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Spike | 15 YEARS OF BOOKS, MUSIC, ART, IDEAS | www.spikemagazine.com downtrodden in the world, and for him that meant the Left. He became an intractable and articulate foe of US imperialism, especially of its machinations in Southern and Central America. In 1955 he wrote The Quiet American, a novel which was to become a classic antiimperialist parable. In later years he was to meet and correspond with Fidel Castro, and while still critical of the curtailing of religious and intellectual freedom in the country, strongly supported Cuba’s struggle against US hegemony. In Latin America of course, the populace shared his Faith, yet he was conscious that the dominant reactionary elements within Catholicism had no interest at all in his anti-imperialist vision. When therefore, in the 80s a new strain of Faith within the region came to prominence which shared his vision, he could scarcely contain his intellectual glee. Liberation Theology combined the apparently antagonistic Catholicism and socialism which had both so inspired Greene, uniting against the US backed juntas of the subcontinent. Oscar Romero in Salvador and Evaristo Arns in Brazil were just two of many to speak out the US sponsored repression and poverty which racked their nations. Greene came to personally befriend another such Liberation priest, Leopoldo Duran. That such movements were to fail, crushed by the Washington backed strong-men, Oscar Romero assassinated – Greene, eternal pessimist as he was, no doubt BUY Graham Greene books online from and anticipated. That they failed to receive the backing of the Vatican, that indeed that they were explicitly denounced by them, he may have found harder to reconcile. Perhaps this contributed to the weary irony of his statement to interviewer John Cornwell in 1989, that he was now a “Catholic agnostic”. Had he lived to see it however, he may well have been heartened to see the success of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Morales in Bolivia, a new generation of leaders combining socialism with their Catholicism. The latest success of the left-leaning bishop Fernando Lugo becoming president in Paraguay would no doubt of gladdened him most of all. Who could doubt he would have seen some vindication here, and an answer both to the Catholic hierarchy who saw in the Left its great nemesis, and those on the Left who argued that believers could only ever be reactionary. Waugh, meanwhile, would have spun once more in his grave, a tomb already doubtless given to much rapid rotation. Greene and Waugh may have had diametrically opposed positions in their politics from their own interpretations of the Faith. But, transcending politics, what both seemed to take from the Faith in their writing was a sense of the complete fragility and frailty of the human condition, the essential unworthiness of people gained from Original Sin. In Greene this seemed to inspire a sense of poetic heroism amidst inevitable failure and desperation, in Waugh a very real contempt 254 More Spike email RSS Facebook Twitter A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Spike | 15 YEARS OF BOOKS, MUSIC, ART, IDEAS | www.spikemagazine.com not just for humanity as a whole in the abstract, but for all human beings individually. That sense of the tragic which under-writes and illuminates the drama in the one, the sharp satire in the other, a sense of the comedic and the sublime in both. It also served to solidify the bond which grew between the two. Melancholic heavy drinkers, red eyes unsatisfied, tilting at the cold Protestant world from different angles. For all their myriad differences, the two became firm friends, and remained so until Waugh’s death in 1966. BUY Graham Greene books online from and Larkin claimed “Deprivation is for me what daffodils were for Wordsworth”. With Greene and Waugh, the inspiration, the framework, the habitat, spark and realm of their work was neither harsh mental state nor delicate flower. Catholicism was the muse for them both. As a very lapsed member of the Faith myself, and distinctly sceptical as to any positive influence it may lend to the modern age, I can at least offer it gratitude for giving the work of both to the world. � 255 More Spike email RSS Facebook Twitter A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
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