‘Secret Agent,’ Man

I’ve been slowing reading, backing up, and re-reading the novel The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad. It came out in 1907, and it turns a 120 years old in a little under a year. It came out in September of that year, though on the 12th, not the 11th. The book’s depiction of politically motivated violence is so intense that Conrad saw fit to pen, a year after its publication, a non-apology (“I do not regret having written it”), and that statement appears as a preface to the edition I’ve got on my little ereader. The moment highlighted in the screenshot above appears early on, when characters discuss where to blow something up. They decide a museum is not a meaningful target. I was reading the book outside on the top of a hill waiting for the next set to begin at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. The field where I stood, Hellman Hollow, renamed in 2011 after the man who founded the festival 20 years prior, was packed from end to end and side to side with attendees. While we waited, I…