30
Apr
2009
The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene
For Thine is the Kingdom, the Power…Yes, yes, it’s that Power and Glory Graham references in his title. Just to be clear. Fitting, since it is about the struggle of a wayward Catholic priest and the Mexican Communists who want him dead.
And then there’s the question: is it better to give in, or to die for your faith? And if you choose death, just how much do you have to believe and uphold your faith’s principles?
The main character, as I said, is bad priest. Not evil–nothing that’s gotten the Church in trouble in the U.S. in recent years–but not the guy who should be offering absolution for your sins. We never get his name. He’s just the priest, or the whiskey priest. Yeah, that’s one of the things that’s not so good about him.
And yet, he sticks to his guns. He’s being hunted, through the whole book, by the Lieutenant, also nameless, who wants him dead, as he is a “danger” to the province’s Communist ideals.
The whiskey priest has an illegitimate daughter, another of the thing he shouldn’t have done, but he does truly love her. It’s part of why he sticks around so long.
Liquor and wine have also been outlawed in Tabasco, the Mexican province that has embraced Communism. One of the most beautifully painful scenes in this book centers around the priest’s quest for wine. He dresses as a laymen, and follows a beggar to a man who deals in liquors. During this whole part, the narrator refers to our protagonist as “the man”, underscoring his need to disguise himself. He spends all of the money he has on a bottle of brandy, which he doesn’t really want, because he wants wine, and one bottle of wine. The beggar has suggested that it would be prudent to offer the guy a drink, having just paid him for the liquor, as he is very influential. Indeed, the Police Chief joins them shortly. The priest (for sake of clarity I’ll keep referring to him as the priest, even if Greene won’t) does offer to toast the dealer, and another man there, with brandy on his business deal. The dealer opts for wine, but as he wants to savor his wine, the priest drinks brandy. Over idle conversation, the dealer pours another glass and another. He mentions his earliest childhood memory, his First Communion, and how, for his official job, he had to shoot the priest who presided over it. As he says this, he upends the bottle of wine, and drinks the last drop. The priest begins to weep, and blames it on the brandy.
Clearly the priest has problem with alcohol. But it is this double torture–the riddance of the Church, and the wine, which was so close to him–that convalesce in one scene that is so haunting. And the reader has to wonders, which is worse for the priest?
If you like this book/author, you might like:
Death Comes to the Archbishop (F) by Willa Cather
Pagan Spain (CNF) by Richard Wright
Bel Canto (F) by
The Thorn Birds (F) by
The Name of the Rose (F) by Umberto Eco
Silence (F) by Shusaku Endo
Diary of a Country Priest (F) by Georges Bernanos
Cry, the Beloved Country (F) by Alan Paton
Under the Volcano (F) by Malcolm Lowry
Mexico (F) by James Michener
Fire on Water: Porgess and the Abyss (F) by Arnost Lustig
The Three Daughters of Madame Liang (F) by Pearl S. Buck
Animal Farm (F) by George Orwell
Taking on Goliath: The Emergence of a New Left Party and the Struggle for Democracy in Mexico (NF) by Kathleen Bruhn
Mexico: Biography of Power (NF) by Enrique Krauze
Narcissus and Goldmund (F) by Hermann Hesse
Other works by Graham Greene:
The Heart of the Matter (F)
Monsignor Quixote (F)
Brighton Rock (F)
The Third Man (F)
The Potting Shed (F)
A Burnt-Out Case (F)
The End of the Affair (F)
The Quiet American (F)
Ways of Escape (CNF)
Related posts:
- Poland by James Michener In European History and Western Civilization classes, at least in the U.S., you pretty much study England, France, a little bit of Germany, some Italy,...
- Spiritual but Not Religious by Robert C. Fuller Have I told you guys about the second and last time I ever went to confession? The first of course, was when I made more...
