Joseph Conrad moved away from his tales of the sea with The Secret Agent, and turned his attention to the politics of the day. This study of anarchism, politics and terrorism, and inspired by a bombing in Greenwich in 1894, revolves around the spy Adolf Verloc, who runs a shop selling pornographic material and a variety of assorted bric-a-brac. He is told by the new First Secretary to the embassy for which he secretly works that he needs to prove himself and is set the task of blowing up the Greenwich Observatory. Conrad's story moves between the run-up and the aftermath of the bombing, which has severe consequences not just for those caught up in the blast, but also for Verloc and his family.