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Brighton Rock
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Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Graham Greene
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Average Customer Rating:
Our Price: $10.20
You Save: $ 4.80 ( 32% )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Graham Greene
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Average Customer Rating:
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Brighton Rock Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.912
EAN: 9780142437971
ISBN: 0142437972
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 288
Publication Date: 2004-09-28
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2004-09-28
Studio: Penguin Classics
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.912
EAN: 9780142437971
ISBN: 0142437972
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 288
Publication Date: 2004-09-28
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2004-09-28
Studio: Penguin Classics
Editorial Review of Brighton Rock
Customer Reviews of Brighton Rock
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Not so much as a page turner.
Review: This is a gangster novel set in the sea-side, tourist town of Brighton in the 1930s. There are 3 main characters: Pinkie, Rose and Ida Arnold. Pinkie's a small time, tempermental, moody gangster, Rose is a naive, young girl who he gets involved with, partly to prevent her from testifying against him, and Ida Arnold is a bar denizen who implausible persistance in getting justice for her brief acquaintance Fred Hale moves the story.
As a thriller, this book was too slow for my taste, as more high-brow literature, it was a little too hokey. Greene keeps having his characters talk about being 'Roman' as in Catholic. Pinkie and Rose seem to think about good and evil in Church terms and it struck me as pretentious and unbelievable.
Greene's prose has been much praised, but I found it purple-ish. Here's a sample, from the initial meeting of Fred Hale and Ida Arnold, "She smelt of soap and wine: comfort and peace and a slow sleepy physical enjoyment, a touch of the nursery and the mother, stole from the big tipsy mouth, the magnificent breasts and legs, and reached Hale's withered and frightened and bitter little brain."
Like others, I came to this book with high expectations, being that it was well recommended by some other authors, such as Truman Capote, so I was disconcerted by the actual reading experience. To be fair however, I did find some of the minor characters well drawn and there was a convincingly seedy atmosphere to the whole thing which was very Noir.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Good enough that I'll never read it again
Review: What makes a book "good"? Is it gripping? enjoyable? convincing? I found this book utterly gripping and not at all enjoyable. It's one of the bleakest books I've ever read. There is no redemptive value to any of the characters. Maybe that's Greene's point- damnation is a major theme in the novel. I've heard one character, Ida, referred to as "brave" or "heroic", but she came off to me as equally depressing as the others--a busybody led on by a flimsy sense of self-righteousness, a juggernaut whose actions lead to death and sadness and who embarked on those actions almost for something to do. Pinkie is one of the most soulless characters ever created, and Rose has nothing other than her fanatical sense of loyalty. Never does anyone show genuine compassion, pity, or joy that is above momentary self-gratification. To be true, the story is a fascinating glimpse into the mind and soul of someone who believes himself to be beyond hope. It is vividly written, like most Greene, in economic, knife-edge prose. I was POWERFULLY moved by this book, and for that reason, I'm never picking it up again!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Bleak and disappointing
Review: BRIGHTON ROCK is unremittingly bleak. It features the blighted and ignored dregs of English society of the Thirties and, to be sure, their lives were pretty damn bleak. But other than a portrait of the underbelly of society, noteworthy for its time, there is little to commend this novel. The plot is only so-so. Greene's characteristic humor, even if it be dark and ironic, is missing. There is a lot about Catholicism, repentance, and the efficacy of religion in human affairs, but done in a way that I suspect would be interesting only to those who are obsessed with Catholicism. Were it not for the fact that this was Greene's first serious novel, I doubt that it would be kept in print or read much anymore.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Modern Feminity Revealed
Review: Although Greene's "The Power and the Glory" takes a similar tack in its pursuit of that dread beast, the secular humanist, here the portraiture is done in even finer shades of grey. Furthermore, "Brighton Rock"'s Ida is given more internal monologue, and a larger piece of the action, than the ardent socialist lieutenant of "The Power and the Glory."
Ida is perhaps the purest distillation of what must be referred to as "the modern woman." A distant descendant of Madame Bovary, she is no less dogged in her pursuit of her own good (at least what she perceives that to be), but perhaps without even Emma's vestigial sense of shame. She has absolutely no sexual compunction, but at the same time, believes in her own measure of good and evil. As the novel progresses, and more of her character reveals itself, the portrait of her conscience becomes truly terrifying. It has absolutely no built-in governor. It is like a brain without folds. It is blank Nietzchean will-to-power.
Brighton Rock's chief strength, ultimately, is how prophetic it is. Millions of women in modern-day America (the West in general) are something like Ida. It is harder to say with certainty, perhaps, how many were like this in 1930s and 40s Britain, at the time of its authorship. In either event, credit must go to Greene -- for all of his technical lapses as a prose stylist -- for this spot-on bit of feminine psycholanalysis.
As an aside, the musings on the notion of repentance, and the guilty conscience at the moment of death, are no less profound. There's a phrase which gets thrown around in this book, "between the stirrup and the ground", which sums up Greene's understanding of the relationship between the speed and the thoroughness of repentance.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A surprisingly deep novel....
Review: Brighton rock is a interesting novel, a very good one. Are the characters realistic? is pinkie pure evil? Ida pure good? or is the answer more ambigious? can there be pure evil if its good for pinkie?
really, this book is one you wont be able to relate with. The problems of these characters portray good and evil on a grand scale and only later, under quite study show difficulty in distinguising between the two. A great novel, well written.
Review Summary: Not so much as a page turner.
Review: This is a gangster novel set in the sea-side, tourist town of Brighton in the 1930s. There are 3 main characters: Pinkie, Rose and Ida Arnold. Pinkie's a small time, tempermental, moody gangster, Rose is a naive, young girl who he gets involved with, partly to prevent her from testifying against him, and Ida Arnold is a bar denizen who implausible persistance in getting justice for her brief acquaintance Fred Hale moves the story.
As a thriller, this book was too slow for my taste, as more high-brow literature, it was a little too hokey. Greene keeps having his characters talk about being 'Roman' as in Catholic. Pinkie and Rose seem to think about good and evil in Church terms and it struck me as pretentious and unbelievable.
Greene's prose has been much praised, but I found it purple-ish. Here's a sample, from the initial meeting of Fred Hale and Ida Arnold, "She smelt of soap and wine: comfort and peace and a slow sleepy physical enjoyment, a touch of the nursery and the mother, stole from the big tipsy mouth, the magnificent breasts and legs, and reached Hale's withered and frightened and bitter little brain."
Like others, I came to this book with high expectations, being that it was well recommended by some other authors, such as Truman Capote, so I was disconcerted by the actual reading experience. To be fair however, I did find some of the minor characters well drawn and there was a convincingly seedy atmosphere to the whole thing which was very Noir.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Good enough that I'll never read it again
Review: What makes a book "good"? Is it gripping? enjoyable? convincing? I found this book utterly gripping and not at all enjoyable. It's one of the bleakest books I've ever read. There is no redemptive value to any of the characters. Maybe that's Greene's point- damnation is a major theme in the novel. I've heard one character, Ida, referred to as "brave" or "heroic", but she came off to me as equally depressing as the others--a busybody led on by a flimsy sense of self-righteousness, a juggernaut whose actions lead to death and sadness and who embarked on those actions almost for something to do. Pinkie is one of the most soulless characters ever created, and Rose has nothing other than her fanatical sense of loyalty. Never does anyone show genuine compassion, pity, or joy that is above momentary self-gratification. To be true, the story is a fascinating glimpse into the mind and soul of someone who believes himself to be beyond hope. It is vividly written, like most Greene, in economic, knife-edge prose. I was POWERFULLY moved by this book, and for that reason, I'm never picking it up again!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Bleak and disappointing
Review: BRIGHTON ROCK is unremittingly bleak. It features the blighted and ignored dregs of English society of the Thirties and, to be sure, their lives were pretty damn bleak. But other than a portrait of the underbelly of society, noteworthy for its time, there is little to commend this novel. The plot is only so-so. Greene's characteristic humor, even if it be dark and ironic, is missing. There is a lot about Catholicism, repentance, and the efficacy of religion in human affairs, but done in a way that I suspect would be interesting only to those who are obsessed with Catholicism. Were it not for the fact that this was Greene's first serious novel, I doubt that it would be kept in print or read much anymore.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Modern Feminity Revealed
Review: Although Greene's "The Power and the Glory" takes a similar tack in its pursuit of that dread beast, the secular humanist, here the portraiture is done in even finer shades of grey. Furthermore, "Brighton Rock"'s Ida is given more internal monologue, and a larger piece of the action, than the ardent socialist lieutenant of "The Power and the Glory."
Ida is perhaps the purest distillation of what must be referred to as "the modern woman." A distant descendant of Madame Bovary, she is no less dogged in her pursuit of her own good (at least what she perceives that to be), but perhaps without even Emma's vestigial sense of shame. She has absolutely no sexual compunction, but at the same time, believes in her own measure of good and evil. As the novel progresses, and more of her character reveals itself, the portrait of her conscience becomes truly terrifying. It has absolutely no built-in governor. It is like a brain without folds. It is blank Nietzchean will-to-power.
Brighton Rock's chief strength, ultimately, is how prophetic it is. Millions of women in modern-day America (the West in general) are something like Ida. It is harder to say with certainty, perhaps, how many were like this in 1930s and 40s Britain, at the time of its authorship. In either event, credit must go to Greene -- for all of his technical lapses as a prose stylist -- for this spot-on bit of feminine psycholanalysis.
As an aside, the musings on the notion of repentance, and the guilty conscience at the moment of death, are no less profound. There's a phrase which gets thrown around in this book, "between the stirrup and the ground", which sums up Greene's understanding of the relationship between the speed and the thoroughness of repentance.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A surprisingly deep novel....
Review: Brighton rock is a interesting novel, a very good one. Are the characters realistic? is pinkie pure evil? Ida pure good? or is the answer more ambigious? can there be pure evil if its good for pinkie?
really, this book is one you wont be able to relate with. The problems of these characters portray good and evil on a grand scale and only later, under quite study show difficulty in distinguising between the two. A great novel, well written.