The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale - Softcover

Conrad, Joseph

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1484879449 ISBN 13: 9781484879443

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2013

Synopsis

"The Secret Agent" is considered to be one of Joseph Conrad's finest works and was ranked the 46th best novel of the 20th century by the Modern Library. Set in London at the end of the nineteenth century, it follows the life of Mr. Verloc, a secret agent who is also the proprietor of a small shop that sells, “photographs of more or less undressed dancing girls” and “a few books, with titles hinting at impropriety.“ Verloc’s friends, a group of anarchists, assign him the task of destroying the Greenwich Observatory, but when things go awry, Verloc must deal with the terrible consequences of his actions. As current now, as it was a century ago, Conrad weaves a chilling tale of espionage, exploitation and terrorism that is all too present in our own time.

About this title

From the Publisher:

8 1.5-hour cassettes

From the Back Cover:

The Secret Agent is set in the seedy world of Adolf Verloc, a storekeeper and double agent in late-Victorian London who pretends to sympathize with a group of international anarchists but reports on their activities to both the Russian embassy and the British government. As he is drawn further into a terrorist bombing plot, his family also becomes involved, with devastating consequences. Based on a real-life failed anarchist plot, The Secret Agent is both intimately engaged with its historical moment and profoundly relevant today.

This new Broadview Edition helps to recreate the historical context that informed Conrad’s preoccupations with global terrorism, human degeneration, the relativity of time, and the position of women.

About this edition

• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1484879449
• ISBN 13: 9781484879443
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 218