Lord Jim (1900), gave Conrad the first indisputable claim to classic rank. That it is one of the finest stories, few will deny, and it is significant that it is based on personal experience of the sea which became Conard's metaphor for life's fitful fevers. To Conrad, the testing time for a man comes when he finds that normal public codes which he had hitherto professed do not work and he finds strength and recovery, either out of self knowledge and loneliness, or goes down to destruction in the heart of darkness. Lord Jim symbolises this man, struggling through the whirlpool of life and finding courage only through self-sacrifice. Literary critics have regarded it as one of the greatest masterpieces of twentieth century literature which marked the birth of the modern novel with its distinct genre and characteristics