Who is a more authoritative source of information — the person
who experiences it firsthand, or a more ‘impartial’ authority?
In the late nineteenth century, testimony became a common
feature of literary works both fact and fiction. But with the
rise of new journalism, the power of testimony could be
undermined by anonymous, institutional voices — a Victorian
subversion which continues to this day. Testimony on
Trialexamines the conflicts over testimony through the eyes of
two of its major combatants, Joseph Conrad and Henry James.
Brian Artese finds an overlooked yet direct inspiration for
Heart of Darknessin the anti-testimonial scheming of Henry
Morton Stanley and the New York Herald. Through new readings of
works including Lord Jim andThe Portrait of a Lady, Artese
demonstrates how the cultural conditions that worked against
testimony fed into a nascent conflict about the meaning of
modernism itself. show more show less |'Speech Was of No Use':
Conrad and the Critical Abjection of Testimony| |Theatre of I