Graham Greene: A Life in Letters [Hardcover]

Richard Greene (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 17, 2008

This absorbing autobiography in letters offers a remarkable window into the life of one of the greatest novelists of our time. "The Best Book of the Year." --David Lodge, The Guardian [UK]

One of the undisputed masters of twentieth-century English prose, Graham Greene (1904-1991) wrote tens of thousands of personal letters. This exemplary volume presents a new and engrossing account of his life constructed out of his own words. Impeccably edited by scholar Richard Greene, the letters--including many unavailable even to his official biographer--give a new perspective on a life that combined literary achievement, political action, espionage, travel, and romantic entanglement. The letters describe his travels in such places as Mexico, Vietnam, and Cuba, where he observed the struggles of mankind with a compassionate and truthful eye. Letters to friends such as Evelyn Waugh and Muriel Spark offer a glimpse into the literary culture in which he wrote, while others reveal the agonies of his heart. The sheer range of experience contained in Greene's correspondence defies comparison. 8 pages

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Richard Greene (an associate professor at the University of Toronto and no relation of the novelist's) provides an incisive introduction, narrative and annotations to his selection of Graham Greene's letters from 1921 to 1991, which appear together for the first time. Perennially shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature but never a recipient, Greene is presented in these letters through the five main preoccupations of his life: Roman Catholicism, politics, love, travel and, certainly not least, the processes of writing and publishing. As a publisher at Eyre & Spottiswoode, and as an author in disputes with Heinemann's and Viking ("Would rather change publisher than title"), Greene gained an unusually rounded view of the business side of his profession. In love and through several intense and long-lasting affairs, Greene remains something of a tortured exhibitionist. His writing career led to correspondence with a range of authors and personalities, including Evelyn Waugh, Muriel Spark, Kurt Vonnegut, Ralph Richardson, Michael Korda, Anthony Burgess, the future Pope Paul VI and radical Swiss theologian Hans Küng. Points of travel famously include such hot spots as Vietnam, Sierra Leone, Haiti, Cuba and Israel. In all, this well-thought-out collection newly reveals a remarkable activist-writer. 8 pages of illus. (Dec.)
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From Booklist

English fiction writer Greene is solidly established in the English-language canon. A prolific and candid letter writer, Greene had a wide circle of friends and extensive family connections. To these people he confided, in written form, his activities and opinions, beginning at age 16 and continuing up to within a few days of his death at age 86, in 1991. The chief audience for all compilations of correspondence is the cognoscenti of the field in which the letter writer existed, in this case, of course, the literary scene. Because of his stature, and his wide range of interests and experiences, to say nothing of his pure writing style, Greene’s epistles are an excellent way for the appreciators of his fiction and travel writing to gain additional familiarity with his life, talents, and ways of thinking. --Brad Hooper

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 480 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1st American Ed edition (December 17, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393066428
• ISBN-13: 978-0393066425
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #898,137 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Greene, January 3, 2009

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This review is from: Graham Greene: A Life in Letters (Hardcover)

A nicely edited selection of the letters of the English novelist and public figure.

Those with a special interest in Graham Greene and his career will enjoy these often-short letters written to a multitude of friends, lovers, and fellow artists, such as the Waughs (Evelyn and Auberon), Catherine Walston and Michael Korda.

The letters themselves are well written but are often more straightforward communications than pieces of polished literary prose. Fans and students of Mr. Greene's work will benefit from the scattered background material and insights to his many published efforts, such as "The Comedians" and "The Power and the Glory."

Graham Greene, while a solid believer in free speech, was certainly on the left fringe of Cold War politics and an anti-American having expressed, as an example, support for Manuel Noriega of Panama with such a thought as "...if I have to choose between a drug dealer and American imperialism I prefer the drug dealer."