Naipaul, Conrad, Kureishi

Optician of Lampedusa

"The is a novel taken from a true story – written by the prestigious BBC reporter Emma Jane Kirby, who received the Bayeux-Calvados Award for her report on the Lampedusa disaster (happened on October 3, 2013).

The protagonist (an optician of Neapolitan origins) has lived together with his wife Teresa on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa – one of the main entry points for migrants – for 25 years. He had never regretted having left his chaotic hometown for the loneliness of the island – where the sea was everywhere.

In recent years the optician had feared several times that his shop would fail, and there was strong concern about the future of his two sons. Menna regains optimism when he decides, on an October day, to take a ride with his friends on their 15-metre yacht.

It seemed like a perfect morning to fish and relax, until they were struck by the disturbing noise of the seagulls. After realizing that what they had

heard was not a seagull, they reached the point where they had heard the screams and there, they saw something they didn’t expect: men at sea screaming for help.

The optician wondered how they could save all the shipwrecked people by having only a life jacket on a yacht made for 10, while – in the meantime – his friends tried to save as many people as possible.

The group managed to recover 47 castaways, who were between 13 and 20 years old.

The dead were 368 and among them, only a woman.

This book explains how people that lived an experience in first person, saving lives and having to face such a rescue situation feel afterward => the optician and his wife had difficulties falling asleep, became demotivated at work and also had a lot of trouble accepting that they weren’t able to save everyone.

It’s a story that shows the two sides of the coin: the worst of humanity and the best of it, too.

Racism, bad and good side of people, purity of humanity.

writing in a language that wasn't his mother tongue. One of Conrad's most famous novels is "Heart of Darkness", which explores the dark side of human nature and the effects of imperialism in Africa. Another notable work is "Lord Jim", which tells the story of a young sailor who faces a moral dilemma and the consequences of his actions. Conrad's writing often reflects his own experiences and observations of the world. He was known for his vivid descriptions and complex characters, as well as his exploration of themes such as identity, morality, and the human condition. Overall, Conrad's works are considered to be important contributions to the literary canon, and his writing continues to be studied and appreciated today.

Polish.Conrad is an international writer for his cultural education: he has roots in Eastern Europe and studied in France. In addition, he travelled to colonial places. He lived in a transitional period: between the Victorian era and modernism. He's a pre-modernist.

❖ Plots, stories, adventure => are close to Victorian age

❖ Formation outside England makes him close to modernism

CONRAD'S MODERNISM

He explained the impossibility of describing reality in a unique and objective way, but it can be an approach with different perspectives. The narrator gives his point of view and the narrator is aware that it is his point of view and that there can be many different thoughts about the same reality. There is no omniscient narrator, typical of the Victorian period, but there is a narrator with a subjective perspective.

There are narrative techniques related to unconscious:

Stream of consciousness => idea that thought never ends, sometimes without logic, always flows; for example,

James Joyce feels the need to express what comes into the characters' minds

Interior monologue

Flashback

=> memory, some things that happen in the past appear in the present thanks to memory.

In modernism's novel, we find a hero in isolation, detached from society, caught in isolation that is totally different from Victorian age.

It became important the psychological analysis of characters => the inner life with its ambiguities and complexities. (Freud)

COLONIAL IDEOLOGY

We are at the end of the 19th century; it represents the climax of British empire.

- Status of colonized people defined in different ways by social scientists, missionaries, colonial administrators.

- General idea of the west => people of other races considered morally, intellectually and socially inferior to white Europeans (Darwinian ideas)

- Darwin, a scientist, studied the evolution of species, he published in 1857 "On the Origin of Species through Natural Selection".

Animal species evolved or extinct themselves in base of their capacity of adapting. This idea was moved also in human world, so they justify the extermination of the indigene habitants. Kipling wrote "The White Man's Burden" idea of white superiority, so they have the power of impose their culture on others. On the one hand Conrad condemned the evils of imperial exploitation and the idea of colonization as civilization BUT on other hand he often adopts racist assumptions in the description of colonized people. Conrad has been accused by postcolonial writers of racist assumptions: - Achebe accuses Conrad of depicting Africa as "the other world" with negative connotations of bestiality and primitivism - African characters are de-humanized and metonymically described - African characters do not speak a language, they express themselves through noises and gestures CONRAD AND COLONIALISM His novels are setting in colonies places (Malay, Africa) The portrait of colonized

peoples is “Inconclusive” => there is not a clear cut.

• In some cases, it draws on the conventional terminology of racist discourses
• In other cases, it challenges these discourses and image of otherness they transmit

Conrad questions 2 basic propositions of European racism:

• The idea that a population can be generally given a particular character (savage, violent, lazy)
• The notion of a hierarchy of races, with the white race (or Anglo Saxon) at the top.

Conrad breaks down the dichotomies people of racist discourse (white/black, childhood/adult,civilized/savage)

He proves that European insistence on progress and civilization to justify violence and exploitationon colonized people is just an alibi to guarantee economics advantage.

Lord Jim and Heart of Darkness are considered his greatest works, but ALMAYER’S FOLLY is amasterpiece.

Almayer’s Folly (1895) is Conrad’s 1st novel and also his first attempt of writing. The book was19th

centurywritten at the end of the and published at the beginning of the 20th century.

colonialism:The main topic is the the author will attack the racist theories that justified colonialismstrongly. He starts talking about the problem of different ethnicities and cultures.

Conrad states that Europeans have the wrong picture of indigenous people of the colonies; he calls them «strange» and «cannibal».

He claims that the picture of life here (in Europe) and there (in Malay) is the same and he implies that human beings are the same everywhere and they deserve respect and sympathy.

Malay and Arab people are described by the narrator as having a «savage nature» and «half-formed savage minds».

Malays are represented as bloodthirsty, poisoners, culturally inferior («wild beasts»).

Nina, the child of mixed descent, is used by Conrad to challenge Almayer’s claims of white superiority. She recognises essential similarities between Europeans

and Malays => both are discriminating against each other. The various events take place in the Eastern Archipelago, near Singapore. The north of the Borneo area is the Islamic area of Brunei, one of the richest places in the world. At that time the Borneo area was considered a treasure by Westerners, because it was thought that it was a land where you could do your fortune. This was nevertheless not true, because that area was very poor and people died because of mosquitos. PLOT Almayer, The protagonist of the story is a second-generation inhabitant of this island. His parents, Borneo Dutch by birth, found themselves in the situation to move to because of poverty. Having always been listening to stories about Netherlands by his parents, Almayer dreams constantly during his life in Borneo to go to Europe, especially to Amsterdam. This dream will accompany him during his whole life, but it will never come true. In order to make money, he starts practicing colonialism, so he set up commercial.

businesses with Arabs, Dutchmen and French people, even if he didn’t consider them reliable people.

In a world where everything is done for money, it doesn’t matter who you do business with: what is important is to make affairs with who has the money. Lingard.

When he was young, he met the famous and powerful pirate Almayer was so concentrated in his purpose of making money that he started to admire this man only because of his wealth => both Lingard and Almayer are material men.

They started to share a lot of time, travelling by sea. Little by little they knew each other better and one day, during an ordinary travel, Lingard proposed him a deal: if he married his daughter, he would receive his whole inheritance at the moment of Lingard’s death.

Almayer, fascinated by the power of money and the splendour future he would have had, accepted to marry Lingard’s daughter even if he hadn’t even seen her. This girl was not really Lingard’s daughter: she was a Malay.

girl whose parents had been killed by Lingard's pirates. She was saved only thanks to her beauty: Lingard thought that she deserved a better future, so he sent her to a Convent, where she was educated by white nuns, who taught her the Christian faith.

However, this marriage was a great catastrophe: Almayer didn't like her (and of course she felt it and felt herself depreciated). Lingard had condemned his daughter to be an outcast: she was fully aware that she didn't belong to the white world and, what is more, she was obliged to marry a white man who depreciated her. She couldn't tolerate Almayer, because his everyday behaviour went in contrast with the Christian principles she had learned in the convent. Not being able to survive in such a hostile world without getting mad, she retreated herself in the very essence of her native culture.

The distance between Almayer and Mrs Almayer grew wider and wider, but they had a beautiful Nina.