The core argument of this dissertation is operating on
two levels. Onone level, this study, as a sympathetic critique
of Edward Said''s Orientalism,suggests the need to point to the
complexities and ambivalence of colonialdiscourse. On the
other level, it is a modest attempt to historicize thelate
19th-century exoticism and investigate the extent to which it
interactswith or negotiates forms of discourse with
recourse to Joseph Conrad''s"East" novels. This dissertation
argues that Conrad''s "East" novels aremediated by late
imperialism, but they are simultaneously a symptomatic indexof
narrative interventions between personal nostalgia for the
heroic past andthe present crises of the Empire. Chpater One
examines the previous Conradianscholarship and anayzes the
"theories" I propose to frame my reading ofConrad''s East
fiction. In positing Conrad''s "East" as a cultural signifier,
Icontend that Conrad''s fiction is crucial for colonial
cultural studies, andthat the "East" in his fiction is never a
true reflection of the 19th-centuryMalay Archipelago, or a mere
discursive medium to sustain the colonialistvision of the
day, as Said might argue. To qualify Saidian Orientalism,
Isuggest that Foucault''s concept of discourse, when juxtaposed
and qualifiedwith notions drawn from postcolonial criticism,
offers itself as a helpfultoolbox to read the Eastern world
in Conrad. Chapter Two spells out thehistorical specificity
of late imperialism in which Conrad''s writing careerdevelops.
With the focus of attention on the imperial exoticism that
shapesConrad''s fiction,I map out the particular discourse of
late imperialism,locatethe extent to which the exotic Other is
brought into question at the time, andtake into account the
discursive formation of the East in Conrad''s fiction.This
study deals mainly with four of Conrad''s novels set in the
imaginedcommunity of the Malay Archipelago--Almayer''s Folly,An
Outcast of the Islands,Lord Jim, and The Rescue. To situate
these novels at the discursive levels,Chapter Three addresses
the complex interaction between late imperialismand such
discourses as gender, race, and sexuality, and explores the
extent towhich these issues are brought into fore in Almayer''s
Folly and An Outcast. Bymarking his white male adventurers as
pathological heroes, I suggest, Conraddescribes the imperial
venture of the day with dismay, and highlights
thecontradictions and impasses in the exercise of colonial
power. Chapter Fourdemonstrates that the rhetorical category of
the East in Conrad''s novels showsan obsession with a heroic past
and its discontent toward the globalizationof imperialism. As
an exemplary form of adventure fiction, Conrad''s exoticnovels,
in the case of Lord Jim and The Rescue, sustain the colonialist
vision,but they also sensitive indicators of the anxieties of
the Empire. The finalchapter suggests that reading Joseph
Conrad in the late 20th century helps putthe term "postcolonial"
into perspective.The remembering practices that engageboth
Conrad and postcolonial critics are more than acts of
nostalgia for thebygone colonialism. Conrad''s "East" fiction
expresses ambivalence and anxietyover the crisis of late
imperialism; whereas postcolonial criticism isdistinguished
by its critical engagement with the problem of colonialism
andits aftermath. Their practices demonstrate the significance
of the question ofre-writing the past.Re-reading Conrad today,
then, does not mean relieving theburden of the past. Rather, re-
reading Conrad obliges us to understand thatmore historically
differentiated theories and reading strategies are required.