The Structure of Sympathy: Conrad and the Chance that Wasn't

175 THE STRUCTURE OF SYMPATHY: CONRAD AND THE CHANCE THAT WASN'T Ey Gary Geddes (University of Toronto) Chance is a uniquely successful part of the Conrad canon, but a part which has been seriously misunderstood. Few readers of the novel have failed to notice Its technical virtuosity. In 1936, Edward Crankshaw called Chance "that rare thing, a work of fine spiritual significance and a technical tour de force."! More recently, Albert Guerard has compared the narrative structure of Chance with that of Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!; and Jerome Zuckerman, expanding a point made by Crankshaw, claims that Chance's "merit lies. . .in its architecture, its juxtaposition of two counterpolnted plots."2 Behind this general recognition of the technical complexities of Chance, however, lurks an equally general suspicion that somehow Conrad struck out, that his elaborate machinery simply does not work. Douglas Hewitt, for example, found Chance "oversimplified and falsely romantic," a "decline In his art," a "retreat from the degree of awareness of the complexity of human emotions."3 Leo Gurko concludes that "Chance is a bit short on depth and substance. Its narrative machinery is too large for the story."^ In one of the most recent studies of Conrad, Edward Said manages to fuse both the generous and the sceptical views of Chance, insisting rather niggardly that this Is the "most arid and technical of Conrad's works."5 Fortunately, Conrad was in less doubt than his critics concerning the uniqueness of his achievement in Chance. As he suggested in a letter to his agent J.B. Flnker: "It is the biggest piece of work I've done since Lord Jim. As to what it_ JLs I am very confident. As to what will happen to It when launched - I am much less confident. And It's a pity. One doesn't do a trick like that twice - and I'm not growing younger - alas! It will vanish in the ruck."6 In making this assertion Conrad has not forgotten his epic struggle with Nostromo; he Is simply aware of having faced very different technical difficulties in Chance. Writing to Alfred Knopf, then a representative of Doubleday, Conrad recommended Chance: "I recommend to you that book very specially for, of Its kind. It isn't a thing that one does twice in a lifetime" Tth, II, 149). It would be a mistake to assume that this "trick", this "thing" which can be done just once, refers only to the narrative machinery in Chance. Conrad was not Interested in experiment for experiment's sake; furthermore, he had already experimented with various forms of multiple narration. His alms In Chance do not rest with technique but with the "perfect blending of form and substance."' As he explains In the Author's Note to the novel: "My intention was to interest people in my vision of things which is indlssolubly allied to the style in which It is expressed" (p. x). 176 Conrad's "vision of things" in Chance may best be understood by examining the major structural characteristics of the novel the character relations and the narrative point of view. When Conrad advised Norman Douglas to try writing a "novel of analysis on the basis of some strong situation" (LL, II, 68), he was describing his own fictional technique, etpecially in novels such as Lord Jim. Under Western Eyes, and Chance. The "strong situation" around which Chance is constructed is Flora's experience with her governess. This austere Medusa-like creature, Marlow informs us, is no normal woman but one with "ungovernable passions; yet suppressed by the very same means which keep the rest of us in order: early training - necessity - circumstances - fear of consequences; till finally there comes an age, a time when the restraint of years becomes intolerable - and infatuation irresistible" (p. 103). Encroaching age and financial expectations crushed by the collapse of de Barrai, provoke the governess to lash out at Flora from the depths of anguish and despair. Ironically, Flora had considered her the embodiment of wisdom and authority and security, so that when the governess appeared before her "like an emanation of evil" (p. 117)ι she "set free in Flora that faculty of unreasoning terror...