Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford: A Study in Collaboration by John Hope Morey (review)

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• Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford: A Study in Collaboration by John Hope Morey
• Fiona Houston (bio)

Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford: A Study in Collaboration
John Hope Morey.
Leiden: Brill, 2021. 198 pp.
ISBN: 9789004449701.

While the relationship and collaboration between Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford is well known and well acknowledged, the nature of the relationship, however, is perhaps no longer, or rarely, analyzed, or challenged. This is not to say that scholars necessarily agree on the nature of the collaboration: did Ford exaggerate the extent of the help he provided for Conrad? Did Conrad underplay the importance of Ford’s services? John Hope Morey’s doctoral dissertation—edited and reproduced “to make it more readily available to a wider readership” (ix) by Gene M. Moore—is by no means recent scholarship (the very opposite is true); yet its tracking and testing of what Morey refers to as [End Page 188] the “Conrad controversy” (x) is vital reading for a new generation of scholars, as well as those who have been immersed in Ford or Conrad studies for years. Many works discuss the collaborative work of these two men, yet few track and test it so thoroughly as Morey, and the publication of this work decades after its original production highlights the importance of questioning accepted assumptions which may perhaps have been repeated without enquiry for many years.

Conrad’s and Ford’s reputations have differed greatly from each other over the years, perhaps perpetuated by the loyalties of Ford scholars and Conrad scholars alike in defense of each man, a fact Morey acknowledges. He highlights the extent to which Conrad was “revered,” arguing that his “enormous popularity almost completely obscured the fact that he and Ford had ever collaborated” (2–4). He recognizes that those with “predilections in favour of Conrad [. . . .] scoff at [. . . .] the claims of Ford, while Ford adherents are often guilty of uncritically accepting what Ford said about his relationship with Conrad” (67). It is this contradiction of loyalties that makes this thesis such an important piece of work: written without bias towards either man, but rather laying out the facts and the history of this literary collaboration to try and ascertain the truth. After all, the fact that a close relationship did exist cannot be contested, and “for a period of ten years they talked about fiction, wrestled with English idiom, discussed plots and—most important of all—wrote fiction together” (151). What Morey undertakes is a close study of the nature of that relationship.

Throughout the work, Morey dissects numerous claims about the authors’ partnership, testing them against evidence and comparing published works with works that were unpublished at the time of his writing. In many ways, his doctoral dissertation acts as a defense of Ford’s character: Morey devotes a great amount of time to discussing Ford’s reputation and public opinion of him, testing the many claims that were made against his character by friends and supporters of Conrad. Morey claims that through the evidence provided in his thesis, we are able to see that “some of the claims made by Ford—claims which have been scoffed at or ignored for many years—are valid” (65–66). One key line of enquiry Morey undertakes is a detailed analysis of Ford’s claims of his having lent Conrad money. Morey explores the founding of the literary magazine The English Review, investigating Ford’s claims that it was set up in part as a method of providing a source of income for Conrad and providing opportunity for his friend to publish work.

Another point of contention against Ford for supporters of Conrad are his claims of the extent of his input in some of Conrad’s work, including Nostromo. Morey, however, again gives credit to Ford, acknowledging that “more than once Ford disclaimed any essential part in Conrad’s work, and took pains to [End Page 189] state explicitly the precise nature of the help he provided” (88). Morey carefully and extensively analyzes the claim that Ford was able to represent and imitate Conrad’s style, allowing him to complete works on his friend’s behalf when Conrad was...