The Lagoon

"The Lagoon" is a short story by Joseph Conrad composed in 1896 and first published in The Cornhill Magazine in January 1897. The work was collected in Conrad’s first volume of short stories Tales of Unrest (1898). One of Conrad’s “Malayan tales”, “The Lagoon”, at 5,500 words, is Conrad’s shortest work of fiction. Frequently anthologized, Conrad reported that it was his favorite story.