The Dialectic of the Double in Lord Jim and the Secret Sharer

The Dialectic of the Double in LordJim and“The Secret Sharer”

Christie GrammSeattle, Washington

[His] affliction was independent of him, likethat of a child: he was not responsible forit; it could destroy him, it could not modifyhim. He could cease to exist, disappear in avice, in a monomania; he could not become aman.

Malraux, Man’s Fate

OR A WORK that is widely regarded as overlyobvious in the repetition of its theme,there is considerable disagreement about

the meaning of “The Secret Sharer.”1 Indeed,Conrad’s fiction, in general, is often regardedas indeterminate and subjective. For example,“Conrad produces effects not of clarity but ofuncertainty – visual, moral, and political. Onall of these levels, the black and white worldof Conrad is disconcertingly vague” (Parkes19). In Conrad, a “deep-rooted subjectivismwhich sees the world as desperately enigmatic .

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1 For a summary of criticism on this story, see Berthoud (2008).

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. . leaves its meanings multiple and ambiguousand unachieved” (Eagleton 134-36).

Among many examples of clear, unequivocaljudgements in Lord Jim, the declaration that BigBrierly’s life was a “sham” (68) asserts the(now commonplace) position that absolute a prioristandards draw a map that does not fullyaccount for the territory. Nevertheless, theperception of Conrad’s writing as enigmaticpersists, deriving, in part from the use of theover-determined symbol. However, the over-determined images are intentionally productiveof, rather than resistant to meaning. InEmpson’s terms, the constructive ambiguity ofthe over-determined figure of the Double inConrad’s work allows the synthesis ofcontradictions, “making clear a complicatedstate of mind” (133).

The idea that analyzing the over-determinedsymbols in Conrad is “just like interpreting adream” (Emmett 154) also contributes to a senseof subjectivity and indeterminacy. Unlike theself-referential, spontaneous products ofdreams, Conrad’s images are intentionally over-determined as a provocation to the reader, as away of engaging and exhorting the reader to“explore for themselves” (Tsao 44). Ernst Krisilluminates this distinction, pointing out thatwhile works of art, like dreams, are over-determined products of primary thoughtprocesses, there is a difference betweenmanifestations of unconscious thought processesin dreams, and those present in art since “The

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contingencies from which works of art proceedare not confined to the realities of theauthor’s drives and desires, but mustnecessarily include the structure of hisartistic problem and the historical state ofhis particular genre” (29).

Within the historical context of the Double,“The Secret Sharer” achieves rare insight inits treatment of this motif by suggesting thatthe solution to the problem of the divided selfis a result of the process of psychicdisorientation and conflict. While other“dramas of the alter ego [may] take on thericher force of psychic confusion andduplicity” (Zabel 24), this essay will arguethat “The Secret Sharer” does not focus on theproblem of the psyche at war with itself forthe sake of dramatic effect. Rather thanexploiting the dramatic process ofdecomposition, for example in the image of aman turning into a werewolf, Conrad takes onthe task of resolution.

While Conrad’s depiction of a unified theoryof the self in “The Secret Sharer” is presentedfrom the point of view of the subject, theideas of the divided self and the Double arenot subjective, but rather have analogues inmany systems of psychology. For example, theJungian shadow archetype provides a conceptualcontext for the Double. As the personified sumof the inferior, dark, threatening, or evencriminal potentials of the psyche, the shadowarchetype is an autonomous partial system that

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is given its independence, ironically, by thevery effort of the ego to banish such aspectsof the self from consciousness. Jung emphasizedthe importance of recognizing, rather thandenying, such potentials, since unacknowledgedthey create vulnerable blind spots. The Doublefigure in literature often functions as theshadow archetype, as the embodiment ofsuppressed aspects of the protagonist’s psyche.

Most literary doubles interact as a partialdialectic – as a thesis and an antithesis,without synthesis, or integration. Stories ofthe Double tend to focus on the drama of abifurcated personality – a psyche at war withitself. Dostoevsky’s The Double exemplifiesDoubles that interact, for the most part,antagonistically, without reconciliation, withthe interplay between Goliadkin Senior andGoliadkin Junior dramatizing the protagonist’sshifting, increasingly tormented state of mind.In The Raw Youth, Dostoevsky describes the Doubleas “the first stage in some serious mentalderangement, which may lead to a badconclusion, a dualism between feeling andthought” (qtd. in Kohlberg 349). The Double endsbadly for Goliadkin, Sr when Goliadkin, Jrdisplaces him. As the shadow archetype,Goliadkin, Jr epitomizes the idea of anautonomous partial system that has been givenits independence by the protagonist’s attemptto manage conflicting impulses. Alternatively,Conrad’s “The Secret Sharer” develops acomplete dialectic of the Double by suggesting

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that the solution to the problem of psychicdissolution is a result of the interaction ofthe Doubles.

As depictions of split off, partial aspectsof the protagonist’s psyche, literary Doublesusually begin and end as unreconcileddichotomies, in part because the quality thatmakes the Double device appealing to writers –allowing the dramatic representation of acharacter’s conflicted psyche – also tends toreinforce and perpetuate the psychologicalsplit. The process of disowning a troublesomepart of the psyche by projecting it onto aDouble tends to define the conflict asexternal, thus making the problem lessavailable to conscious awareness andintegration. The irony of the Double is thatthe projection of inner conflict onto anexternal character is an illusion: theprotagonist gains a sense of having gotten ridof the problem, yet it remains within theunconscious; he feels less responsible for it,yet he cannot control it, so the unconsciousconflict is more likely to emerge at aninopportune moment, under the pressure of acrisis, such as a shipwreck.

Freudian theory is also useful forunderstanding how the Double functions. In TheDynamics of Literary Response, Norman Holland notesthat the most prominent defensive strategiesfound in literature include projection,introjection, splitting, and symbolization (55-

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56). Splitting – the process of “breaking upone thing into several” – is particularlyapparent in the motif of the Double, whereconflicting aspects of the psyche are splitinto two characters. As a contemporary of Freud, Conrad’s briefand elliptical comments regarding psychoanalysis have led some to conclude that Conrad was antagonistic toward Freud. My view is that Conrad’s antipathy was more to absolutesystems of thought and “isms” in general, than to Freud in particular. Lord Jim was written prior to the publication of Freud’s major work. My view is that Conrad developed his own psychological insights parallel to Freud. Rather than being directly influenced by Freud, it is more likelythat he was influenced by ideas that were in general circulation at the time, and which later became associated with Freud. For example, the term sublimation was used prior to Freud by Novalis, Nietzsche, Goethe and Schopenhauer (Walter Kaufman , Nietzsche, Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, pp. 218-219).

Terms and concepts that later became associated with Freud are prevalent throughout Lord Jim:

“There were his fine sensibilities . . . asort of sublimated, selfishness.”

(177; emphasis added)

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“Trust a boat on the high seas to bringout the Irrational at the bottom of everythought.” (121)

“It is from weakness unknown… that may lie. . . repressed . . . that not one of us issafe.” (43)

“No man ever understands quite his ownartful dodges to escape from the grimshadow of self-knowledge.” (80)

“Very few of us have the will or thecapacity to look consciously under the surfaceof familiar emotions.” (222)

“madness, derived from intense egoism,inflamed by resistance, tearing the soulto pieces, and giving factitious vigour tothe body”(344)2

Lord Jim is an investigation of how charactersadapt when experience is antithetical to a prioriideas, and how the failure to reconcile suchcontradictions may lead to psychic bifurcation.Psychoanalytic theory is particularly useful inunderstanding the character of Brierly, whooverreacts to Jim with a sense of humiliation“enough to burn a man to ashes” (67) andeventually commits suicide. As Frederick Crewsnotes, “the jargon of psychoanalysis is2 Emphases added.

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sometimes invaluable in analysis of literaturesince, for example, the concept ‘superego’ withthe force Freud showed it capable, much betteraccounts for the irrationality – even thesavagery – with which self-punishment is ofteninflicted in literary plots, than does theconcept of conscience” (17). Moreover,according to Holland, the defensive strategy ofintrojection is apparent where a character hasso internalized the demands of the super-egothat it is difficult to distinguish the super-ego from the ego. In this process, a charactermay inflict self-punishment for the sins ofothers, whose guilt is often indistinguishablefrom a sense of personal guilt (55). In Lord Jim,Brierly’s response to Jim follows this patternof punishing self-control.

As Brierly observes the official inquiry intoJim’s role in the wreck of the Patna, his senseof devastation is disconnected from the Patnaincident itself. As his Double, Jim acts as amirror, reflecting Brierly’s unconscious:“While I thought . . . of the immensity of[Brierly’s] contempt for [Jim], he was probablyholding silent inquiry into his own case. Theverdict must have been of unmitigated guilt . .. for he committed suicide very soon after”(58).

Before his participation in the Patna inquiry,Brierly has lived according to a “fixedstandard of conduct” (50), and a “belief in hisown splendour” (64). Having “never made amistake” (57), he sees himself as flawless:

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“The sting of life could do no more to hiscomplacent soul than the scratch of a pin tothe smooth face of a rock . . . . His self-satisfaction presented to me and to the world asurface as hard as granite” (58). Brierly’s“fixed standard of conduct” is as inadequate toaccount for the nuances of actual life as theromantic sea adventures that inform Jim’s viewof the world: “. . . he went to sea, andentering the regions so well known to hisimagination, found them strangely barren ofadventure” (10).

In order to manage the contradictions withinhis psyche, Brierly has disowned his shadowself, and can only experience these traits asqualities of others. As his mirroring Double,Jim is the catalyst that cracks Brierly’sarmour. Introjecting Jim’s fallibility as hisown, he can not reconcile the idea of himselfas imperfect with his Ideal self: “the matterwas no doubt of the gravest import, one ofthose trifles that awaken ideas – start intolife some thought with which a man unused tosuch a companionship finds it impossible tolive” (59).

Brierly’s dualistic, all-or-nothing view oflife can not accommodate his identificationwith Jim, and he goes from one extreme toanother – from seeing himself as infallible toseeing himself as irredeemably flawed. Hisgrandiosity sets the stage for him to identifythe flaws of the human race as personalfailings. Glimpsing, but unable to integrate,

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his shadow self, he is trapped on the ledge ofa precipice overlooking the unconscious, and hejumps, “committing his reality and his shamtogether to the keeping of the sea” (68).

The “sham” is the result of mistaking the mapfor the territory, of viewing qualities likestrength and weakness as mutually exclusive,and believing that will power alone caneliminate the shadow self. In one last attemptto deny the claim of the unconscious, Brierlydrowns in it: “There was a veil ofinexpressibly mean pathos over Brierly’sremembered figure, the posthumous revenge offate for that belief in his own splendour whichhad almost cheated his life of its legitimateterrors . . . . Who can tell what flatteringview he had induced himself to take of his ownsuicide” (64).

Brierly’s story suggests that believingexclusively in the ideal self may make lifemore manageable up to a point, until suchbelief cuts one off from one’s own life – thatdefences are necessary, but imperfectcompromises to make sense of oftencontradictory human experience. Eliseo Vivasrefers to this paradox in the following terms:“if Freud is right about the self, thestrategies we successfully employ to deceiveourselves are the highest evidence of oursuperiority over the brutes, and to top theirony, the basis of our distinctively humanachievement” (xxxiii). Marlow echoes this view:“Is not mankind itself, pushing on in its blind

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way, driven by a dream of its greatness and itspower upon the dark paths of excessive crueltyand of excessive devotion?” (Lord Jim 349).

Terry Eagleton states that Conrad “distrustsideals as the irrational reflexes of egoism andillusion” (134). However, as much as theBrierly episode in Lord Jim is a cautionary taleof ideals as absolutes, it would be a mistaketo understand the view of ideals in Lord Jim assimply convenient illusions. Viewing life as a balancing act that includesthe real and the ideal, the rational, as wellas the irrational, Conrad’s aim is “to be fairto all the phantoms in possession,” not to holdoppositional forces or ideas as mutuallyexclusive. Hence, as a counterpoint to thecritique of Brierly’s idealism, Lord Jim includesa satire of materialism, in Chester’s beliefthat a pile of dung is worth more than a man’shonour: “As to the inaccessible guano deposit,that was another story altogether. One couldintelligibly break one’s heart over that”(173). Moreover, rather than being a blanketindictment of idealism, there is sympathy forthe ideals of youth, as Marlow wonders whetherthe reader will grasp the nuances of thisposition:

Frankly, it is not my words that Imistrust but your minds. I could beeloquent were I not afraid you fellows hadstarved your imaginations to feed your bodies. . . .It is respectable to have no illusions –and safe – and

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profitable –and dull. You too, in your time,must have known the intensity of life,that light of glamour created in the shockof trifles, as amazing as the glow ofsparks struck from a cold stone – and asshort-lived, alas!

(225; emphases added)

In her essay “Conrad and ExploratoryScience,” Tiffany Tsao notes that “by and largeLord Jim has been read as Conrad’s condemnationof rational inquiry and the assumption that anytruth can be found in supposed ‘facts’” (47).Tsao goes on to question this assessment sincethe novel’s investigation of Jim is itself theresult of rigorous observation, of “Marlow’spainstaking gathering of information aboutJim.”

Tsao also shows that “Conrad’s work not onlyincorporates and manifests the scientificdiscoveries and notions of its era but alsocontains a critique of the scientificenterprise” (45). Conrad came to regardscientific principles, such as the “Laws ofNature” as subject to the same intellectualstagnation – self-reinforcing circularity – asany other a priori truths.

Conrad’s refusal to adopt a philosophy ofabsolutes, interpreted by some as irresolution,is another source for the perception of hiswork as vague. However, the see-saw effect ofjuxtaposing competing philosophies in Lord Jimhas the aim of counteracting the human tendencyto prefer a false conclusion to no conclusion,

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that habit of mind that “when any propositionhas once been laid down . . . forces everythingelse to add fresh support and confirmation; andalthough more cogent instances may exist to thecontrary . . . gets rid of and rejects them . .. rather than sacrifice the authority of itsfirst conclusions” (Bacon 20).

The strength of Conrad’s distrust ofabsolutes is suggested by his comment regardingfavouritism in the “Author’s Note.” In responseto whether Lord Jim was “the book of [his he]liked best,” he states: “I am a great foe tofavouritism in public life [and] in privatelife. As a matter of principle I shall have nofavourites” (xxxii). However, this rejection ofabsolutes does not mean there is no truth orthat everything is equally true. The idea thatrejecting absolutes necessarily results inindeterminacy is a circular argument – the kindof “either-or” ultimatum Conrad rejects. Ratherthan resulting in a relativistic limbo,Conrad’s rejection of absolutes is the basisfor a unified concept of the self.

In order to develop a dialectic of thedivided self in Lord Jim, Conrad adds the tertiumquid of Marlow to mediate the antitheticalinteractions between characters. As Marlowexplains:

all I could see was merely the human being. . . A confounded democratic quality ofvision . . . (94)

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It was a subtle and momentous quarrel asto the true essence of life. . . . I feltthe risk I ran of being circumvented,blinded . . . into taking a definite partin a dispute impossible of decision if onehad to be fair to all the phantoms inpossession – to the reputable that had itsclaims and to the disreputable that hadits exigencies . . . . I was made to lookat the convention that lurks in all truthand the essential sincerity of falsehood.

(93)

In his “Author’s Note,” Conrad acknowledgesthe unusual length of Marlow’s speech actcompared to typical quoted speech. It isnevertheless necessary to place his narrativein quotation marks, to locate him as aparticipant within the story, rather than anobjective narrator, in order to emphasize theexperiential nature of truth. An explanation ofevents by an omniscient narrator wouldobjectify Jim’s dilemma and reinforce thedualistic view that the problem is internalwhile the solution is external. Moreover, sucha narrator would demarcate a strict divisionbetween observer and observed, self and other,rather than emphasizing affinity, as Marlowdoes by repeating that Jim is “one of us.” For Jim, abandoning the Patna is a “leapinto moral darkness” (Sherry ix) and a leapinto the unconscious that is not bound by therules of honour and does not act as “an exampleof devotion to duty, and as unflinching as a

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hero in a book” (Lord Jim 3). But like Brierly,Jim is determined to keep his shadow self asfar from consciousness as possible. BecauseMarlow sees that Jim’s problem is internal, hepredicts that Jim will not be able escape hisinner demons even if he runs to the ends of theearth; and, later, even when Jim seems to be onan even keel, Marlow allows, “I ought to bedelighted . . . but I am not so pleased as Iwould have expected to be” (224). He doubtsthat Jim has really gotten out from under “thatmist in which he loomed . . . with floatingoutlines – a straggler yearning inconsolablyfor his humble place in the ranks” (225).

Unable to integrate his shadow self, Jim isdoomed to meet his Double in the “other,” inthe form of Gentleman Brown. As is often thecase in the first encounter between Doubles,the meeting of Jim and Brown seems both fatedand willed, welcomed and intrusive. As Marlowobserves their meeting:

There ran through the rough talk a veinof subtle reference to their common blood,an assumption of common experience; asickening suggestion of common guilt, ofsecret knowledge that was like a bond oftheir minds and of their hearts. (387)

To me the conversation of these two . . .appears now as the deadliest kind of duelon which Fate looked on with her cold-eyedknowledge of the end . . . These were theemissaries with whom the world he had

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renounced was pursuing him in hisretreat . . . from ‘out there’ where hedid not think himself good enough to live.

(385)

When [Brown] asked Jim, with a sort ofbrusque despairing frankness, whether hehimself – straight now – didn’t understandthat when ‘it came to saving one’s life inthe dark, one didn’t care who else went –three, thirty, three hundred people’ – itwas as if a demon had been whisperingadvice in his ear. ‘I made him wince,’boasted Brown to me.(386-87)

Brown has a kind of hypnotic control over Jim

because Jim has abdicated responsibility forhis shadow self, creating a blind spot thatBrown is able to manipulate by working “his wayas broad as a turnpike, to get in and shake[Jim’s] twopenny soul around and inside out andupside down . . .”(384). Accepting Brown’scondemnation as a confirmation of his own senseof inadequacy, he introjects Brown’s villainyas his own. In mediating Brown’s judgement ofJim, Marlow tells Jewel that Jim is “not goodenough,” but allows that “nobody is goodenough” (318) when measured against theabsolute Ideal.

The Secret Sharer

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While Lord Jim explores the problem of the dividedself, “The Secret Sharer” suggests a resolutionto it. Having elaborated the consequences ofdenying the shadow self in Lord Jim, Conradenvisions an alternative outcome to the meetingof Doubles. Like Jim, the narrator at thebeginning of “The Secret Sharer” is insecure,close to becoming unhinged; he certainly lacksthe confidence to command the ship. However, incontrast to most depictions of the Double,Conrad takes the imaginative leap of employingthe motif not only as the embodiment ofconflicts within the psyche, but also as thecatalyst for the creation of a new, unifiedidentity. The first-person narrative allowsConrad to encompass the contrapuntalinteractions of the Doubles as a completedialectic (conflict and resolution) within theprotagonist’s subjective consciousness.

“The Secret Sharer” and The Double stand atopposite ends of a continuum of types ofDoubles, distinguished by the extent to whichthe protagonist is able to recognize andintegrate the shadow self. Dostoevsky’s storyrepresents the commoner type that remainunintegrated, while the Doubles in Conrad’sstory arrive at a synthesis. Both stories beginwith a protagonist who is worried about how heis perceived by others. The captain fears hewill not be able to meet the responsibilitiesof his first command; he feels out of place, “astranger to the ship” and “a stranger tomyself,” afraid that he will “appear

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eccentric,” “queer,” or “downright drunk” (83,85, 97). The captain is more self-aware thanGoliadkin who becomes increasingly anxious andparanoid, as reflected in the following: “Ihave wicked enemies who have sworn to destroyme” (15).

At first, both Goliadkin and the captain arecomforted by their Doubles. The captaindescribes his Double as “perfectly self-controlled, more than calm – almostinvulnerable” (“Secret Sharer” 106) . . . .“The self-possession of that man had somehowinduced a corresponding state in myself” (87).Initially, Goliadkin also regards his Double asan ally: “because he not only was not afraid ofhis enemies, but was now even ready tochallenge them all to a most decisive battle”(69). He confidently tells his Double that“like two brothers we will be clevertogether. . . .We’ll conduct an intrigue tospite them” (70). But because Goliadkin isunable to integrate his shadow self, the splitwithin his psyche grows, and his Double joinshis enemies “in collusion with each other . . .supporting each other and setting each otheragainst me” (84). The Double ends, not insynthesis, but in annihilation of the ego, asGoliadkin, Jr ultimately usurps theprotagonist, illustrating Jung’s principle thatdenial of the shadow self tends to increase itspower. As “The Secret Sharer” develops, therelationship between the captain and Leggatt

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becomes increasingly sympathetic. These doublesare flexible, mutually supportive parts of awhole. Leggatt “is a catalyst for a moreefficient integration of both the captain’spersonality and his fitness to command”(Schwarz 106). The captain and Leggatt areinterdependent such that “the captain is asmuch Leggatt’s secret sharer as Leggatt is thecaptain’s” (106), and this reciprocity is keyto the development of the dialecticalrelationship. The captain is aware that whenthey are separated, a part of him is missing,and he is able to integrate both the positiveand negative qualities of himself that arerevealed “in the depths of a sombre and immensemirror” (“Secret Sharer” 88). While Leggatt isself-possessed, a strong soul, confident, andcalm, he has also killed a man. The captain isable to empathize with, rather than disown, hisDouble’s (and by implication, his own)transgressions and punishment: “I knew wellenough also that my Double there was nohomicidal ruffian. . . I saw it all as though Iwere myself inside that other sleeping suit” (88;emphasis added). “I had become so connected inthoughts and impressions with the secret sharerof my cabin that I felt as if I, personally,were being given to understand that I, too, wasnot the sort that would have done for the chiefmate of a ship like the Sephora” (101). Conrad accomplishes the synthesis of thedivided self in “The Secret Sharer” by allowingthe integrative potential of the Double to

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develop fully, by employing the motif toencompass both a split and a reconciliation ofthe psyche, ending with an image of the unifiedself: “Already the ship was drawing ahead and Iwas alone with her. Nothing! No one in theworld should stand now between us, throwing ashadow on the way of silent knowledge and muteaffection, the perfect communion of a seamanwith his first command” (“Secret Sharer” 119). Several critics have noted theapplicability of Coleridge’s distinctionbetween fancy and imagination to the variety ofDoubles found in literature (Keppler; Rogers).According to Coleridge’s definition, productsof fancy are combinations of discrete entitiesthat retain their autonomous character even inrelationship. Products of imagination, on theother hand, are fusions that bear littleresemblance to their unbonded state. In thissense, Dostoevsky’s Doubles are products offancy, as two halves of the protagonist’spersonality that are not integrated to form anew, conceptual whole. On the other hand,Leggatt and the captain are examples of animaginative fusion, whose interdependenceallows them to act upon and modify each other,resulting in integration.

One of the keys to understanding Conrad’sunusual synthesis of Doubles lies in theportrait of Leggatt. The critical debate aboutLeggatt’s corporeal reality is testimony toConrad’s skilful use of metaphor and symbol,for as is the case with the most effective

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figurative language, it is impossiblecompletely to separate the tenor and vehicleencompassed by Leggatt. Some passages suggestthat we should read him literally, while otherssuggest his meaning is more abstract. As thecaptain explains: “all the time the dualworking of my mind distracted me, almost to thepoint of insanity. I was constantly watching myself,my secret self, as dependent on my own actionsas my own personality . . . It was very much likebeing mad, only it was worse because one wasaware of it” (97-8; emphasis added). Leggatt is allowed to remain an ambiguousfigure in order to reflect the protagonist’sambivalence, and a sense of shifting boundariesbetween inner and outer reality, as the captainexplains: “Greatly bothered by an exasperatingknocking in my head, it was a relief todiscover that it was not in my head at all, buton the outside of the door” (96). It is thecaptain’s achievement that he is able to endurethe ambiguity of his circumstances, throughwhat Keats called negative capability, in order towrestle with and resolve the conflict. Theability to remain in “mysteries anduncertainties” is negative in the sense that anantithesis is necessary in order for a positivesynthesis to emerge. The ambiguity of Leggatt is key toConrad’s method of integrating the separateparts of the divided psyche. Rather than being“either/or,” Leggatt is both a projection ofthe captain’s psyche and a literal character;

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there is evidence to support both views. On theone hand, plot elements such as CaptainArchbold’s visit support a literal reading(Phelan 135); elsewhere the “supernatural”aspect of Leggatt’s being is emphasized when heis described as a “ghost ,” “witchcraft ,”“like being haunted,” and “risen from thebottom of the sea” (90, 109, 86). His “entranceis really a materialization,” and “one of thecharacteristic activities of the double in “TheSecret Sharer” is a spiritualist phenomenon:uncanny forms of communication” (Bock 107-08).Yet, just as we are encouraged to regardLeggatt as an apparition, the pendulum swingsand we are informed that Leggatt is morevolitional and decisive than the supposedlyflesh-and-blood captain who “projects ontoLeggatt the confidence he himself lacks”(Schwarz 106). Leggatt, “the apparition,” thenseems more “of-this-world” than the captain whoexplains that “Whoever was being drivendistracted, it was not he. He was sane”(“Secret Sharer” 110). This contrapuntal backand forth between the Doubles describes theprocess of psychic splitting and reintegration. Another key to understanding the wayConrad achieves the synthesized Doubles in “TheSecret Sharer” lies in what some consider theoverly schematic treatment of its theme. It hasbeen described as belaboured and obvious in theparallel descriptions of the Double figures andthe explicit references to the other, secretself (Karl 231). Furthermore, “The story risks

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offending . . . by making its secret too plain,its hero too aware of what is happening to him”(Zabel 24). “The relationship between Leggattand the captain is superficial and far tooheavily underscored” (Oates ix).

Alternatively, rather than being redundant,Conrad may have intended the repetition to readas a theme and counter-theme that resolve as incontrapuntal harmony. Rather than the sharplydualistic, ultimately separate juxtaposition ofDostoevsky’s Doubles, Leggatt and the captaininteract according to a studied counterpointthat intertwines in a composition that does notresemble its parts in isolation. In fact, theobviousness of the theme is an essentialreflection of the narrator’s self-awareness.Conrad emphasizes the captain’s acknowledgmentof his Double because it is this sustainedconsciousness that allows the story to end inredemption rather than the tragedy so common tostories of the divided self. While Jim’s goalis oblivion (Levin 216), the captain’s repeatedreferences to his Double indicate his “capacityto look consciously under the surface offamiliar emotions” (Lord Jim 222). While Jim’sdesire for unconsciousness dooms him to meethis Double in the ruinous Gentleman Brown, thecaptain’s acute awareness of the shadow selfleads to psychic integration and maturity.

By using the Double to encompass a completedialectic, Conrad conveys the resilience andplasticity of the psyche, and the convictionthat, as frightening as the unknown unconscious

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can be, it can also be lifesaving, as Steinsuggests in Lord Jim: “A man that is born fallsinto a dream like a man who falls into the sea.If he tries to climb out into the air asinexperienced people endeavour to do, he drowns– nicht war? . . . No! I tell you! The way is tothe destructive element submit yourself, andwith the exertions of your hands and feet inthe water, make the deep, deep sea keep you up”(214).

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Berthoud, Jacques. “Introduction.” ’Twixt Land and Sea:Tales, edited by J. A. Berthoud, Laura L. Davis,and S. W. Reid. Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 2008.

Bock, Martin. “The Power of Suggestion: Conrad,Professor Grasset, and French Medical Occultism.”Conradiana 39.2 (2007): 97-112.

Crews, Frederick C. Out of My System: Psychoanalysis,Ideology, and Literary Method. New York: OxfordUniversity Press, 1975.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Double and the Gambler,translated Richard Pevear and LarissaVolokhonsky. New York: Alfred Knopf, 2005.

Eagleton, Terry. Criticism and Ideology: A Study in MarxistLiterary Theory. London: Verso, 2006.

Emmett, Paul. “Conrad’s Secrets Shared.” Journal ofEvolutionary Psychology. 25.3-4 (2004): 154-69.

Empson, William. Seven Types of Ambiguity. New York: NewDirections, 1947.

Freud, Sigmund. The Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis.Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1965.

Guerard, Albert J. Stories of the Double. New York:Lippincott, 1967.

Holland, Norman. The Dynamics of Literary Response. NewYork: Norton, 1975.

Jung, Carl. “The Archetypes of the CollectiveUnconscious.” In Collected Works, Vol.IX. New York:Pantheon, 1953.

Karl, Frederick R. A Reader’s Guide to Joseph Conrad. NewYork: Noonday Press, 1960.

Keppler, Carl. The Literature of the Second Self. Tucson:University of Arizona Press, 1972.

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