Publisher's Synopsis
The story of a man granted a second chance but unable to gain an understanding of others serves as a parable of human frailty, with love and death playing major roles, in this tale of intrigue and adventure. At the port of Makassar, Captain Lingard comes across Willems, a boy who just escaped from a merchant ship from Rotterdam. He adopts and helps him, despite noticing the young man's moral weakness immediately. Willems manages to become the right-hand man to a disreputable merchant and, believing himself to be untouchable, steals from the company, which leads to his dismissal from his job and his exile from his home. Captain Lingard rescues the abandoned pariah a second time and brings him to Sambir, where the only other white man there is Almayer, Lingard's business partner. In small villages on the outskirts of the town live the destitute descendents of the old pirates who settled on the river and in the jungle; among them is Aissa, herself the daughter of a pirate. Willems is immediately taken with her beauty and mysterious power, but he soon learns that even passion cannot overcome isolation and eternal solitude in this analysis of human nature.
