A uniquely fascinating novel -- depending on how you read it.

If you like stories about living a life on a ship at sea, you'll probably like this story without "reading anything into it." It stands as a good story about seamanship and travel. There are some wonderful passages that describe character interactions, and of course, the crew is in awe of James "Jimmy" Wait, the "negro" that takes a position on the ship. Again, if you like stories like Master and Commander then you'll probably like this novel as it stands.

For me, I need to read something into it in order to fully appreciate it. Conrad notoriously wrote about politics, and in this case you should definitely approach this text thinking of how much Conrad disliked socialism. Socialism and individualism, on a ship, endangers everyone that is on the ship -- think of the interaction between Jimmy and Duncan. Duncan happily stops working to tend to a sick Jimmy, so now there are two members of the crew that are not working! Darn socialists.

While this is not my favorite Conrad novel (and I'm in a course right now about "Conrad and Modernism" at the Ph.D. level) it definitely is worth reading and is one of the major six novels from his shelf. It is a sorter read as well (about 107 pages in the Norton Critical Edition) and you can decide, from this, if you want to continue with modernism or Conrad.

Still one of his best upon re-reading. Perhaps my fave.

A voyage from East to West. A voyage through life. A voyage into eternity. Conrad takes the reader along all three journeys. Along with Lord Jim, I feel The Nigger of "Narcissus" captures the author at his height and in his most pure form. Another one of his shorter works, a novella, The Nigger of the "Narcissus" condenses into just over a hundred or so pages the style and preoccupations that will characterize most of his later work. The shifting perspectives, the psychological observations, and, here, also, the notations about how shipboard crews meet and splinter, only tied by vague remembrances of endless voyages. Still, each journey in the age of sail has its own unique personality, something that is yielded from the men who man the decks, go aloft, steady the wheel, and issue commands. It is a living breathing organism. That is why there is no central protagonist, other than perhaps The Narcissus herself. The title character, the "Nigger of the Narcissus" is James Wait, a black seaman around whom the constellation of shipmates gather and in turn criticize, suspect, and find fault, before coming to realize that his journey, the final one through life, is one each must make in his own time. Alas, it is true for the reader as well. Thus the novel has a sense of the cosmic about it. All supported by the at times lyrical nature of the prose. And, too, there are times when Conrad joins hands with Kipling, in this story, when depicting lives heretofore unacknowledged and often discarded. In this work, they all live and breathe together, and give The Narcissus a sense of mission, a vital organism if only for a few months before the ship takes on a new lot and the former crew disbands to new duties ashore or aboard new vessels.

A baffling narrative in which Conrad seems to shift between the third person and the point-of-view of a crew member (indeed, I didn't even catch on until several pages into the work when Conrad casually throws in "our," implying a first-person perspective.) On the downside, the more I read of Conrad, the more I find his writing to be stodgy and stilted, as if I'm reading a Victorian translation of non-English prose. Of course, for these very reasons he's the great link between Romanticism and Modernism. Unfortunately, I just have trouble enjoying his work on either wavelength. Even so, his writing is just interesting and unique enough to keep me reading.

This book wasn't as great as some other short stories that I read by Joseph Conrad. So far I think the Secret Sharer, Heart of Darkness and Typhoon are his best works. I still don't get the ending though, did Donkin steal Jimmy's belongings or not, giving the fact that he wore decent clothes the second day suggests that, but I wish Conrad has shown it, for the book is painfully detailed at times

The foreword should be rated separately - as a 5star piece of writing!
the rest, not really my cup of tea