Islands is the descriptive richness.’ (Watts
xix). However, the argument may still lies in the question of why is it ‘striking’?
My analysis in the previous chapter is an alternative point of view towards the
argument.
As Conrad depicts the setting of place to create an atmosphere that flows
according with the plot-sequences in the novel, I believe that he uses each
atmosphere as a foreshadow for the following story and for the end of the story
since both finally conveys mostly the same gloomy and dark atmosphere. By
doing so, Conrad is able to sustain the elements of suspense and surprise in the
novel through the setting descriptions. His goal is not merely to give the readers
clear portrayal of the setting of place in a tropical forest, but more as to create the
elements of ‘Setting and plot [to] reinforce each other.’ (Kennedy 15).
15
Maranatha Christian University
In An Outcast of the Islands, Conrad tends to describe the setting of place
through a monotonous way. Constantly the author presents the descriptions by
using the third person omniscient point of view, which makes the narrator’s
‘knowledge and prerogatives… unlimited.’ (Perrine 175), and Conrad usually
uses the words ‘It is’ in the beginning of the setting descriptions and ‘sombre’ in
several descriptions. I believe that the readers will be bored with such
monotonous explanations of the setting of place for it feels like re-opening the
previous pages repeatedly and read the same portrayal of the setting of place in
the novel. However, by using the atmosphere built by the setting of place as a
foreshadow for the story Conrad is able to avoid the boredom caused from the
monotonous descriptions for the readers because there are some objectives planted
in their mind, which are to find out the likelihood of the atmosphere and to try to
realize what it is used for.
I assume that by using such technique of creating a foreshadow of the
story through the descriptions of the setting of place, Conrad is trying to invite his
readers to be more involved with the story. Through the setting descriptions,
Conrad wants the readers to build their own expectations towards the following
story before they even read it.
The likelihood of the atmospheres created and the connections between the
setting of place and the following story will make the readers to be fond of
reading both parts. It seems to me that Conrad tries to let the readers guess the
following story as well as the end of the story and find out whether their guesses
are the same or different from the story told in the novel. It is not a matter of
16
Maranatha Christian University
guessing right or wrong, but more as his way to make the readers more interested
in the novel.
As for my own personal experience while reading the novel, I do not
instantly find out the purpose that Conrad intents to share with the readers through
such use of the setting of place. However, the intense and many descriptions of
the setting of place will eventually create questions upon even the inexperienced
reader of what is Conrad’s intention by doing so. It is not easy to find the answer,
yet it is very noticeable that makes it impossible for us not to realize it.
17
Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Text:
Conrad, Joseph. An Outcast of the Islands. London: Everyman, 1996.
References:
Watts, Cedric, ed. Intro: An Outcast of the Islands. London: Everyman, 1996.
Murphy, M.J. Understanding Unseen. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1972.
Kenney, William. How to Analyze Fiction. New York: Monarch Press, 1996.
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