Modernizing the mythic figure: Conrad's Marlow as recasting of Chretien's Perceval

Chretien de Troyes created in Perceval a mythic type used for centuries in literature. Joseph Conrad's Charlie Marlow is a modern re-creation of the Perceval-type. Marlow has been the subject of scholarly study as vehicle for Conrad's other characters and, in recent work, as a significant character in his own right, but the construction of his character has not previously been approached as a rewriting of the Perceval-type, structured across the four works where Marlow appears. Bringing forward Campbell's and Frye's theories of myth, Bakhtin's theories of time and intertextuality, theories of narratology, and the bildungsroman, I examine how Conrad's work reconstructs our understanding of the mythic type. I argue that Marlow is a self-narrated reconstruction of the Perceval-type and, as such, serves as a bridge between Chretien's Perceval and the modern antihero. This connection informs the understanding of the importance of the continued use of mythic types in literary culture, opens up a new aspect of Conrad studies, and challenges traditional critical reading assumptions.