The End of the Affair was simply a great book. I had avoided Graham Greene books up to this point. I do not know why since he is often associated with Evelyn Waugh, who is by far one of my favorite authors and one of the best writers of the past century. I think there was something, some odd passage, on the first page of The Quiet American that dissuaded me from continuing. (And that book itself has the bizarre distinction of being one of the few, if any, literary references Baby Bush ever made in his life.) But I found a really good copy of “Affair” at Recycled Books, and how can you stop reading when the book begins with the line, “A story has no beginning or end: arbitrarily one chooses that moment of experience from which to look back or from which to look ahead”? No one, as far as I can tell, writes that good these days.
Next up? Our Man in Havana, mainly because I also want to see the film (that way, I’ll have something more than Star Wars to talk about if I ever meet the spirit of Alec Guinness).
