Conrad’s World

Abstract

Conrad spent his first sixteen years in Poland, from his birth on 3 December 1857 until his departure for Marseilles on 15 October 1874, with two substantial interruptions: the period of his father’s exile in Russia (May 1862–January 1868, with visits to his uncle Tadeusz during this time), and the months he spent in Switzerland in 1873. Since the late eighteenth century, Poland had been partitioned between Austrla, Prussia and Russia. Conrad was born in Russian-occupied Poland, at Berdyczów, south-west of Kiev and about 110 miles north of the Derebczynka estate, which was leased and farmed by his father. (Baines, Karl and others have given his birthplace as Derebczynka Manor, but Najder (p. 10) has shown that this is incorrect.) During the boy’s second year, his family moved to Zhitomir, a little to the north-east, and then two years later to Warsaw, in the region occupied by Austria. When his father was allowed to return to Poland from exile at the beginning of 1868, the widower and his young son settled in Lvov (Lemberg) in Galicia, not far from Conrad’s birthplace; and after his father’s death in the following year the boy continued to live in Austrian-occupied Poland and received some education at schools in Lvov and Cracow.