SECRET AGENT, THE - A SIMPLE TALE

In reexamining The Secret Agent in a post-9/11 world, Robert D. Kaplan praises Joseph Conrad’s surgical insight into the mechanics of terrorism, calling the book a fine example of how a savvy novelist may detect the future long before a social scientist does. This intense 1907 thriller - a precursor to works by Graham Greene and John le Carré - concerns a British double agent who infiltrates a cabal of anarchists. Conrad explores political and criminal intrigue in a modern society, building to a climax that the critic F. R. Leavis deemed one of the most astonishing triumphs of genius in fiction.