Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1991. British and American Philologycal Studies (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 20)

Katalin Grezsu: Psychological Implications in Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim

35 Water, which, as I have already mentioned, is present everywhere, is in its original sense a life-giving element. In its other meaning, that is in the meaning of baptizmal water, it should purify and make the person a member of a larger community. But in Conrad's novel the function of water is just the opposite. It brings neither birth, nor rebirth for Jim, but rather if only later, death. Water does not function as life-giver, but as an executioner. It does not make Jim become a member of the society, on the contrary it isolates him. Every description of the sea-storm is menacing, foreshadowing the coming tragedy. This incident brought a very strange kind of re-birth for Jim. Conrad actually describes the way Jim physically enters his new existence. This description resembles our birth: ' He told me it was like being swept by a flood through a cavern

... for two or three minutes the end of the world had come through in a deluge in a pitchy blackness.' * ^ AU in all Jim gets through this confrontation with nature with a totally new personality which later turns into moral and spiritual isolation. Jim is aware of the fact that his life in a way has come to an end. His life continues from this time on on a different level. As he puts it: 'I seemed to l>elieve it. Everything was gone and - all was over

...' he. fetched a deep sigh

.... 'with me.' He flees from port to port pursued by bis own responsibility. He wears the stigma of his earlier sin, almost like the heroine of The Scarlet tetter, but Jim's sin is burnt deep into his soul. Stein, who wants to help Jim recover from his self-punishment, offers a very strange solution to the problem of "how to be". Stein suggests, as 'it is not good for you to find you cannot make your dream come true, for the reason that you not strong enough are, or not clever enough ... in the destructive element immerse. For Stein the only way out is living according to the ideal, that is the dream, which is on the other hand the destructive element. Stein takes his simile from the sea: 'A man that is born falls into a dream like a man who falls into the sea. If he tries to climb out into the air as inexperienced people endeavour to do. he drowns - nicht war? ... No! I tell you! The way is to the destructive element submit yourself, and with the exertions of your hands and feet in the water make the deep, deep sea keep you up. So if you ask me - how to be?... In the destructive element immerse.'^

1