AN OUTPOST OF PROGRESS by JOSEPH CONRAD
1001 Classic Short Stories & Tales
Jon Hagadorn
4.5 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 25 August 2019
⏱️ 71 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The story AN OUTPOST OF P[ROGRESS deals with two European men, named Kayerts and Carlier, who are assigned to a trading post in a remote part of the African Jungle. There they take part in ivory trading, hoping to financially benefit the company as well as themselves. With no specific tasks or important things to be done, they both become increasingly isolated and demoralized as time goes by. At one point in the story, the native Makola, serving as Kayerts's and Carlier's bookkeeper, initiates an exchange of slaves for ivory. Initially Kayerts and Carlier are stunned and scandalized by the idea, yet eventually they accept the deal and aid Makola for his huge profit. Both men are plagued by disease and grow very weak physically towards the end of the story. Finally, a seemingly trivial matter – sugar – sparks an irrational, uncontrolled and violent conflict between them, and ends tragically. Symbolocally- their plight in this story reflects that of the downfall of British colonialism- and that's what makes this story so powerful. STORIES BY JOSEPH CONRAD JOSEPH CONRAD PODCAST
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | And the Yeah, Welcome to 1001 Classic Short Stories and Tales |
| 0:34.0 | Today's Story An Outpost of Progress |
| 0:36.8 | by Joseph Conrad. |
| 0:39.5 | Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English writer who was regarded as one of the greatest |
| 0:44.2 | novelists to write in the English language. Though he did not speak English |
| 0:48.6 | fluently until his 20s, he was a master prose stylist who brought a non-English sensibility into English literature. |
| 0:57.0 | Conrad wrote stories and novels, many with a nautical setting that depict trials of the human |
| 1:02.0 | spirit in the midst of what he saw as an |
| 1:04.7 | impassive inscrutable universe. Conrad served in the French and British |
| 1:09.7 | navies and leaned heavily upon his experiences on the sea and in Africa. |
| 1:14.0 | His stories often reflected the brutal realism of European colonialism |
| 1:18.7 | during the height of exploration to Africa |
| 1:21.1 | and an outpost of progress Conrad's personal favorite is a prime example. |
| 1:27.0 | The story and outpost of progress deals with two European men named Cayerts and Carlier who are assigned to a trading post in a remote part of the African jungle. |
| 1:39.0 | Symbolically, their plight in this story reflects that of the downfall of British colonialism |
| 1:44.8 | and that's what makes this story so powerful. |
| 1:48.4 | And now an outpost of progress by Joseph Conrad. |
| 1:56.4 | There were two white men in charge of the trading station. |
| 1:59.6 | Cayerts, the chief, was short and fat. |
| 2:09.3 | Carlier, the assistant, was tall, with a large head and a very broad trunk perched upon a long pair of thin legs. |
| 2:17.0 | The third man on the staff was a Sierra Leone native who maintained that his name was Henry Price. However, for some reason or other, the natives down the river had given him the name of Macola and had stuck to him through all his |
| 2:24.3 | wanderings about the country. |
... |
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