Secret Sharer

1
Secret Sharer

• By Joseph Conrad

2
Content

• Flow chart pages 3-4
• The main Character pages 5-6
• Characters pages. 7-8
• Literary Devices pages. 9-12
• Joseph Conrad page. 13

3
Flow Chart
The story begins with a short description of a
ship. The main character in the story is the
Captain of the ship.
One night he meets a man who comes out from the
water. The man asks him for help, because he
murdered somebody from another ship, Sephora. The
Captain lets him stay for a couple of days in his
cabin, without anyone knowing of his existence.

4
Flow Chart
What follows is a strange existance based on
secrecy and similarities between strangers.
On a desolate island the stranger from the sea
begs the captian to let him off.
The ship sets sail for its destination.
The captain does so, getting dangerously close to
the coast.
The stranger departs, and the captian sets off to
do his job as a captain again.
5
The Main Character

• He is the Captain of the ship.
• He has dark hair
• He is young and experienced captain.
• He smokes cigars.
• He is nice to the people he is with, here is a
  quote,

6
Main Character

• He is nice to the people he is with, here is a
  quote, The man in the water began suddenly to
  climb
• up the ladder, and I hastened away from the
• rail to fetch some clothes.
• In this quote the Captain has been kind to
  lend some clothes to a stranger from the sea.
• The Captain dose not really like Leggatt ( the
  man from the water), but he is still very kind to
  him, Leggatt murdered
• a man and escaped from a ship called Sephora.
  Here is a quote,
• He was one of those creatures that are just
  simmering all
  the time with a silly sort of wickedness.
• Miserable devils that have no business to live
  at all.
• In this example the Captain says what he thinks
  about Leggatt or people that do criminal things.
  

7
Antagonists

• Leggatt - The murderer from the Sephora who
  escapes to the Narrators ship and is harbored by
  the Narrator allowing him to learn much about
  himself.
• Archbold - The captain of the Sephora who comes
  aboard the narrators ship in search of Leggatt
  while providing a contrast to the new,
  inexperienced Narrator.
• Chief Mate - An old experienced sailor who looks
  down towards the new captain because of his
  inexperience.

8
Minor Characters

• Second Mate - The only sailor on the ship younger
  than the caption yet also looks down at the
  captain.
• Achbolds Wife - The wife of the captain of the
  Sephora who lives on the Sephora against common
  conventi

9
Literary Devices

• In this story what is clearly noticeable from the
  first is the dense descriptive language of the
  author. With the use of emotive language,
  similes, metaphors, adjectives and adverbs the
  author conveys a detailed, dense picture to the
  reader.

To best describe the way in which the author
writes I have decided to concentrate on the first
few pages of the story, although his style
continues in much the same way throughout the
rest of the story, it is simple to see the
different uses of literary devices in the dense
first few pages.
10
Simile

• Joseph Conrads use of simile is not as frequent
  as might be expected, given the dense description
  in his work. He uses similes to illustrate a
  piece of a picture as it were. For example, in
  pages 12 and 13, there are two noticeable similes

• Here and there gleams as of a few scattered
  pieces of silver marked the windings of the great
  river. (lines 2-4 of page 12)

2) while I lingered yet, my hand resting
lightly on my ships rail as if on the shoulder of
a trusted friend (line 35,page 12 to line 2,page
13)
Both these quotes create an acute image from the
story, by using his similes with care, and
choosing powerful images to make his picture,
Joseph Conrad is able to accentuate his story
with clear, poignant views of the story.
11
Metaphor

• Conrads use of metaphor in the story is much
  more common than his use of simile, but more
  obscure, so that sometimes you cant tell whether
  or not he is actually using metaphor. An example
  of Conrads use of metaphor is the following

• The tide of darkness flowed on swiftly, and
  with tropical suddenness a swarm of stars came
  out above the shadowy earth,

In the above quote there are in fact two clear
uses of metaphor in the first example Conrad is
comparing the oncoming darkness to the sea. Just
as the tide comes and goes, so does the darkness,
bringing with it absolute coverage, just as the
tide does when it covers the beach.
The second example of metaphor compares the stars
to a swarm of insects, in my mind bees. Just as a
swarm of bees appear suddenly, in a big group so
do the stars, just as the bees are small and
bright, so appear the stars.
As you can see from this quote, Conrad uses
metaphor to help give a clear, quick picture of
something he wants to describe with detail.
12
Adjectives
In The Secret Sharer Conrad uses adjectives
frequently. A sentence which clearly shows the
way in which he uses these types of words is the
following
I saw the straight line of the flat shore
joined to the stable sea, edge to edge, with a
perfect and unmarked closeness, in one levelled
floor half brown, half blue under the enormous
dome of the sky.
As you can see, Conrad uses adjectives
frequently. Prehaps this is because he wishes to
create a very detailed picture, where nothing is
just something, but everything is something
special.
Joseph Conrads use of Literary devices throughout
the story is constantly dense. His use of them
creates a dense, detailed picture, so much so
that sometimes it is hard to hold all the images
in ones mind.
13
Joseph Conrad

• Joseph was born in 1857
• 1894 was a landmark year for Conrad his first
  novel was published.
• Joseph Conrad grew up in the Polish Ukraine, a
  large, fertile plain between Poland and Russia.
• He met Jessie by the autumn of 1895. He married
  her in March of 1896.
• He went America, where he remained until a heart
  attack took him in 1924, at the age of
  sixty-seven.
• Conrad's father, Apollo Korzeniowski. He died by
  tuberculosis in 1869. Conrad's mother, Eva
  Bobrowska, was thirteen years younger than
  Apollo. Eva gradually developed tuberculosis, and
  died in 1865