Comparing the Orpheus Myth and Conrads The Secret Sharer :: Comparison Compare Contrast Essays

Parallels in the Orpheus Myth and Conrads The hidden Sh arer The myth of Orpheus and his farm animal into the underworld is paralleled in Joseph Conrads The Secret Sharer, revealing a common theme, the narrators self-importance-fulfillment through the conclusion of his symbolic and inward necessitate. This parallel, which may be called archetypal, serves to improver the readers sense of identification with Conrads narrator, and it lends an otherworldly tone to the work as a whole. Likewise, these echoes of Orphic material lead the reader through three stages. These are a modern and secular rendition of the descent into the unknown, followed by a symbolic rebirth or rejoining of the fractured portions of the complete self, and finally the parting with the preliminary self that ostensibly existed in the initial state. The reader finds an initial parallel amongst the myth and story through Conrads sea, as compared to Orpheus underworld, along with the surface of the quest motif. T he ship in The Secret Share is described as at the starting point of a long journey (Conrad 273), and as universe very still in an immense stillness.... where nothing moved, and nothing lived (273). I read the stillness of the sea and the absence of life is an allusion to the stillness of end, which is the soil Orpheus takes his journey to, before turning homeward. Moreover, the stars are described in this source scene, but do not reappear in the story until later on the departure of the secret sharer the narrators Euridice or hidden self (this hidden self aspect closely reflects the double nature of the sharer as well). Between these two appearances of the stars, which could solo visible in an overworld, the ship and its crew as consumed by the feed of darkness (273) that encompasses the vessel, much as Orpheus leaves behind the stars when he descends into the realm of death in Hades. On a symbolic level, both the Orpheus myth and The Secret Sharer use the journey as a rite of passage, or a rebirth into a greater state of self-knowledge. Orpheus comes to know the humans of death and the limitations of his powers, while Conrads narrator makes a transition from being a stranger to the ship..., untried as yet by a coif of the fullest responsibility (273) such that the comfort of quiet communion... was gone for good (273), to the undefiled communion of a sea with his first command (113 italics mine).