One of the first iterations of The Shadow Line presents a deviation from the original working title. According to the “Note On The Text” in the Oxford University Press edition of The Shadow-Line, in the year 1900 the concept of a novel that Joseph Conrad provided to David Meldrum of Blackwood’s publishing house was titled “First Command” in letters exchanged between the two men (Hawthorn, XXXIV). This title would later change to The Shadow Line once Conrad began working on the manuscript itself. In his letter to J.B Pinker, his literary agent, Conrad referred to the book by the title The Shadow-Line, chosen because it had a more “spiritual meaning” (Hawthorn, XXXIV).

1. Although the concept of the book originated in 1900 as First Command, it was World War 1 that would help shape The Shadow Line as we know it today. Discussing the influence of war, Cinelli says “the war was the event that triggered again Conrad’s interest in his first command after his son Borys went overseas to fight in 1915” (Cinelli, 96). The war was proving to be a rite of passage for many young soldiers overseas, having to make decisions that could affect the lives of those around them and under their command (Cinelli, 96).

Language used within the novel provides a close link to the war. Cinelli explains that “it is no accident that the novel is so rich in military expressions like “enemy,” “contest,” “to fight,” “to retire in disorder,” “to face,” “heroism,” “endless vigil in the face of the enemy,” etc” (Cinelli, 96). Had the story been written in 1900 when Conrad first brought it to Blackwood Publishing House’s attention, it could be argued that Conrad’s personal experiences would be the predominant force behind the story at least linguistically.

This shaping of fiction by a real world event provides an element of continuity among the different transformations that the story has endured. This moment in time that Conrad wrote about is something he dedicated to “Borys and all others who like himself have crossed in early youth the shadow-line of their generation” (Hawthorn, 2). Despite the need for typists and edited editions across the globe, the central theme remains the same.

1. The textual lifecycle of Conrad’s novella has experienced a vast array of changes. From the moment the draft was completed, Conrad set about revising “phrasing, stylistic polishing and the settling of punctation” (Stape & Simmons, 125). Beyond this, the differences between the First English edition and serialised edition are what Stape and Simmons refer to as Conrad’s “painstaking and extensive” edits (142). Revisions would also include replacements for words and phrases. Such examples include “couple of years ago for a few years ago” and “every fortnight was amended to every month” (Stape & Simmons, 143).

Alterations and new editions have remained a consistent presence in The Shadow Line’s lifespan. In 1921 The Shadow Line was included in Heinemann’s collected editions, along with the novella Within the Tides, and again in 1922 in Doubleday’s Sun Dial (Stape & Simmons, 150). In 1946-55 this set was reissued as Dent’s Collected Edition (Stape & Simmons, 150). The Heinemann collected edition fell out of circulation until in 1986 when Jacques Berthoud used the copy text for the Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics edition, and this edition was reissued again in 2001 (Stape & Simmons, 150-151).

These are just some of the means with which to engage with The Shadow Line, and despite these edits, alterations, editions, serialisations and revisions, the heart of the story remains consistent throughout, just as Conrad had said himself when he dedicated the novella to ““Borys and all others who like himself have crossed in early youth the shadow-line of their generation” (Hawthorn, 2).

The creation of The Shadow Line ran into problems during 1915 that reveal some of the physical and external limitations that plagued Conrad. It was during this period of time that World War 1 was raging and causing Conrad to feel as though literary art was more difficult (Stape & Simmons, 119). It is also during this time that Conrad, now a man of fifty seven, was plagued by arthritis and gout. By October of that year, Conrad’s gout rendered him unable to physically write, and it was his wife who reached out to Conrad’s literary agent Pinker for a typist for dictation of the rest of the story (Stape & Simmons 119-120). This is mentioned in the Notes on the Text of the Oxford Edition which includes text from a letter Conrad sent to John Quinn on the 24th of December that year. After explaining how many pages were written and how many were typed Conrad says “That was when I could not hold the pen and tried to get on dictating to an operator who came from town for 3 days” (Hawthorn, XXXV). Conrad himself was curious how different critics would read his book literarily given this split between handwriting it himself, then having someone type what he had said (Hawthorn, XXXV).

1. The Shadow Line was first published in The English Review in London between September 1916 and March 1917. This first serialisation was untouched, remaining in its original form for it’s more sophisticated audience (p. 116). It was then published in the Metropolitan Magazine in New York during the same time period. The differences between these two serialisations shows a distinct disparity in their perceived readership. Whilst the English review is quite similar to the original story, the copy published within the Metropolitan makes significant changes to the text itself.

Some examples of textual edits include lines such as “He was an unhappy, wizened little man, who if put into a jockey’s rig would have looked the part to perfection” & “with a mincing gait around the whole system of desks” (Oxford Edition, 7). This elimination of certain scene setting, or character building text harkens back to what Stape and Simmons discuss regarding the “adventure and uncanny aspects” (p. 116) that the magazine was trying to present to their audience.

This targeting of text towards their specific readerships could show how audiences across the globe were ultimately experiencing the novel in separate ways, and yet at the same time it could be argued that these different cultures still read the same story.

The alteration of the novel’s title would not be the first in the novel’s lifespan. When the book was published to and serialised in the Metropolitan Magazine, the title of the novel was simply, “The Shadow Line”. The subtitle “A Confession” was one of many aspects of the novel that was altered including much text within the story itself. This was done in an effort to “bring the story into line with the magazine’s preferred length, but also to highlight it’s ‘adventure’ and uncanny aspects” (Stape & Simmons, 116).