If you enjoy film at all: The Third Man is a classic & a masterpiece of the cinema. Greene adapted it from a novella he'd been working on. Famously, Carol Reed changed the ending a bit...which Greene protested, 'til he saw the final version, conceding the change was better, and later worked again with Reed to adapt his own Our Man In Havana (their 3rd collaboration).

I read this book in a history class before I had really developed an interest in literature. Your thoughts here have really jogged my memory about this book. I always felt the narrator was ironically as ignorant as the american. The secretive nature of the american's work are also pretty prophetic to the modern american state and its modern wars. I did not realize this book was from 1955 until i watched this video. That does make the book quite stunning. Very disappointing that my professor didn't focus on publication date of the novel. Of course i may have just been asleep that day.

I need to read this book now! The Power and the Glory was simply amazing. I recommend it over Brighton Rock.

Fall’s Street Without Joy and Logevall’s Embers of War both discuss this novel at some length. That’s how I found out about it.

I've been thinking of this book for awhile, and now I'll bump it up on my priority list. I bought Tree of Smoke three weeks ago and I'll dive into that sooner than I planned because of your comments. Thanks for another great discussion.

Graham Greene is one of my favourite authors and so I'm glad you enjoyed this one! :D

This has long been one of my favorite books but it's due for a reread. I was also amazed at how much is in such a tiny package. I think Greene was a very precise writer and also focused on being entertaining. I haven't read Tree of Smoke, yet. Thanks for the review!

Also quote from Richard West from 1991 "That evening, in the bar of the main hotel in Managua, I saw Graham Greene with one of the Sandinista leaders, and later I introduced myself. He was very friendly, talking of people we knew in London, but would not move on to Nicaraguan politics, on which we disagreed. I told him about the bomb at Rivas, hoping to lure him into revealing what he now thinks of the bomb in The Quiet American. Was Pyle really guilty? Alas, Mr. Greene would not be drawn."

I also highly recommend Jesus' Son be Denis Johnson!!

This is one of my favourites of his novels but Tree of Smoke is still unread on my shelf - you have just raised it up my tbr pile! I would suggest Power and the Glory, Heart of the Matter or A Burnt-out Case as among his best.

1955! So cool . something to look forward to when the used books open back up.

This is, indeed a great novel, one of the best of the last century and incredibly prescient. It has powerful relevance to the present day.

If you loved this, then I would follow up with "The Power and the Glory" - Greene's true magnum opus and one of the finest meditations on the concept of humanity. Don't be put off by it nominally being a part of Greene's "Catholic novels", ‘cause it transcends any single religion or ideology.

incredible insight, as always!

Read this not too long ago. Really liked it. I felt like i would want to read everything he wrote. Thanks Bookchemist!

Loved this book when I read it in college!

It is much more than the surface we see and think we know

Main character, Alden Pyle, is based on Col. Edward Lansdale, a covert CIA coup expert and counter insurgency specialist in the Philippines, Vietnam and Cuba. There is a photo of Lansdale in Dealey Plaza, Dallas 11/22/63

I love the shirt!!!

You absolutely NEED to read Charlie Kaufman's book "Antkind". Very pynchonian, very satirical, absolutely fucking hilarious, it's excellent and so to your taste.

Wow I just finished The Heart of the Matter like 3 days ago, lets go Graham Greene bros. It was a little bleak, but very powerfully felt and even though it seems at times like the character function within the knowledge of the preordained tragedy of their lives, it was a moving read. Have you read it? I know that Graham Greene made a distinction between his "entertainments" and "serious novels", though I'm not sure which The Quiet American is supposed to be, and I'm not sure that it matters much.

Can we get a tour of your library please?😊

It was a bestseller when it came out

Quote from Richard West in 1991 "The French police in Indochina systematically locked up, tortured, and even killed political suspects. Many were brutes who would not have read a Simenon story, let alone Pascal. French Indochina had been from the start a commercial racket, exploiting virtually forced labor to work in the paddy fields, mines, and rubber plantations. The colonial government raised a third of its revenue through its monopoly of opium, which was systematically pushed to the native community, as well as the Chinese and French."

Graham Greene was nominated thirteen times for the Nobel prize!!!

probably the greatest final line of any book

I’m probably gonna check this out, but I’m skeptical of Graham Greene. I see a lot of love for The Power and the Glory which is the only Greene I’ve read this far, but I personally found the story and prose pretty mundane and the depiction of the world relatively one-dimensional, especially the depictions of the government officials in their emotionally motivated anti-church stance and obvious cognitive dissonance when dealing with vs thinking about the citizens... Maybe I just didn’t get it, or I’m just not a fan of Greene’s style, but I’d be interested to see how it stacks up.

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What is your email? Can you help me with my essay if you are familiar with the texts : Hamlet by William Shakespeare and Duchess of Malfi by John Malfi

I just finished reading this book. As a Southeast Asian, I would say Greene is genius! I do agree with him that good intentions don’t always lead to good results. This book critically explores the mentality of American people in the beginning of the cold war. I used to think that Americans in the past had evil and cruel mind, having done all these terrible and evil things because they want to make some benefit out of the region. But that might not be quite accurate. Americans actually have done a lot of shit in our region because of their good will and their innocence.