The end of the affair by Graham Greene – A book review

A few days ago, I met a gentleman or rather the gentleman met me. As I sat quietly with a book, about to start reading it, he settled himself in the seat beside me. It was rather eccentric of him to start speaking the very next moment and say that he knew a lot about me and my thoughts. I smiled at first and knew it was now time to look the other way but he persisted. He kept speaking without looking at me. And what he said with each utterance not just intrigued but shocked me. I sat there, hypnotized, listening helplessly.

Just as he had come unannounced, he left after his soliloquy, without bidding adieu and I sat there feeling naked and exposed, feeling heavy; my emotions, thoughts, doubts, affairs, my love and hatred, jealousy and pity whirling in eddies of wind right where he had sat.

And as I finish this engrossing book, I know it was Greene that I’d met.

And I know that I will read this book again; probably ten times, even more. It’s a treasure that I’ve not had to hunt for; it’s a treasure that has found me. I usually highlight beautiful thoughts in books and weave them in my review but amusingly, I ended up highlighting almost the entire book. It’s pure in its beauty and ugliness and madness. It’s for everyone in love, out of love, married or just human. It’s for everyone who loves and has innumerable questions for God. It’s about your fight against love, for it, against and for your understanding of His mysterious ways. And as you’re left deprived of answers at the end of this mental entanglement, you inanely end up grinning that there are others, like you, who are capable of the same immorality in the helplessness and powerlessness of the situation, as if that is even justified. It’s a mirror for lovers and what you see, isn’t physical.

I’d thought I dare not write a review for this one but have ended up doing just that, if this can be called one. All I feel as I keep it back on my shelves is the universe trying to tell me something; something very strong. And it isn’t a whisper; it’s a loud and constant yell asking me to suspend judgments and believe. I’ve been made to read this one for a reason.

I love a butterfly. Should I just watch and admire it from a distance even though my heart longs to possess it? Or should I attempt to capture and keep it or should I let it go? Will it ever come to me, to stay forever or just tease and flit around? Maurice Bendrix never got his answers, why would I; surely the orchestrator has.

My rating: 10/10


Image copyrights

© Graham Greene - https://www.businessdestinations.com/bd-portrait/graham-green-our-man-around-the-globe/

© Book cover - https://epublib.info/the-end-of-the-affair-by-graham-greene/