Awards
Winner of the Hawthornden Prize.
Synopses & Reviews
The last priest is on the run. During an anti-clerical purge in one of the southern states of Mexico, he is hunted like a hare. Too human for heroism, too humble for martyrdom, the little worldly 'whisky priest' is nevertheless impelled towards his squalid Calvary as much by his own compassion for humanity as by the efforts of his pursuers. A baleful vulture of doom hovers over this modern crucifixion story, but above the vulture soars an eagle the inevitability of the Church's triumph.
Review
"The Power and the Glory's nameless whisky priest blends seamlessly with his tropical, crooked, anticlerical Mexico. Roman Catholicism is intrinsic to the character and terrain both; Greene's imaginative immersion in both is triumphant." John Updike in his Introduction
Synopsis
In a poor, remote section of southern Mexico, the Red Shirts have taken control. God has been outlawed, and the priests have been systematically hunted down and killed. Now, the last priest strives to overcome physical and moral cowardice in order to find redemption.
Introduction by John Updike
About the Author
Graham Greene (1904-1991) worked as a journalist and critic, and was later employed by the foreign office. His many books include
The Power and the Glory, The Third Man, Our Man in Havana, The Comedians and
Travels with My Aunt. He is the subject of an acclaimed three-volume biography by Norman Sherry.
John Updike was born in Shillington, PA. His novels have won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Howells Medal.