Nostromo is a novel published by Joseph Conrad in 1904. While it certainly is not as well-known as Lord Jim or Heart of Darkness, it is often held in the highest esteem as the pinnacle of Conrad's long-form literary achievement. F. Scott Fitzgerald once famously wrote that if he could have authored any novel ever written by another writer, it would have been this work by Joseph Conrad. Interestingly, Fitzgerald did not identify Nostromo as the greatest or even second-greatest novel ever written.
On its surface, the story is simply a tale of buried treasure. The book spins the narrative of political corruption in the fictional South American nation of Costaguana, the theft of an enormously rich load of recently mined silver, and the effects of greed upon the soul. The unusual title of the novel derives from the nickname by which its central character, a charismatic Italian named Giovanni Battista Fidanza comes to be known. Fidanza and another man are secured to deliver the treasure trove of silver to a ship to be transported for safeguarding. A collision at sea results in their rushing to hide it from their political opponents on a deserted island.
While the title character heads back to Costaguana to play a part in the political instability, the man left behind on the island to guard the treasure eventually goes mad and shoots himself after weighing himself down with four bars of silver so he will sink to the bottom of the ocean. Nostromo's return trip to discover this tragedy creates the conflict upon which the novel is primarily centered as he must make a decision on how to handle the fact that all the silver he was entrusted with is now short and will immediately cast doubt on his honesty. Nostromo returns home amidst dreams of becoming a great political figure. When things do not work out according to his dreams, he becomes increasingly unfulfilled, and this sets the stage for the novel's exploration of the corrupting influence upon the mind and soul of a basically good individual.
At this point, it is important to remember what Fitzgerald wrote about the novel. He states explicitly that it is the novel he wishes he had written above all others while placing it beneath both Vanity Fairy and Madame Bovary in terms of greatness. What reconciles this seemingly impossible paradox of one author wishing he had written the book of another that he doesn't consider the greatest ever is that Fitzgerald is speaking not of the story so much as the storytelling. In terms of theme, Nostromo is really not much different from Heart of Darkness. The difference lies in the approach to telling the story of the corruption of the soul.
The author approaches the story of the fall from grace not via the singular vision of a character like Marlowe telling the story of Kurtz's fall in Heart of Darkness. The story is basically summed up in a single sentence: "A transgression, a crime, entering a man’s existence, eats it up like a malignant growth, consume it like a fever. Nostromo had lost his peace; the genuineness of all his qualities was destroyed." Such a summing up of the narrative could certainly lead to a thin volume lacking much depth or nuance.
Nostromo is admired above even Heart of Darkness by many readers, including Fitzgerald, because it is the telling of the story rather than that simple summing up which makes it, arguably, Conrad's finest achievement. Without the advantage of a single perspective through which all action is viewed and filtered, the narrative style of Nostromo is almost cinematic at times. The action is portrayed, and the emotions are noted, but Conrad ultimately leaves it up to each reader to determine whether the story should be viewed as a tragedy or not.
