William Freedman

Conrad's "Woman as Truth" Topos: "Supposing Truth Is a Woman — What Then?"

The topos of the dangerous woman in many of Conrad’s narratives is more than an emblem of authorial gynophobia — it stands for the danger of truth or knowledge, typically for the protectively hidden truths of the instinctual, uncontrollable, or savage self whose trampling of self possession is tantamount to death. Is Conrad’s presentation of woman as the alluring and intimidating object of knowledge to be construed literally or metaphorically? I believe that the two options are compatible and belong to the tradition in which woman, like truth itself, holds special claim as the fascinating object of male desire, forbidden, and inscrutable — this last largely as a defense against the danger of what so irresistibly draws men. The ambivalent attitude toward hidden truth in Conrad’s fiction typically derives from its association with woman as both carnal reality and the symbolic incarnation of forbidden knowledge.