The Rescue was originally published in 1920; it concludes what is sometimes referred to as The Lingard Trilogy, a group of novels based on Conrad's experience as mate on the steamer, Vidar. Although it was the last of the three novels to be published, after Almayer's Folly (1895) and An Outcast of the Islands (1896), the events related in the novel precede those. The Rescue is a tersely written adventure novel with all the power and scope one would expect from Joseph Conrad.