'The Islands are Very Quiet':Space and Silence in Conrad's Victory Sarah Dauncey (bio) Conrad's novels' commitment to exploring the expressive and philosophical potential of silence has provoked a great deal of controversy. In particular, the role silence plays in producing metaphysical landscapes for the narratives' events has been subject to scrutiny.1 This singular use of silence can be interpreted in contrary ways, either positively as a sign of authentic experience residing outside of an imperialist worldview or negatively as a product of a Eurocentric perspective which is unable to credit indigenous peoples with voice and agency. Less uncertainty, however, surrounds the meanings of the mute geographies in Heart of Darkness, Lord Jim, and Nostromo. In these novels, the protagonists' experience of silent landscapes contributes to their epistemological and existential crises. Famously, both Charlie Marlow's senses and his powers of cognition are thrown into disarray by the silence of the alien space he encounters in Heart of Darkness. The intractability of Africa—its landscape, cultures, and language—is figured in aural terms. More dramatically, Nostromo spatializes and concretizes silence to such an extent that Martin Decoud is described looking at the silence of the Golfo Placido "like a still cord stretched to breaking point, with his life [. . .] suspended to it like a weight" (499). His experience of this specifically mute metaphysical geography precipitates his mental collapse—it is active in dismantling his individuated sense of self. In Conrad's later novel, Victory, published in 1915, this narrative project is continued as the island of Samburan, in the Malay archipelago, is identified with silence: [End Page 141] The islands are very quiet. One sees them lying about, clothed in their dark garments of leaves, in a great hush of silver and azure, where the sea without murmurs meets the sky in a ring of magic stillness. A sort of smiling somnolence broods over them; the very voices of their people are soft and subdued, as if afraid to break some protecting spell. (74) Yet, to-date, this treatment of silence has escaped rigorous critical analysis. I want to redress this omission by scrutinizing the transactions between space and silence in the novel. Victory self-consciously investigates the construction of mythical worlds and peoples and, consequently, can be seen to mark a departure from Conrad's earlier work which attributes immutable properties to colonial worlds and views indigenous peoples as inert and unconscious.2 The Western characters' and narrators' imperialist perspectives are highly fallible and thus the representation of Samburan, such as that given in the above passage, should be viewed as both ironic and strategic. The prominence of rebellious, underground activities further reinforces the need to re-examine the figuration of the Alfuros and their island as mystically silent. Those who appear taciturn and passive are often deeply committed to a course of action that challenges those representing masculine imperialist culture. Hence, the description of the Alfuros as somnolent with "soft and subdued" voices is to be treated with suspicion (Victory 74). If nothing else, Wang's rebellion provides a dramatic example of the way that silence can belie ambitious and subversive thinking. Victory's opening account of the "liquidation" of the Tropical Belt Coal Company initiates its forceful critique of imperialism and its endeavor to conceal its profit motive behind its civilizing mission (5). Axel Heyst's talk of making a great "stride forward" follows the description of the company's failure and is thus derided, along with his ambition to introduce capitalism into the east (Victory 6). By the time we finally get to the present moment of the narrative events, Samburan has long since ceased to produce coal. An observer of the former headquarters, the narrator states, "could have noted the decaying bones of that once sanguine enterprise" (Victory 193). The island merely bears the traces of Heyst's venture: the coal mines, the administration and accommodation buildings, and one single remaining (imported) Chinese worker, Wang. Yet, these "traces" of capitalism cannot simply be read as a sign of its withdrawal from the island. For, crucially, Wang adopts colonialist principles and wields the logic of imperial-capitalism against the colonizer, Heyst, to secure his...
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Nov 15, 2021
Laura Day 
