SOURCE: "The Dual Morality in Conrad's The Secret Sharer," in Studies in Short Fiction, Vol. II, No. 3, Spring, 1965, pp. 209-20.

In the following essay, Simmons argues that the character of Leggatt represents an ideal of morality in the context of maritime discipline.

There is a notable chronological relationship between "The Secret Sharer" and Under Western Eyes. The story was written when the novel was nearing completion—and when Conrad was in that state of desperation to which he was commonly reduced by the strain of a long imaginative task. "There's neither inspiration nor hope in my work," we have seen him write to Norman Douglas about the novel in December 1909. "The Secret Sharer" was written in the previous month. With whatever degree of conscious intention, he had found relief from the theme of betrayal by turning aside to the story of a man who, appealed to in a...