Conrad, Konrad, and the Uses of the Sea 

Photo by Ant Rozetsky

“The sea has never been friendly to man. At most it has been the accomplice of human restlessness.” So wrote Joseph Conrad in The Mirror of the Sea, meditating on that uneasy alliance between human ambition and the indifferent deep.

And elsewhere, more darkly still: “The conquest of the earth… is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much” (Heart of Darkness).

As it happens, another seafaring Conrad—or Konrad—has something else to say on this. 

Captain John Konrad...