Abstract
Sir, All the recent biographers of Joseph Conrad have overlooked the fact that he was employed for about two months as a translator of Slavonic languages during the early ‘nineties1 by a Translating Agency, a few doors away from Mudie’s Library, New Oxford Street, WC. I remember Conrad calling one day at the office of the long since defunct St Stephen’s Review,2 in the Adelphi, and informing the assistant editor, the late Mr Edgar Lee,3 that he had ceased calling for work at the Agency. Sometimes, Conrad said, his remuneration did not exceed ninepence per week. This was owing to the fact that most of the Slavonic firms doing business with English customers wrote in French or German. Conrad brought with him at the same time some translations of Polish short stories, which Mr Lee promised he would read. Mr Lee, however, afterwards told me that he was compelled to return the Polish tales to Conrad, because all of them were much too revolutionary for a Conservative weekly journal like the St Stephen’s Review.4
New Statesman, vol. XXXI (28 July 1928) p. 511.
Chapter PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
The exact date is not known, although Zdzisław Najder suggests 1891 (see Joseph Conrad: A Chronicle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983) p. 149).
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1990 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
de Ternant, A. (1990). An Unknown Episode of Conrad’s Life. In: Ray, M. (eds) Joseph Conrad. Interviews and Recollections Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09387-8_18
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09387-8_18
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-09389-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-09387-8
eBook Packages: Palgrave Literature & Performing Arts CollectionLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)