Conrad, Joseph

a series of letters written with blazing intensity to one of his closest friends, urging him to propose to the woman he loves and then congratulating both him and his fiancée on their engagement, with one earlier letter on his plans for the publication of An Outcast of the Islands (“…F[isher] U[nwin] wants to get the book accepted for a serial by some magazine or newspaper. I hate the idea but have given in to his arguments … My opinion is he shall not be able to place it…”) and his investment in a South African mining venture, a later letter commenting on his parting with Unwin and future publication plans (“…I can see a long, hard fight before me, with no certitude of victory. I am rather weary and not as restful as I ought to be – considering my many virtues…”), and the receipt of a letter from Poland (“…like voices from some other world seen a long time ago in another existence…”), together with one much later incomplete letter, 42 pages, 8vo, one with autograph envelope, 17 Gillingham Street, London, and Stanford-le-Hope, Essex, 14 August 1895 to 14 November 1896, the first letter seemingly lacking final leaf and with punch holes and adhesive stain, fold tears, one later letter lacking portion of text and signature

[with:] Three autograph letters signed by Sanderson to Helen Watson, and four autograph letters signed by Watson to Sanderson, letters of a cautiously blossoming courtship, including her comments on The Outcast of the Islands (“…Mr Conrad has a curious power of expressing feelings one has had & did not know of till one read his book...”) and Almayer's Folly, and his defence of Conrad and his works (“…Conrad’s is one of the noblest, most unselfish refined natures that I have ever met. I think I told you of the hard life which he has had to lead. Throughout it all, his Ideals have never been lowered…”), 33 pages, 13 September to 1 October 1896

Collected Letters, IX, pp.35-41, 255-59

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“…But the truth of life is – I hold – that we get just exactly the happiness we deserve; and our deserts are (alas!) measured by a more impartial standard than that set up by your affection, to judge by the motives and acts of those you love…”

These striking letters are among the most intimate, unguarded, and personal letters written by Conrad. Edward Lancelot Sanderson (1867-1939) met Conrad in 1893 when he was John Galsworthy's travelling companion to the South Pacific and returned to Europe on the Torrens, on which Conrad was serving as first officer. A lifelong friendship ensued between these two very different men. Sanderson was a committed Anglican from a large and comfortably middle class family in Middlesex who, having read Classics at Cambridge, was working as a teacher at his family's Preparatory School in Elstree, Middlesex. In the months and years that followed their meeting, Sanderson encouraged Conrad to complete Almayer's Folly and helped to prepare the book for publication, whilst his family made Conrad welcome in their home on many occasions. This was a period when Conrad was particularly rootless and isolated, struggling financially as he tried to establish himself as a writer, and he was profoundly appreciative of the easy friendship offered by the Sanderson family. Conrad did not, of course, share Sanderson's deep religious faith, and it is fascinating to observe how his religious scepticism lies just submerged in these letters, with their cautious but sympathetic treatment of Christian faith.

Love and marriage are at the heart of this sequence of letters, four of which date from October to November 1896. Conrad had recently married (his comment in the earliest letter in the series, from August 1895, that his "life has been so strangely full lately" was probably a veiled reference to his courtship) and Sanderson had fallen in love with a young Scottish woman, Helen Mary Watson. The first letter was written when Sanderson was about to set off to Dumfries and Galloway with tentative plans to propose marriage, and in it Conrad encourages his friend to overcome his reservations:

"...I do not wish to argue you away from conscientious scruples – to combat hesitations that are caused not by unworthy and selfish considerations but by a serious sense of duty. Yet I, standing a little way off have the presumption to think that I see things in a more true perspective... Have you the right to let the chance of happiness for both of you go by?... You must judge. I only wish to point out that in the most high-minded impulses there may lurk error and disaster, for our mind has been given us for good and all, for our perdition or our salvation. But through our hearts, if they are reverent and humble, the Supreme Master of our lives sends inspiration upon the earth…”

This letter is followed by an equally remarkable expression of joy at the news of Sanderson's engagement, an outburst of feeling that surely owed much to his powerful memories of the consolation that the Sanderson family had provided to him, as well as his own recent marriage. Not only did Conrad send his friend blessings (“...May you in your Faith sustain and console, and never ask for consolation in vain...”), but he also wrote a letter of congratulation to Helen Watson that makes clear his deep affection for Sanderson (“…He will give into your keeping his longings, his ambitions; the passing dreams of the moment and the guiding principle of his life. And to you also will be disclosed his weaknesses, his hesitations, his falterings, his doubts – and they will make him only the more precious to you…”). Even these letters of love and affection do, however, contain passages of more characteristic Conradian intensity:

“…Tell Her that men are very impenetrable – not because they wish to be so, but because such is their fate. On earth we are orphan souls, wandering lonely, each with its own intolerable burden, under the compassionate eyes of our Father in Heaven. In forgiveness and love is consolation and fleeting ease, till the time of final relief. We can make nothing clear – we can only ask for help even while we cannot disclose our danger. If you groan under a great burden you ought to be the more precious for Her…”

The current letters were withheld by the family when the bulk of Conrad's letters to Sanderson (73 letters) were sold in these rooms shortly after the death of Helen Sanderson (10 December 1968, lot 742, now at Yale), as they were considered too personal to be made public.