This gouache is related to an oil painting of the same title done in 1951. In a letter dated May 9 of that year to Paul Colinet, Magritte described a series of images he was developing: "and/moving from one thing to another, often chosing Theatre Root [Racine], House Root, I have chosen for the picture: Roots of feudal towers" (ed. D. Sylvester, René Magritte Catalogue Raisonné, London, 1993, vol. III, p. 181). He derived the ruined tower from an illustration to Paul Eluard's poem 'Vieillir' which he drew in 1946. Magritte also asked Colinet to find a title for the subject, but it was either Paul Nougé or Louis Scutenaire who proposed the name of Joseph Conrad's first novel, a tale of pirates and smugglers set in Borneo.

David Sylvester lists this gouache as no. 1471 in the forthcoming fourth volume of his Magritte catalogue raisonné.