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The Heart of the Matter (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)
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Manufacturer: Penguin
Author: Graham Greene
Publisher: Penguin
Average Customer Rating:
Our Price: $10.20
You Save: $ 4.80 ( 32% )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Penguin
Author: Graham Greene
Publisher: Penguin
Average Customer Rating:
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The Heart of the Matter (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century) Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.912
EAN: 9780140283327
ISBN: 0140283323
Label: Penguin
Manufacturer: Penguin
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 256
Publication Date: 1999-10-01
Publisher: Penguin
Studio: Penguin
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.912
EAN: 9780140283327
ISBN: 0140283323
Label: Penguin
Manufacturer: Penguin
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 256
Publication Date: 1999-10-01
Publisher: Penguin
Studio: Penguin
Editorial Review of The Heart of the Matter (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)
Scobie, a police officer serving in a war-time West African state, is distrusted, being scrupulously honest and immune to bribery. But then he falls in love, and in doing so is forced to betray everything he believes in, with tragic consequences.
Customer Reviews of The Heart of the Matter (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)
Customer Rating: 
Review Summary: Last half is worth it...
Review: What most struck me was the sense of isolation and despair (and removal from God) that one human being can effect in himself through a series of acts that create value conflicts that cannot be easily remedied once certain events have occurred. The planning of a suicide and the carrying out of said suicide were described without any romance but also in a way that I perceive as an accurate portrayal of one who is intent on pulling off the "real deal." In that I would say this is a masterful work of fiction, but I only gave it three stars because the landscape of despair became a despair to me as I was reading it...I felt that all of the characters were stagnant and that the dialogue was stilted (more likely a sign of the time in which it was written). I was impressed by Greene's ability to throw out seemingly obvious (but rarely, if ever, raised) theological conundrums without being prolix.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Green's tragic masterpiece
Review: It's hard for me to review The Heart of the Matter without mentioning The Power and the Glory, so I won't even try. While many people think The Power and the Glory is Greene's tragic masterpiece, I think the case could be made for this book. In a way, The Heart of the Matter is the reciprocal of The Power and the Glory - instead of leading a fairly villainous protagonist on a path to redemption through death at the hands of the ruling authority, it takes a basically good authority figure, the police commissioner Scobie, down a path to both spiritual damnation and public and private ridicule. I find it ironic that Scobie's one abuse of his power, sleeping with a native, is but one of the many committed by the whiskey priest in The Power and the Glory, and the final act of each, suicide, is seen as heroic in The Power and the Glory, and quite pitiful in The Heart of the Matter. The is of course easily attributable to Greene's Catholic obsession with redemption - the whiskey priest proclaims his sinful nature and the narrator forgives (and deifies) him, while Scobie (and the narrator) clings to his own essential goodness - thus the sin of pride is what ultimately prevents Scobie from either human or divine forgiveness. This is problematic at best and arrogant at worst for an audience unconcerned with godly redemption. I would fall into the godless swine category, which is why I find Scobie so much more likeable than the whiskey priest, and why I find his ultimate ruin so much more tragic. And if we're rating tragedy, isn't that the most important indicator?
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Sorrowful Tale of a Common Man [40][T]
Review: Henry "Ticki" Scobie at first leads a sanguine life, runs into a life stupified by languishing heat to the point of frequently experiencing torpor, and ultimately succumbs to common human frailties, including one of the greatest sins.
Like the unnamed priest in Graham's classic "The Power and the Glory", Scobie's character lives in a secluded third world country as an expatriate worker; is a foreigner in a foreign land involved with war, and holds a position of authority observed with dignity by the locals. And, interestingly, the beginnings of each book include cavalcades of attention for the rare entry of a ship and people meeting or discussing matters with the local dentist.
Scobie's wife nags to leave the heat and boredom of the land. She prevails, at a cost which he cannot afford. Thereafter, living in a land without his wife, he meets a young woman whose physical attraction to his 50-year old self can only be accepted. But, when reflecting upon this awkward relationship, his first tryst, he confesses, that: "When we say to someone, `I can't live without you' what we really mean is `I can't live feeling you may be in pain, unhappy, in want.' That's all it is. When they are dead our responsibility ends." This statement become extremely important later in the book.
Eventually, his wife returns. Things become terribly complicated in his previously uncomplicated life. The stress builds and angina sets. He cannot sleep. Torn between two lovers, and being hunted by fellow civil servants as well as local mafia, he realizes he and his life have accelerated to a speed to which he is not accustomed, nor could become accustomed to. Such a life is extremely un-British. Scobie is quintessentially British.
Some characteristics of Scobie and his wife remind me of the fateful characters of Waugh's Tony and Brenda Last of "Handful of Dust." And, the rich dialogue of this book reminds me of the polite but sometime acrid comments volleyed like shuttlecocks between characters. The wife in each encounters a similar ending.
This book well rivals any other written by the author. He is a master of delivering the pains and poignant reflections which people often make when scolded by heat, sun and torrential downpours associated with Africa or Mexico (site of "Power"). Also, his artful delivery of the reader to fictional lands is one of his greatest talents. This is a great read.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: God, I love two women. I feel responsibility toward them and pity doesn't leave me.
Review: This was Greene's first book I read. Some time ago I had come across the review of part 3 of his biography by Norman Sherry in New York Times book review. What caught my eye was his voracious appetite for sex and having a list of 41 favorite prostitutes. From his novels one gets the impression he encouraged frequenting brothels. Many of Greene's novels are aimed at moral issues facing human beings. Some of his protagonists commit suicide to save others from having to make decisions about them. In this book that person is God. The protagonist is afflicted with excessive feeling of responsibility toward others and he feels pity for everyone he knows at the expense of himself. If you like this book you might also want to consider "The Power and the Glory" and "End of the Affair."
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: An anguished story of personal and spiritual confusion
Review: Major Henri Scobie is deputy-commissioner of police in a war-torn state in West Africa. A highly principled officer, he is forced to borrow money to send his despairing wife Louise on a holiday in South Africa. In her absence he falls in love with Helen Rolt, a young widow, and his life is transformed by the experience. With a duty to repay his debts, an inability to distinguish between love, pity and responsibility to others and God, Scobie inexorably moves to his final damnation.
The novel pictures a man who realises that despair is the price he has to pay for setting himself an impossible aim: to be just. He soon reaches the point of knowing about his absolute failure and of never being able to reach the heart of the matter. Because of his weakness Scobie is forced to tell so many lies that even for a Catholic like himself it is no longer possible to kneel down at the confessional. He knows that he is desecrating God because he loves another woman. There is no hope anywhere he turns his eyes: the dead figure upon the cross, the plaster Virgin or the religious representations of events which happened so long ago that they no longer seem relevant. Finally Scobie resigns himself to love failure because he can't love success. Even his promotion to commissioner means nothing to him anymore and he feels resigned to death because he isn't resigned to life anymore.
Review Summary: Last half is worth it...
Review: What most struck me was the sense of isolation and despair (and removal from God) that one human being can effect in himself through a series of acts that create value conflicts that cannot be easily remedied once certain events have occurred. The planning of a suicide and the carrying out of said suicide were described without any romance but also in a way that I perceive as an accurate portrayal of one who is intent on pulling off the "real deal." In that I would say this is a masterful work of fiction, but I only gave it three stars because the landscape of despair became a despair to me as I was reading it...I felt that all of the characters were stagnant and that the dialogue was stilted (more likely a sign of the time in which it was written). I was impressed by Greene's ability to throw out seemingly obvious (but rarely, if ever, raised) theological conundrums without being prolix.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Green's tragic masterpiece
Review: It's hard for me to review The Heart of the Matter without mentioning The Power and the Glory, so I won't even try. While many people think The Power and the Glory is Greene's tragic masterpiece, I think the case could be made for this book. In a way, The Heart of the Matter is the reciprocal of The Power and the Glory - instead of leading a fairly villainous protagonist on a path to redemption through death at the hands of the ruling authority, it takes a basically good authority figure, the police commissioner Scobie, down a path to both spiritual damnation and public and private ridicule. I find it ironic that Scobie's one abuse of his power, sleeping with a native, is but one of the many committed by the whiskey priest in The Power and the Glory, and the final act of each, suicide, is seen as heroic in The Power and the Glory, and quite pitiful in The Heart of the Matter. The is of course easily attributable to Greene's Catholic obsession with redemption - the whiskey priest proclaims his sinful nature and the narrator forgives (and deifies) him, while Scobie (and the narrator) clings to his own essential goodness - thus the sin of pride is what ultimately prevents Scobie from either human or divine forgiveness. This is problematic at best and arrogant at worst for an audience unconcerned with godly redemption. I would fall into the godless swine category, which is why I find Scobie so much more likeable than the whiskey priest, and why I find his ultimate ruin so much more tragic. And if we're rating tragedy, isn't that the most important indicator?
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Sorrowful Tale of a Common Man [40][T]
Review: Henry "Ticki" Scobie at first leads a sanguine life, runs into a life stupified by languishing heat to the point of frequently experiencing torpor, and ultimately succumbs to common human frailties, including one of the greatest sins.
Like the unnamed priest in Graham's classic "The Power and the Glory", Scobie's character lives in a secluded third world country as an expatriate worker; is a foreigner in a foreign land involved with war, and holds a position of authority observed with dignity by the locals. And, interestingly, the beginnings of each book include cavalcades of attention for the rare entry of a ship and people meeting or discussing matters with the local dentist.
Scobie's wife nags to leave the heat and boredom of the land. She prevails, at a cost which he cannot afford. Thereafter, living in a land without his wife, he meets a young woman whose physical attraction to his 50-year old self can only be accepted. But, when reflecting upon this awkward relationship, his first tryst, he confesses, that: "When we say to someone, `I can't live without you' what we really mean is `I can't live feeling you may be in pain, unhappy, in want.' That's all it is. When they are dead our responsibility ends." This statement become extremely important later in the book.
Eventually, his wife returns. Things become terribly complicated in his previously uncomplicated life. The stress builds and angina sets. He cannot sleep. Torn between two lovers, and being hunted by fellow civil servants as well as local mafia, he realizes he and his life have accelerated to a speed to which he is not accustomed, nor could become accustomed to. Such a life is extremely un-British. Scobie is quintessentially British.
Some characteristics of Scobie and his wife remind me of the fateful characters of Waugh's Tony and Brenda Last of "Handful of Dust." And, the rich dialogue of this book reminds me of the polite but sometime acrid comments volleyed like shuttlecocks between characters. The wife in each encounters a similar ending.
This book well rivals any other written by the author. He is a master of delivering the pains and poignant reflections which people often make when scolded by heat, sun and torrential downpours associated with Africa or Mexico (site of "Power"). Also, his artful delivery of the reader to fictional lands is one of his greatest talents. This is a great read.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: God, I love two women. I feel responsibility toward them and pity doesn't leave me.
Review: This was Greene's first book I read. Some time ago I had come across the review of part 3 of his biography by Norman Sherry in New York Times book review. What caught my eye was his voracious appetite for sex and having a list of 41 favorite prostitutes. From his novels one gets the impression he encouraged frequenting brothels. Many of Greene's novels are aimed at moral issues facing human beings. Some of his protagonists commit suicide to save others from having to make decisions about them. In this book that person is God. The protagonist is afflicted with excessive feeling of responsibility toward others and he feels pity for everyone he knows at the expense of himself. If you like this book you might also want to consider "The Power and the Glory" and "End of the Affair."
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: An anguished story of personal and spiritual confusion
Review: Major Henri Scobie is deputy-commissioner of police in a war-torn state in West Africa. A highly principled officer, he is forced to borrow money to send his despairing wife Louise on a holiday in South Africa. In her absence he falls in love with Helen Rolt, a young widow, and his life is transformed by the experience. With a duty to repay his debts, an inability to distinguish between love, pity and responsibility to others and God, Scobie inexorably moves to his final damnation.
The novel pictures a man who realises that despair is the price he has to pay for setting himself an impossible aim: to be just. He soon reaches the point of knowing about his absolute failure and of never being able to reach the heart of the matter. Because of his weakness Scobie is forced to tell so many lies that even for a Catholic like himself it is no longer possible to kneel down at the confessional. He knows that he is desecrating God because he loves another woman. There is no hope anywhere he turns his eyes: the dead figure upon the cross, the plaster Virgin or the religious representations of events which happened so long ago that they no longer seem relevant. Finally Scobie resigns himself to love failure because he can't love success. Even his promotion to commissioner means nothing to him anymore and he feels resigned to death because he isn't resigned to life anymore.