Oxford Reader's Companion to Conrad - Hardcover

Knowles, Owen; Moore, Gene M.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0198662149 ISBN 13: 9780198662143

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2000

Synopsis

Jozef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski (as he was born in 1857) is one of the most compelling and complex figures in English literature. His own life was as astonishing as any of his novels: born in the Ukraine of Polish parents, after a childhood in exile and a 20-year career as a merchant seaman, he began in middle age to write in English, the language of his newly adopted country.
The Oxford Reader's Companion to Conrad represents a unique and long-overdue achievement in Conrad scholarship: the first comprehensive and authoritative reference to distil in a lively, readable way a vast range of information on Joseph Conrad's life, works, reputation, and the historical and cultural contexts in which he lived. Much of the material in the Companion is entirely new, compiled from scattered Conrad resources, many of which have never been published before.
Produced by two of the world's leading Conradians, with the help of specialist contributors, here are the latest findings of modern scholarship captured in an unparalleled resource for all Conrad enthusiasts.

About this title

About the Author

Owen Knowles, Senior Lecturer, Department of English, University of Hull. Gene Moore, Senior Lecturer in English, University of Amsterdam.

From Booklist

Reviewed with The Oxford Reader's Companion to Hardy.

In 1999, Oxford introduced a new branch of its esteemed family of Oxford Companions with the publication of Oxford Reader's Com panion to Dickens [RBB O 1 99] and Oxford Reader's Companion to Trollope (1999). Reflecting the general format of the previous volumes, these two new compilations cover not only the authors' lives and works but also the social, cultural, and political milieu in which they lived. Thus, the alphabetically arranged entries range from lengthy treatments of each author's publications, to family members, friends, and associates, to places, ideas, and events that had a significant influence on their lives or that figured prominently in their writings. In addition, both volumes include articles that offer valuable overviews of the major critical and biographical studies available on each writer. A significant difference is that only the volume on Conrad also includes entries for major characters.The more than 400 entries in the Conrad companion were authored by Knowles and Moore (both noted Conrad scholars) and four additional contributors, while the 320 entries in the Hardy companion are the work of Page, who is a prominent and prolific authority on English literature, and an international team of 42 scholars. Both volumes include black-and-white illustrations, author chronologies, and useful indexes that arrange entry headings under broad subject categories. The Conrad companion also contains an index of references to his works, a family tree, and a section of maps; and the Hardy companion features five appendixes, ranging from an index to his poems to a list of media adaptations, the latter of which is disappointing in its incompleteness. Both volumes could have benefited from a more generous use of see references; for instance, neither companion refers users from Evolution to Darwinism or from World War I to First World War.Oxford Reader's Companion to Conrad is the first truly encyclopedic work devoted to Conrad. It complements Leonard Orr and Ted Billy's recent A Joseph Conrad Companion (Greenwood, 1999), which is a collection of 14 essays that survey the biographical and critical scholarship on Conrad, and it provides both broader and more in-depth coverage of Conrad's life and works than does Norman Page's A Conrad Companion (St. Martin's, 1986). Because Oxford Reader's Companion to Hardy does not include separate entries for Hardy's characters, earlier guides to Hardy, such as F. B. Pinion's A Hardy Companion (Macmillan, 1976) and Glenda Leeming's Who's Who in Thomas Hardy (Taplinger, 1975), continue to be useful resources for Hardy scholars.Reflecting the high scholarly standards and readability that one has come to expect of an Oxford Companion, these volumes are highly recommended for all academic libraries and for larger public libraries. REVWR
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About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0198662149
• ISBN 13: 9780198662143
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 462