RARA-AVIS: Re: Graham Greene / Noir?

From: caroli1975 ( karabair@gmail.com)
Date: 07 Mar 2008


--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, <funkmasterj@...> wrote:
>
> ----- Start Original Message -----
>
>
> I should know soon, I just checked a bunch of his "entertainments"
out of the library, I'm reading Orient Express right now.
>
> Jordan
>

Oh, that's one of my favorite books! I'll be interested to read your thoughts. My first instinct was that a lot of Greene's spy stories qualify as noir, but "Orient Express" probably doesn't. Then I remembered that it IS a spy story, but there are so many other layers to the book that I didn't think of it that way. I'm still not sure how I'd class it. (Whereas I'd definitely call "Brighton Rock" a noir).
  Actually, a lot of Greene's more "serious" novels, like "Heart of the Matter" and "Power and the Glory," have a noir feeling about them, and they also have violence and crime, even if they aren't "crime novels."

I now wonder if the heavy religious overtone to these does something to take them out of the noir category. I've never thought about whether noir and religion are mutually exclusive, but off the top of my head, I can't think of a noir story with a heavy emphasis on the existence of God. (As opposed to having corrupt clergymen as characters).

Thoughts?

-Carrie



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