The Power and the Glory (1940)
Hate was just a failure of imagination.
Named one of the 100 best novels of the twentieth century by Time magazine, this novel is considered by many to be Greene’s finest work.
During a vicious persecution of the clergy in 1930’s Mexico, a worldly priest, the ’whisky priest’, is on the run, fleeing not just an unshakable police lieutenant but also his own wavering morals. With the police closing in, his routes of escape are being shut off, his chances getting fewer.
As he scraps his way towards salvation, haunted by an affair from his past, the nameless ‘whiskey priest’ is pulled between the bottle and the Bible, but compassion and humanity force him along the road to his destiny, reluctant to abandon those who need him, and those he cares for.
Timeless and unforgettable, The Power and the Glory shows the best and worst of dogma as well as the cowardice and bravery of human beings by a master storyteller at the height of his powers.