"I find a special intensity in his writing, regardless of
topic. Greene may be much undervalued, still, by the literary
establishment."
Greene's interesting in terms of this discussion isn't he, in
that he did split his works into the 'entertainments' and
serious literature and the entertainments tend to be the
works that come under Rara Avis's large and flexible
umbrella. I used to be quite annoyed with Greene for doing
this (a particularly stupid and pointless rage I'll freely
admit - I think I was annoyed he didn't consider Brighton
Rock serious when I did!) and I've just been having a quick
flick through the Norman Sherry biography (though I only have
the first volume, to 1939, here) to see if I can find
anything on this division, which I can't, beyond a brief
snippet that Brighton Rock was intended as a thriller and "an
entertainment" - I'd be grateful if anyone does know.
I think Greene is magnificent and love his 'entertainments'
probably more than his 'serious' works, particularly Brighton
Rock, Our Man in Havana and A Gun For Sale, I think you'll
love Ministry of Fear: an entertainment, too
(what a magnificent title) and it is certainly noir -
although Graham Greene makes me think of a particularly
English greyness. I've never seen the Fritz Lang film, but
scan the TV schedules for a showing.
Is he undervalued? I hope not and in my brief searchings I've
just found Stamboul Train has been voted as the best novel of
1932 by a panel at the Cheltenham Literary Festival
(Britain's biggest) given the odd task of awarding Booker
prizes for pre-Booker years or something similar.
I've always thought of Chandler being similar in
sensibility to Greene and vice versa, but just found this
quote from Big Uncle Raymond:
"Am reading The Heart of the Matter, a chapter at a time. It
has everything in it that makes literature -- except verve,
wit, gusto, music, and magic... There is more life in the
worst chapter Dickens or Thackeray ever wrote, and they wrote
some pretty awful chapters."
Cheers all, Colin.
Join my Church: www.myspace.com/thereverendspadgedooley
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