The secret partner
The secret part-owner (English original title The Secret Sharer , alternative title The secret part-owner ) is a short story that was written in 1909 by Joseph Conrad and published in 1910.
The story is about a captain who hides a helmsman from another ship who has been arrested for murder there from his crew and helps him escape.
action
The action begins on a ship, which is lying in an estuary to the Gulf of Siam, waiting for a breeze sufficient for the journey home. The captain, who is new to the ship for unexplained reasons, takes over the watch the night before departure. During this watch he notices a swimmer named Leggatt, who introduces himself as the helmsman of the Sephora anchored nearby .
To explain his unexpected appearance, the latter tells that he strangled another sailor in an affect during a storm . For this reason, he reports, he has been arrested by the team. Thanks to an unlocked door, he finally managed to swim to a small island and finally to flee to the ship already mentioned. For unknown reasons, the captain finally hides Leggatt in his cabin from his own crew and the Sephora crew who are looking for him.
When the ship finally begins its voyage through the Gulf of Siam , they both work out a plan to drop Leggatt off the coast of Cambodia . For this purpose, the captain finally maneuvers his ship under the pretext of wanting to use the land wind very close to the coast of a Cambodian island. The moment the ship turns to move away from the island, Leggatt slides into the water to swim to the coast. The floppy hat that he loses in the end is used by the captain, who, in the opinion of his crew, has driven the ship too close to the coast, as a guide to successfully turning the ship around.
Narrative perspective
The entire story is told by the captain, whose name remains unknown. It is therefore a first- person narration and therefore a personal narrative situation .
Historical background
In his story, Conrad deals with an incident on the sailor Cutty Sark . Captain Wallace, who was only 27 years old, committed suicide on the ship in September 1880 for reasons unknown. It was believed that he had helped a seaman who had killed a black sailor to escape and thus saved him from a trial.
Expenses (selection)
- Stories II. The End of the Song - The Secret Partner - The Shadow Line . Edition Maritim, Hamburg 2006, ISBN 978-3892255543
- The Secret Sharer The Secret Sharer: An Episode from the Coast A Tale from the Coast . [Bilingual edition] Translated by Maria von Schweinitz. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1995. ISBN 978-3423093408