Edited with an introduction and notes by Martin Seymour-Smith. In his evocation of the republic of Costaguana, set amid the exotic and grandiose scenery of South America, Conrad reveals not only the lives and fates of his characters but also the physical and political composition of a whole country.

Joseph Conrad's Nostromo (1904) is widely considered his modernist masterpiece. The first of his major political novels, it depicts the effects of repeated revolution in a fictional South American state under the growing influence of the United States of America. It is an enduring portrait of global economics and politics during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This first comprehensive and authoritative critical edition offers an introduction clarifying the novel's origins and sources, while explanatory notes detail literary and historical references. An accompanying essay lays out the history of composition and publication, detailing interventions made by Conrad's editors. Also included are appendices of Conrad's source material; glossaries of nautical and foreign terms; a map; and reproductions of early drafts. By returning to (and respecting) Conrad's own early manuscript and typescript forms, this edition presents the novel and its preface in a form more authoritative than any so far.