Chapter 11 Summary

Jim thanks Marlow for listening to him, and says that telling his story is cathartic. He had jumped but he insists that he meant not to save himself. Still, he is overcome with guilt and it for this reason, he says, that he must stay to face the consequences of the inquiry.

Chapter 11 Analysis

"There was not the thickness of a sheet of paper between the right and wrong of this affair." In saying this Jim illustrates that his actions are not quite as cut-and-dried, as black-and-white as they would first seem. As though the realization has dawned upon him that he did want to save his life (when up until now he had been quite insistent that he was prepared to die).

Had the boat sank, he would, by his own admission have grasped the first life-buoy to come along, but that...