Though others have published reminiscences of Joseph Conrad, these accounts have frequently contained inaccuracies, sometimes even simple fabrications. It is partly in an attempt to set the record straight that John Conrad, the novelist's only surviving son, has committed these memoirs to print. Mr Conrad has not tried to import into the book the biographical interpretations or speculations of others, but rather to recall and set down as honestly and directly as possible what he remembers from around 1909 to the point of his father's death in 1924. Through his vivid and detailed account of the day-to-day existence in the various houses the family inhabited during this period, Mr Conrad is able both to throw light on many aspects of his father's life and to invoke the sense of an era of English social life which has now disappeared. His memoirs are informal, often anecdotal, recording what amused, irritated or moved his father.
