Illusion of Modernity in Joseph Conrad’s Selected Short Stories

Abstract

This research paper examines Joseph Conrad’s selected short stories, with a special attention to their representation of modernity. For this, the paper uses concept of modernist philosophy regarding marriage, love and youth along with “The power of Myth” as methods to cave into the narrative of the stories through analytical methodology. Conrad's stories reflect the ambiguous conditions of people and male heroism due to rise of modernity. With regard to this fact, this study assumes that due to initiation of modernistic prospective people fall in the contradict mood they cannot completely get rid of traditional norms and values, nor can they adapt to the purely modern situation. Unclear path can lead to intolerable or uncontrollable problems without knowing its further results. Thisproject hypothesizes that due to initiation of modernistic prospective people fall in the contradict mood they cannot completely get rid of traditional norms and values, nor can they adapt to the purely modern situation. Due to long lasting effects of modernity, they are unable to deal with such problems. So, to bring the issue of: marriage, love and youth of modern era into forefront, this paper highlights the isolated and ambiguous situations in the stories and then analyses them thoroughly. The stories are: “The Lagoon”, “Youth”, and “Amy foster”. Similarly the later part of the paper explores the socio-political circumstances and the author’s standpoint to depict the real condition of society. My entry point is concept about love, marriage and youth in modern era this took me to myth, male heroism along with colonial wave and it’s far reaching consequences. Thus, my central research concern is to examine how modernistic prospective creates illusion regarding love, marriage and youth in modern society. Key Words: Modernism, illusion, duality, myth, male heroism,