Graham Greene

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Standard Name: Greene, Graham
Birth Name: Henry Graham Greene
An English novelist of exceptional energy, Graham Greene built a career spanning a dozen genres—most notably more than twenty novels or thrillers, as well as short stories, film reviews, travel books, plays, screenplays, and autobiography. Many of his novels wrestle with issues of belief. His personal correspondence included thousands of letters, and for much of his life he reported as a spy to the British Secret Intelligence Service . His restlessness drew him to dangerous places, adulterous relationships, self-harm, and a belief, infusing his pages, that a focus on squalor makes for an honest portrayal of the world.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Literary responses Dorothy L. Sayers
Within Sayers's lifetime she had become a figure of controversy on account of the element of Christian partisanship in her non-fictional works. In The Emperor's Clothes, 1953, Kathleen Nott bracketed Sayers with T. S. Eliot
Textual Production Edith Sitwell
A large collection of Sitwell papers, stemming from all three siblings, is held at the University of Texas at Austin. There are deposits of her letters at the University of Tulsa , Georgetown University
Textual Production Zadie Smith
ZS excels at what could be called appreciation pieces. She published a hyperbolic and loving eulogy on the recently dead Katharine Hepburn in 2003, and a fine assessment of Graham Greene for his centenary in...
Friends, Associates Muriel Spark
She acquired new literary friends after her religious conversion, such as Allen Tate , Neville and June Braybrooke (the latter of whom wrote as Isobel English , and titled two of her novels at Spark's...
Wealth and Poverty Muriel Spark
She was assisted during her illness (at the behest of Derek Stanford )
Stannard, Martin. Muriel Spark. The Biography. Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
161
by many friends, and treated without fees by her doctor, also an old friend. Throughout her convalescence she was supported by...
Material Conditions of Writing Muriel Spark
MS began her career as a novelist in illness and under financial stress. In 1954, Macmillan , who were looking for promising new writers, invited her to write a novel. Although ill and unable to...
Publishing Muriel Spark
MS received £100 for it, half as an advance.
Stannard, Martin. Muriel Spark. The Biography. Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
164
She finished writing in late 1955, but then hit a snag: Macmillan developed cold feet about its being difficult. During this hiatus the proofs...
Literary responses Muriel Spark
This novel was chosen a Book Society recommendation (of which between six and ten were selected per month); it was not the choice of the month, since the panel felt it was too morbid—deeply...
Literary responses Muriel Spark
Graham Greene wrote to tell Spark that this was her best book since Memento Mori (as he was to do with several later titles as well).
Greene, Graham. Graham Greene. A Life in Letters. Editor Greene, Richard, Alfred A. Knopf.
309-10
Reviews were mixed, many sounding baffled. While admirers...
Literary responses Muriel Spark
Graham Greene offered the same accolade as for her previous novel, recognizing its disappointing reception with: What fools the reviewers have been.
Greene, Graham. Graham Greene. A Life in Letters. Editor Greene, Richard, Alfred A. Knopf.
317
A. S. Byatt admired the mocking and sinister games played by the...
Literary responses Muriel Spark
Frank Kermode , reviewing this novel in The Listener, commented that the great pleasures offered by this writer are contingent upon our being willing to work harder than usual.
Page, Norman. Muriel Spark. Macmillan.
119
Again Graham Greene complimented...
Literary responses Muriel Spark
Her friend Graham Greene hastened to offer his usual compliment of best-since-Memento Mori—this time after reading only the first three pages.
Greene, Graham. Graham Greene. A Life in Letters. Editor Greene, Richard, Alfred A. Knopf.
399
Claire Tomalin called it a novel about a hate affair...
Textual Production Mary Stewart
MS was bored by modern movements like the anti-novel, the sicks and the beats, but felt there was a place for them: they're trying things out, keeping literature alive and moving.
Stewart, Mary. “Mary Stewart”. Counterpoint, edited by Roy Newquist, George Allen & Unwin , pp. 561-7.
561
She thought her...
Textual Production Lesley Storm
In 1948, Twentieth-Century Fox filmed LS 's screenplay Meet Me At Dawn, which she wrote in collaboration with James Seymour .
“Contemporary Authors”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Centre-LRC.
She also co-wrote, with Graham Greene and William Templeton , the screenplay for...
Textual Production Lesley Storm
In 1953 she adapted another work by Graham Greene , this time his novel The Heart of the Matter. The screenplay is set in 1942, and tells the story of a deeply Catholic police...

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