Joseph Conrad was a Polish-British writer regarded as one of the greatest novelists to write in the English language. His first novel Almayer's Folly is a tale of personal tragedy as well as a broader meditation on the evils of colonialism. Set in the lush jungle of Borneo in the late 1800s, it tells of the Dutch merchant Kaspar Almayer, whose dreams of riches for his beloved daughter, Nina, collapse under the weight of his own greed and prejudice. Conrad established in Almayer's Folly the themes of betrayal, isolation, and colonialism that he would explore throughout the rest of his life and work. Portraying a young man's first sea-voyage to the East in Youth, and the blind old age of Captain Whalley in The End of the Tether, the stories in this volume are united in their theme — the 'Ages of Man' — and in their scepticism.