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This thesis explores the archetypal theme of initiation in selected texts by Joseph Conrad. The Introduction first surveys critical attention to initiatory motifs in Conrad with the objective of demonstrating the need for an approach to the topic informed by a more formal and theorized understanding of initiation. It then offers a prima facie case for the centrality of the idea of initiation in Conrad's oeuvre, based on references culled from a range of the author's writings. Chapter One seeks to contextualise initiation by providing a history of anthropological research into and theorisations of the rite, proceeding to a description of its typical structure and functions. A detailed account is given of the most widely accepted model of initiation, Arnold van Gennep's tripartite schema. Moving on to Conrad's writing, Chapter Two draws on both his fiction and more personal writings in order to provide a provisional account of the writer's own understanding of initiation and its importance, and to offer some explanation of why Conrad should have been prompted to accord the motif such prominence in his work. Conrad's presentation and (impliedly) his understanding of initiation was never entirely consistent and underwent some change in the course of his writing career. The critical assessment of "Typhoon" in Chapter Three depicts Conrad's more optimistic conception of initiation as a rite benefitting both society, by promoting solidarity, and the individual, by advancing self-knowledge. Chapter Four introduces, via analyses of the novellas "Youth" and "The Shadow Line", that variation on the motif of initiation which is more typical of its manifestation in Conrad: the failure of individuals to complete their cycles of initiation. Chapter Five identifies those characteristics of initiation which appear to be determinative in the representations of incomplete initiation in Conrad's work. Initiation seems to play out approximately seven paradoxes; the impact of some of these is examined through analysis of the initiatory ordeals of the main protagonists in The Secret Agent. Integral to this discussion is an attempt to demonstrate the vital role which initiation plays in the healthy maintenance not only of social order but also of faith and life itself. The Conclusion summarises the more important findings of the study and indicates some directions for further, related research.

The purpose of this study is to show that many of Conrad's women characters were not merely passive factors and that their inclusion in his fiction was more functional than incidental.

This thesis has two purposes. The first is to trace the gradual transformation of certain Gothic traits, primarily those of the veil and the Doppelganger, from their original form in the historical Gothic to the manner of their use by Joseph Conrad. The second is to interpret Moby-Dick. Lord Jim. The Secret Sharer, and Benito Cereno in terms of Gothicism, and by this interpretation both to strengthen some common interpretations and to indicate how certain others have resulted from the authors' careful and successful attempts to hide from their critics the moral beliefs and dilemmas in their works. When Coleridge wrote the Rime, he was introducing a new and very important setting into Gothic literature: the sea. Because of the formlessness of the sea, because of the suddenness of its change in appearance from serenity to malicious killer, and because its glassy surface hides unimaginable unknowns, it is obviously well-suited to Melville's purposes in Moby-Dick. He makes use of his readers' acquaintance with Gothic tales in portraying Ahab and Ishmael, who struggle for self-knowledge by facing the sea and its terrors. In Lord Jim, Conrad uses the same initial situation: the unseen agent of destruction which takes all security from Jim's life, and prompts in him a quest like that of the Ancient Mariner or the Wandering Jew. He exists behind a veil which represents, as it does in Moby-Dick, Benito Cereno, and most Gothic novels, the inability to clarify moral issues and act according to personal moral beliefs. This moral ambiguity is often phrased in other terms, namely the duality of being, the "good"-"bad" dichotomy, where two aspects of the same person are often separated by a veil of some sort; this can be seen in such stories as Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Wilde's Dorian Gray, and Poe's William Wilson. It is also the case with The Secret Sharer. In this story, Conrad makes a point of showing how the moral dilemma which Leggatt's presence evokes is dealt with by the captain--but not, I feel, to the captain's credit. The veil and the double motifs in these stories reveal an interesting transformation; though in early Gothic they are little more than plot devices, they become in Conrad central concerns, through which the interpretations of his stories may be effected. Thus, as I have tried to show, Gothicism, far from being a minor and short-lived type of fiction which died out in the early part of the last century, exerts a potent and central influence in such literature as Melville's and Conrad's. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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Lau, Chi Sum Garfield. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 136-137). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Introduction: Conflictual Self in the Modern Era: Conrad and Kawabata --- p.6 / Chapter Chapter One: --- Immorality and Conflictual Self in Conrad's The Return --- p.20 / Chapter Chapter Two: --- The Past and Split Self in Kawabata's Thousand Cranes --- p.50 / Chapter Chapter Three: --- Conflictual Self and Split Self in Conrad's The Secret Agent and Kawabata's The Sound of the Mountain --- p.81 / Conclusion: Conflictual Self in Occidental and Oriental Contexts --- p.117 / Bibliography --- p.136

Winnie Verloc's role in "The Secret Agent" has received little initial critical attention. However, this character emerges as Conrad's hero in this novel because she is an exception to what afflicts the other characters: institutionalism. In the first chapter, I discuss the effect of institutions on the characters in the novel as well as on London, and how both the characters and the city lack hope and humanity. Chapter II is an analysis of Winnie's character, concentrating on her philosophy that "life doesn't stand much looking into," and how this view, coupled with her disturbing experience of having looked into the "abyss," makes Winnie heroic in her affirmative existentialism. Chapters III and IV broaden the focus, comparing Winnie to Conrad's other protagonists and to his other female characters.