Affectionately,
Graham
No change was made. Howard’s performance is generally regarded as brilliant, but the film inevitably suffers by comparison with the book.
TO DAVID JONES
The Welsh poet and painter David Jones (1895–1974) is best known for his long poem The Anathemata (1952), which depicts British history and mythology in terms of the Eucharist. He is regarded by some as a major, if neglected, figure.
5 St. James’s Street, | London S.W.1 | 23rd February 1953
Dear David,
Being a little drunk, as perhaps one should always be when reading a really new poem, please accept my homage for Anathemata. For weeks now it has been lying on a chair while I waited for the courage to read it. As one grows older one grows more and more disinclined to read a really new thing. One is afraid one won’t understand, which hurts one’s pride, (and there are great passages in your poem which I don’t understand), and one is afraid of being unduly disturbed. But please will you accept from me lying on a sofa, suffering from a bad cold, a sense of excitement which makes one mark passage after passage on page after page. I have read the ending with immense excitement, but I haven’t yet got to it. This is a silly letter, but anyway I shall be right out of the country before you receive it.
Yours,
Graham
TO R. K. NARAYAN
C.6 Albany, | London, W.1. | 19th November 1953
My dear Narayan,
I’ve been so glad to see first-class reviews of your novels recently in The New Yorker and other American papers. It’s taken a long time for your genius to come through to the public, but at last it really seems to be making itself felt.
I am going out again East this winter to Indo-China and it occurs to me that it might be possible for me to stop off at Calcutta on the way home and come down to Madras if there was a chance of seeing you. You know how much I should love to do that and how much I should love to see ‘Malgudi’, but I trust you as an old friend to tell me if it would be in any way difficult or awkward. Alas! politics thrust their way into every human relationship. Please let me trust you to tell me of any difficulty, just as you could trust me if you were living in London and rang up for a drink to say that I couldn’t manage it as I had somebody there with whom I wished to be alone! […]
TO LADY DIANA COOPER
Duff Cooper died of a haemorrhage 1 January 1954.
Hotel Majestic, | Saigon, | Jan. 2 [1954]
Dear Diana,
Please forgive an incoherent note. I have just read of Duff’s death. Why does one think selfishly of the loss to his friends & only after a second of time of his loss to you – the real loser? Perhaps because one knows you have him always, & we only had him for a few years. Do please not answer this silly inadequate note. When I get to Hanoi tomorrow, I’ll arrange for a Mass – you won’t mind, will you? It’s the expression – the only one we have – of the sense that life isn’t over.
Affectionately,
Graham Greene
TO EVELYN WAUGH
In a letter to the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Giuseppe Pizzardo (1877–1970), Secretary of the Holy Office, advised that The Power and the Glory had been ‘denounced to this Sacred Congregation. He noted indulgently that Greene was a convert, but observed that in the novel man’s wretchedness carries the day and that the work is injurious to thepriesthood. ‘The novel moreover portrays a state of affairs so paradoxical, so extraordinary and so erroneous as to disconcert unenlightened persons, who form the majority of the readers.’ Greene was instructed not to permit further editions or translations. In a letter of 2 May 1954, Waugh declared himself ready to join a demonstration on Greene’s behalf but assumed he would not want anything of the kind.
C.6 Albany, | London, W. 1. | May 3 [1954]
Dear Evelyn,
I was very touched by your generous letter & so complete an offer of help. I think however that for the time being – for the sake of the Church even, whom the Inquisitor may well injure in the eyes of non-Catholics – slowness & caution are required, two qualities I detest. Of course I doubt if the situation would ever have got this far without our Cardinal Kipps.44
My answers go off this week, & if the Inquisitor proceeds to publication, then I will be very grateful for your support.
I can’t tell you how glad I was to get your letter. What a good friend you are!
Affectionately,
Graham
TO MONSIGNOR GIOVANNI BATTISTA MONTINI (LATER POPE PAUL VI)
With the advice of his friend Archbishop David Mathew (1902–75), a papal diplomat, Greene composed a ‘casuistical’ response and sent a copy to the cultured Montini (1897–1978), a future pope, who as Pro-Secretary of State was the most influential of Pope Pius XII’s advisers.45
[6 May 1954]
Your Excellency will be aware of my profound and filial devotion to the person of the Sovereign Pontiff. I am therefore the more deeply disturbed by the difficulty which has arisen in regard to the judgment of the Holy Office in respect of my book, The Power and the Glory. I feel it is only right that I should send to Your Excellency a copy of a letter I have today addressed to His Eminence, Cardinal Pizzardo.
It is not that I ask Your Excellency for any comment on this matter which is so intimately painful to myself. I feel however that I should keep you informed on this question.
I remain with respect
Your Excellency’s devoted servant in Christ,
Graham Greene
Montini had already been involved – on 1 October 1953 he had written to Cardinal Pizzardo defending the book.46
TO CARDINAL PIZZARDO
[c. 6 May 1954]
It is not without hesitation that I presume to address Your Eminence: but, in the present delicate situation, I have grounds, it seems to me, to present you with an account of the facts.
On 9 April, during an audience which His Eminence Cardinal Griffin, Archbishop of Westminster, granted me, he handed me the copy of a letter which Your Eminence had written to him on 16 November. The delay in the communication of this document is due to my absence from London: I was in Indochina, where I was doing my utmost to make world opinion, for which my articles are intended, understand the difficulties faced by the heroic Catholics of Indochina confronted with the Communist menace.
I wish to emphasize that, throughout my life as a Catholic, I have never ceased to feel deep sentiments of personal attachment to the Vicar of Christ, fostered in particular by admiration for the wisdom with which the Holy Father has constantly guided God’s Church. I have always been vividly impressed by the high spirituality which characterizes the Government of Pius XII. Your Eminence knows that I had the honour of a private audience during the holy year 1950. I shall retain my impression of it until my last breath. Your Eminence will therefore understand how distraught I am to learn that my book The Power and the Glory has been the object of criticism from the Holy Office. The aim of the book was to oppose the power of the sacraments and the indestructibility of the Church on the one hand with, on the other, the merely temporal power of an essentially Communist state.
May I remind Your Eminence that this book was written in 1938–39 before the menace which I myself witnessed in Mexico spread to Western Europe? I beg Your Eminence, in conclusion, to consider the fact that the book was published 14 years ago and, consequently, the rights have passed from my hands into those of publishers in different countries. In addition, the translations to which Your Eminence’s letter refers appeared for the most part several years ago and no new translation is envisaged.
I am sending His Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster the names of the publishers concerned. They alone have the right to reprint.
I wish to assure Your Eminence of my profound respect for any communication emanating from the Sacred Congregation of the Index …
Your most humble and devoted servant
Graham Greene
The Vatican quietl
y allowed the matter to drop.
TO R. K. NARAYAN
C.6 Albany, | London, W.1. | 19th July 1954
My dear Narayan,
I am about half-way through making small corrections in your book and hope to finish this week. The only title I thought of so far is ‘Waiting For The Mahatma’ but I don’t think this will be a very popular title.47
I was fascinated by the portrait you have drawn of Gandhi and that period in India’s history, the love story of Sriram and Bharati is charming, and the whole book will do you credit I am sure. I confess myself a little disappointed to find politics entering Malgudi if only because politics either date or become history, and I have always felt a kind of eternal quality in Malgudi.
Yours affectionately,
Graham
TO EVELYN WAUGH
C.6 Albany, | London, W. 1. | 17th August 1954
Dear Evelyn,
I always type my letters to you since the sad day when you couldn’t read my signature! I do wish I had been able to come to the fête which from the accounts in the various papers I have read seems to have been great fun for the populace if not for you. Have I ever seen Rossetti’s only nude or is it a new acquisition?
I am off tomorrow on the spur of the moment to Haiti to have ten days holiday there with Peter Brook and Natasha. Do you know them? I like them both, especially Natasha, very very much.
No, I don’t think you should share my indignation about Colette’sfuneral48 as the indignation was really whipped up by an extremely good lunch, a lot of alcohol and some French friends who are dear to me. I wasn’t really protesting against the lack of an official mass but only against the way in which the announcement was made, and surely if the relatives want it it’s possible to have a few prayers said at a grave-side without involving the church officially. I have a strong impression that something of this kind was done for Conrad who had also lived the greater part of his life outside the Church but on consulting Aubry’s Life there is no mention of death. Anyway I don’t think that my letter has done any harm as it has made the Archbishop write a letter in reply explaining exactly the reasons which will now be understood by non-Catholics.
Yours ever,
Graham
TO CATHERINE WALSTON
Will you keep this letter in case I need it to refresh my mind?
El Rancho Hotel | Port-Au-Prince, Haiti | Sunday, Aug. 30 [1954]
Dearest Cafryn,
I wonder if this will follow you to Ireland? Last night we were at a Voodoo ceremony until 3 in the morning. One reads about such things49 but to see them is incredible & terrifying. The first two hours were spent in a kind of parody of Catholic rites – a choir of white-clothed girls jigging & singing & responding, holy banners – one marked St. Jacques, the portrait of a saint, the kissing of crosses & vestments, endless prayers from the Houngan or priest recited in a Catholic way, the ‘fairy’ motions of a server, a kind of Asperges with a jug of water – the horrible really began when the Agape began – a procession carrying fuel & food & dishes & a live hen. The man carrying the hen swung it like a censer, & then would dash to this & that member of the congregation & plaster his face & body with the live bird (you can imagine how I felt about that!). More interminable prayers & then the bird’s feet were cracked off like cheese biscuits & the attendant put the live bird’s head in his mouth & bit it off– the body of course went on flapping while he squeezed the blood out of the trunk (a small black boy a little older than James watched it all solemnly).
The next startling thing was the initiations after the feast – the initiate wrapped in a sheet like a mummy was carried in on a man’s back to the cooking pit flames (extraordinary shadows), & one hand & one foot were drawn out of the cerements & held for as much as a quarter of a minute in the flames while the drummers drummed & the women shrieked their sacred songs. Last of all & quite suddenly (the intervals were filled with a kind of bacchanalian dancing) came ‘possession’. They believe that the various gods of war & love etc. start winging their way from Africa when the ceremony starts. They had taken about five hours to cross the Atlantic – & on this occasion it was the God of War. A man started staggering & falling & twisting. People held him up, twisted a scarlet cloth round his middle & put a rum bottle & a panga50 in his hand. Then he began to whirl around the room, falling & tripping & brandishing the axe; we had to leap up on benches to get out of the way. Sometimes he pressed the blunt end of the panga in someone’s stomach, & that man or woman knelt on the ground before him & kissed it, while he sprayed them with rum out of his mouth. Two of those got possessed too, but were quieted by the priest. I was glad when the man gave a shriek & collapsed, & the God had started back to Africa & the party was over.51
I like Truman Capote very much. A most queer figure not only in the technical sense. He is telling my fortune & it gives one the creeps because one half believes – there’s an odd psychic quality about him. The fortune depresses me for obvious reasons even though it might be called a happy one. I’ll put it on record.
Between September 1956 & February 1957 I marry a girl 20 years younger who is either Canadian, American, New Zealand or Australian. I am very much in love & she is 5 months gone with a daughter who proves herself a genius by the time she is 18. I see little of my other children. My whole life changes. We have a house abroad by the sea where we are very happy & about the same time I finish (or start) my best book. When I am in the seventies (I remain sexually active till the end!) we spend the summer in the mountains & the winters in the desert. We are very happy, but before we marry I go (in about 2 years time) through a great crisis with myself. Well, there it is – watch out. I’m oddly depressed by it. I want to be with you till death.
[…]
TO NATASHA AND PETER BROOK
6th September 1954
Dear Natasha, and Peter,
Oh what a time! When I arrived at Puerto Rico I was formally asked by the Immigration Officer whether I had ever been a member of the Communist Party, and so of course I said ‘Yes, for about four weeks at the age of 19.’ That put him back quite a bit, and I had to wait reading my P. G. Wodehouse for about two hours until his boss could deal with the situation. I was then told that they couldn’t let me proceed and that I would have to be returned to Haiti. I remained extremely equable as I had no engagement in London and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I told them they would get a bit of publicity, but I don’t think they believed it.
After a bit of to-ing and fro-ing they decided that I could spend the night at a hotel and not in the Airport if I gave my word of honour not to leave. Earlier before the boss took control I hadremarked that perhaps they would let me go as far as the bar for the night and sleep with the drink and was told ‘For you this is a dry Airport.’ I was then put in charge of two plain clothes Cuban officers and driven to a hotel. I gave them drinks in the bar at the expense of the Government or of P. A. A.52 I don’t know which, and this softened them up a bit and one of them said he would drive me around town if I liked. So back we got into the car and we went around town until two in the morning by which time one of the plain-clothes men was distinctly the worse for drink. The next morning they took me to the airport and a squabble ensued between the Immigration authorities and the airline as of course I hadn’t got a Haitian Visa any longer. So I slipped quietly away and sent a cable to Reuters with the results that I expect you know. At last they put me on a plane and at Port-au-Prince I had another quarrel with a disagreeable American manager of Delta, who refused to allow me to go on in the plane for Havana. He told me that he had fixed things with the Haitian authorities that I was to stay two or three days and then he would [be] ‘sending me’ to Jamaica. I refused to be treated as a parcel and said that I would not go to Jamaica and after a long wrangle I got back into the plane and went on to Havana.53
Havana has been a fascinating city, quite the most vicious I have ever been in. I had hardly left my hotel door before I was offered cocaine, marijuana and various varieties of t
wo girls and a boy, two boys and a girl, etc. I smoked my first marijuana cigarette and went to what I am sure exists nowhere else in the world, a public blue film exhibition with advertisements outside, seats in the stalls at $1.20 and a pornographic bookshop in the foyer. I was stuck there for two days before I could get a passage so I sampled most of the delights!
[…]
TO NATASHA BROOK
C.6 Albany | London, W. 1 | 2nd December 1954
Dearest Natasha,
[…]
I loved Haiti and we did quite a number of things which we should have done and didn’t, i.e. we went up to Le Perchoir,54 though not for a meal, and to another village right at the top of the mountains with a view towards the D.R.55 To the D.R. I did not go, nor did I want to. I think I told you on a postcard that we obeyed the Commander in the Marine Gardens this time and it was simply wonderful, being towed on rubber tyres56 across the reefs and the fishes coming to take food out of one’s hands. We also went and bathed on that beach which you and I spotted on the drive back from Cap Haitien and where we planned to go for a Sunday Lunch. We needn’t have been dissuaded – there was plenty of shade! We borrowed masks and swam there too but got a severe surprise when a large octopus suddenly opened up with all its tentacles and flashed underneath us. In Havana we found much better blue films than I had and we tried something which was called cocaine but which I suspect was boracic powder. Anyway it had no effect except giving me a hangover next day.
I have decided not to go to the Far East this winter as to escape bankruptcy I must really finish a book. So I am going to Brighton instead. Perhaps you will visit me there. Do you ice skate? I don’t. Anyway I still plan the Far East for the year after so we may yet find ourselves all together in Hong Kong or Macao.
Give my love to Peter and lots of it [to] yourself.
Graham Greene Page 24