Appearances
The novel’s thematic obsession with reality and illusion and the chasm of deception existing between them as a blurred mirage is situated in the first important use of metaphorical language in the book. On the opening page, the narrator brings the concept of appearances into question:
“To a teacher of languages there comes a time when the world is but a place of many words and man appears a mere talking animal not much more wonderful than a parrot.”
Who Is Razumov?
One of the key questions the novel raises is who is Razumov? In the sense of what is Razumov? What is he true being, his inner sense and sensibility? What drives him and what is he all about. One answer is provided by the narrator, though couched in the enigma of metaphor:
“The true Razumov had his being in the willed, in the determined future—in that future menaced by the lawlessness of autocracy—for autocracy knows no law—and the lawlessness of revolution.”
Character Description
One of Conrad’s most powerfully effective uses of simile is that of describing character. He has a knack for using the short of comparison to the utmost efficiency by making the comparison clear while also elevating it with a dash of artistry:
“Her rigidity was frightful, like the rigor of a corpse galvanized into harsh speech and glittering stare by the force of murderous hate.”
Russia
Much of the novel is set in Russia. And in the hands of the Polish-born author, it does not come off particularly well. Not that Conrad is the kind of writer to directly make awkward insults; rather his aspersions upon the country are carefully developed in metaphor capable of being just ambiguous in its meaning:
“In Russia, the land of spectral ideas and disembodied aspirations, many brave minds have turned away at last from the vain and endless conflict to the one great historical fact of the land.”
White Hair
An older revolutionary name Sophia is distinguished by her white hair. For Razumov, this shock of white is not a sign of the natural negative aspects of aging, but quite the opposite. Conrad uses the power of metaphor to subvert natural expectations and conventions:
“It threw out into an astonishing relief the unwrinkled face, the brilliant black glance, the upright compact figure, the simple, brisk self–possession of the mature personality—as though in her revolutionary pilgrimage she had discovered the secret, not of everlasting youth, but of everlasting endurance.”
