Тайфун: Джозеф Конрадтың повесі

Typhoon is a short novel by Joseph Conrad, begun in 1899 and serialized in Pall Mall Magazine in January–March 1902. Its first book publication was in New York by Putnam in 1902; it was also published in Britain in Typhoon and Other Stories by Heinemann in 1903.

Captain MacWhirr sails the Nan Shan, a British built steamer running under the Siamese flag, into a typhoon—a mature tropical cyclone of the northwestern part of the Pacific Ocean. Other characters include the young Jukes—most probably an alter ego of Conrad from the time he had sailed under captain John McWhir—and Solomon Rout, the chief engineer. While MacWhirr, who, according to Conrad, "never walked on this Earth"—is emotionally estranged from his family and crew, and though he refuses to consider an alternative course to skirt the typhoon, his indomitable will in the face of a superior natural force elicits grudging admiration.

Conrad "broke new ground" by showing the ways a steam ship differs from a sailing vessel, an historic shift occurring at the time. For example how the crew were broken into "sailors and firemen" [engineers]; the unromantic labors of Hackett and Beal; the captain as a mirror of his ship, isolated from nature and lacking the power of imagination. Stylistically, Conrad made "perhaps the most celebrated ellipsis in modern short fiction". He drew upon this six months voyage for the novel. Conrad once dictated to biographer and friend Richard Curle a list of ships he served on, and the stories they were connected to—the connections might have been minor (a single character or incident) or major (a complete voyage), Conrad did not indicate. For Typhoon he said it "suggested" the steamer John P. Best which he served on. Joseph Conrad dedicated the book to Cunninghame Graham, a fellow writer and Scots radical who was an enthusiastic supporter of Conrad since his earliest publications.

Captain Tom MacWhirr, an empirical man without imagination. Jukes, the first mate. Typhoon alternates between his third person limited point of view, the third person limited point of view of MacWhirr, and the third person omniscient point of view of the narrator. Jukes' absent friend, the second mate from a trans Atlantic liner. The omniscient narrator quotes from Jukes's letters to him, and the friend comments to his shipmates about a letter from Jukes. Solomon Rout, the chief engineer, an experienced seaman. The garrulous, choleric second engineer Harry and the silent third engineer Beale. The boatswain, "an ill favoured, undersized, gruff sailor of fifty, coarsely hairy, short legged, long armed, resembing an elderly ape." The second mate: "He was one of those men who are competent enough, appear hopelessly hard up, show no evidence of any kind of vice, and carry about with them all the signs of manifest failure." The other sailors, steward and cook of the Nan Shan. The reader only learns the name of the helmsman, Hackett. The coolies, hired workers being sent home to China by the Bun Hin Company. The clerk for the Bun Hin Company, who interprets between the workers and the ship's officers. Mrs. Lucy MacWhirr, Lydia, and Tom, the Captain's wife, daughter and son, who all comment upon him in one way or another from their home in London. Mrs. Rout, the chief engineer's wife and the elder Mrs. Rout, the chief engineer's mother, also living in London, who comment upon the engineer. The two owners of the shipbuilding firm in Dumbarton, Scotland, that constructed the Nan Shan. They discuss MacWhirr after hiring and briefing him.