The Honorary Consul (Penguin Classics)

"The Honorary Consul" written in the early 1970s about a botched kidnapping attempt of an American ambassador in Argentina teems with usual Graham Greene characters all of whom are, not coincidentally, lapsed Catholics. The three main characters are Eduardo Plarr, a half English-half Paraguayan doctor who lacks the ability to love and believe in God. Eduardo has ambivalent feelings toward his father who, for safety reasons, sent him and his mother to Argentina when he was a boy. Throughout the book, he appears to be awaiting his father's return who is thought to be imprisoned in Paraguay. Charley Fortnum is the eponymous honorary consul, who is mistakenly kidnapped in the place of the American ambassador. Having been born and raised in Argentina, Charley has never visited England. He is an alcoholic like his father. He constantly seeks the right measure to get drunk. People need water to live; he needs whiskey. Like Eduardo, he too had a distant relationship with his own father and has difficulty imagining himself being one. Leon Rivas, a rebel, ex-priest and a childhood friend of Eduardo, seeks Eduardo's help with itinerary of the American ambassador to facilitate the kidnapping. Leon plans to exchange the ambassador for ten Paraguayan political prisoners including Eduardo's father. Leon has left the church following a dispute with his archbishop over religious teaching. He has tried becoming a lawyer then a revolutionary and feels he has failed. Like most Greene books the dialogue is focused on the characters' beliefs, contradictory teachings of the Catholic Church, political prisoners, adultery, love and the need to have hope. If one prefers something light-hearted from the author, please consider "Monsignor Quixote" and "Travels with My Aunt."

Rather plodding book with many of the same well-worn features of earlier Greene efforts. Ultimately, the narrator (Dr. Plarr) is so disassociated from recognizable human emotion that he becomes a caricature of the a standard Greene plot device.

Not a bad book if taken singly from Greene's other works, but there are much better representatives of this type of effort in 'The Quiet American' or 'The Confidential Agent'

"The Honorary Consul," apparently the 23d novel by Graham Greene, written rather later in his long career, might, perhaps, crassly be described as a bleak, slow thriller. But, of course, that leaves so much out. The book is set in a provincial Argentine town, in the late 1960's, early 1970's. The town is on one side of the Parana, a great muddy river; on the other side lies Paraguay, which, at the time, is suffering under the bloodthirsty military dictatorship of General Alfredo Stroessner. Argentina, on the other hand, has not yet experienced the bloody military coup that will leave it suffering under extraordinarily bloodthirsty tyranny for many years.

The foreign colony of this provincial Argentine city is small. Principal among the residents is Dr. Eduardo Plarr, a physician, born in Paraguay to a local Latin woman: his English father has vanished into one of Stroessner's prisons. Charley Fortnum, the title character,the honorary consul,is a man of sixty-one who drinks heavily, and has just married Clara, a twenty-year old girl from Senora Sanchez's brothel, the town's only cultural center. Also important in the town is Saavedra, an Argentinean novelist, who sometimes appears to be speaking for his creator. However, the Argentinean publishes lugubrious works that mirror the Latin American obsession with "machismo" that impacts the entire town, and continent. Then there is Colonel Perez, the frightening, knowledgeable, efficient, intuitive local policeman with hooded, sunglass-hidden eyes. Throw in a radical priest or two, some terrorists, and Greene has created a vivid, accurate picture of Latin America at the time.

Fortnum is kidnapped by Paraguayan revolutionaries who meant to take the American ambassador. However, the terrorists decide to make the best of the situation, and threaten to kill the Englishman anyway, if their demands for the release of political prisoners -- one of them Plarr's father--are not met. Needless to say, Plarr is torn, especially since one of the terrorists is an old school friend of his. And Plarr had become the lover of Fortnum's wife. Greene's writing is compact, terse, brilliant in its description of the physical and emotional landscape of his portrait of troubled people, time and place.

The writer traveled widely, as a journalist, and to research his novels. He had great serendipity in his wanderings: many of them occurred at critical times. Obviously, he was in Argentina at a rather fraught time. His sojourn in Mexico produced two books, including the famous [[ASIN:0142437301 The Power and the Glory (Penguin Classics)]]. The Cuban-set [[ASIN:0142438006 Our Man in Havana (Penguin Classics)]] was published in October, 1956; on New Years Day 1959 the revolutionary Castro came down from the Cuban mountains to sweep into power. Greene set his Vietnamese war novel, [[ASIN:0143039024 The Quiet American (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)]], just before the important battle of Dien Bien Phu. He set [[ASIN:0143039199 The Comedians (Penguin Classics)]], in the last days of "Papa Doc" Duvalier's tyrannical Haiti regime.

Greene (1904-1991), who was one of the more illustrious British writers of the 20th century, enjoyed a very long life, and a very long, distinguished, prolific writing career. Many of his books were bestsellers; many were made into movies. He was one of the better-known Catholic converts of his time; many of his thrillers, as this one, deal with Catholic themes of guilt and redemption. At the outset of his career, he famously divided his work into novels - the heavier, more philosophical works, and the lighter entertainments. Nobody would call "The Honorary Consul" a light entertainment; nevertheless, it has the author's usual concise wit, and, although its outlook is bleak, the pleasures of reading it are many.

The Honorary Consul was my annual Graham Greene summer read this year. The choice seemed to me at that time a strong one. All the traditional Greene elements are in place: exotic location, odd characters, Catholic angst, fantastic writing, and of course Greene's sociopolitical commentary seeps into events. I'd also read somewhere that The Honorary Consul was Greene's personal favorite. With its South American flavor, reading through it I thought occasionally of Le Carre's The Tailor of Panama. Greene's blended measure of political intrigue and human comedy lurching into tragedy likely influenced Carre's later work. So what happened? Why just three stars? Greene's tale of an ambivalent small-town Argentine doctor mixed up in smaller-town political revolutionaries from Paraguay who mistakenly kidnap the wrong man should've worked out; or at least as much as any of Greene's plots. But it doesn't. Greene drops some occasional insights worth paying attention to, such as the need for authoritarian governments to feed their people on a bare subsistence level. Feed them too little and they revolt. Feed them too much and they revolt(and those in government are less wealthy for doing it). Feed them just right and you're guaranteed a listless and subservient population fit for exploiting. In short, Greene understood the politics of poverty quite well. Ultimately, this novel flounders and fails on its characters. None are particularly likable. Greene's misogyny really screams in this novel, also. Clara, the prostitute who marries the unfortunate Consul captured by the revolutionaries and who has an affair with our doctor after he buys her a pair of gaudy sunglasses, is mercilessly painted by Greene as little more than a greedy, dumb subhuman "beast", perhaps incapable of any authentic feeling, much less love. Greene is seldom generous to female characters(Brighton Rock might be considered an exception), but this story appears to completely malign the gender(south of the border, at least). Greene might argue that this is simply an apparent contrast to the unfortunate politics of machismo which echo throughout the story, but I find this answer unacceptable. But if the women all appear somewhat rotten in Green's novel, the men fare hardly better. Most are cardboardish caricatures. Our morally collapsable doctor Eduardo Plarr, Charley Fortnum, the titular Honorary Consul, and former priest and lead revolutionary "Father" Rivas are really the only characters who have been fleshed out beyond their immediate literary occupations. Greene delves into the usual theology which typically rears its misshapen head in his novels. In this instance we have Greene's former priest/current revolutionary Rivas commenting on the evilness of God and the pity which is due Him for this misfortune. That this is a different take on liberation theology, I must readily admit. Greene's variety, unsurprisingly, comes attached with an anthropology. That his characters seem undeserving of this alliance with the divine might likely have appealed to Greene's eccentric religious sensitivity. This deficiency, however, doesn't make for a better read though. Still, the only character which displays true character is the seemingly ever-drunk faux Consul, Charley. As we wait for our doctor to live up to his lead character status in some way(we will eventually leave disappointed), Charley nudges at the reader as really the only one deserving of some respect for his misfortune and the grace of his sensitivity and forgiveness in the end. For a story that makes so much fuss of the proper "measure" I'm sorry to report this novel fails to rise up to Greene's.

It's a great story. Not really that insightful into Argentina unless you've been there (there's more in many names than comes to mind so it's like reading between the lines). Regardless, it really is an entertaining story, a dramatic comedy of sorts. Very worth your while and money.

The Honorary Consul is a 1973 novel by Graham Greene (1904-91) one of England's greatest twentieth century novelists. As in many of his works this one is set in an exotic location with fascinating characters cast amid the decline of the British Empire's power and South American machismo political strife. The Church and State are both corrupt failing to minister to the needs of the peasantry of Argentina and Paraguay.

The Plot: Their are three major characters:

Dr. Eduardo Plarr: His father was English; his mother a native of Paraguay. He and his mother fled Paraguay after his father was imprisoned by a dictator. Plarr becomes involved in a fatuous plan launched in Paraguay to kidnap a visiting American ambassador holding him as a captive until ten political prisoners are released by the Argentine government. Plarr is a medical doctor who works in the poverty stricken barrios in a fetid northern Argentinian village. He, Dr. Hastings, an English teacher, and Charlie Fortnum are the only three men with Anglo blood in town. Plarr seduces the wife of Fortnum getting her pregnant. He will also be involved in getting Fortnum freed from captivity.
Plarr is a hedonist who believes life is absurd. He has multiple affairs with married women, visits a brothel and cynically believes human love is not possible. A cynical, worldly wise man of intelligence and complexity.

Father Leon Rivas-The ringleader of the plot to capture the American ambassador. Instead, by mistake, Fornum is seized!
Rivas hs renounced the corrupt Roman Catholic Church, married and claims he no longer has the desire to serve mass.
He forgets the Greene maxim, "Once a priest always a priest." Much of his dialogue is directed at criticisms of Church and State. He is a representative of Latin American liberation theology. Rivas is based on several churchman known to Greene in his South American travels.

Charles Fortnum is the "Honorary Consul"of the British government in Argentina. Fortnum in an elderly rake! He is in love with Clara his young wife. She was a girl who worked in the local house of prostitution prior to her marrige to Charlie. Fortnum is a farmer who loves to get drunk, talk and have sex. He believes in God. We wonder until the last pages of the novel whether he will be executed by the Paraguan rebels or will be freed.

One of the major tropes in the novel is the "father theme." Plarr hopes to see his father who he believes is still alive in Paraguay in a dank jail cell. This is the motivation for his participation in the kidnapping of Fortnum. Fortnum looks forward to fatherhood when he learns Clara is pregnant. He does not know that the father of the baby is Plarr!

Father Leon Rivas has a lover's quarrel with God His Father and his role as a priest (fathere) in his poverty stricken community. He is reminiscent of Greene's whiskey priest in his best known novel "The Power and the Glory."

Graham Greene is an expert at philisophical dialogue. Greene in "The Honorary Consul" also provides taut suspense. We readers wonder how the kidnapping story will be resolved. Will the kidnap plot be resolved? Will Fortnum be exectued or freed by his captors? Will the British government intervene in the case? Greene was a Roman Catholic believer who supported liberation theology in South America.

This is a novel which can be read on many levels. An excellent work by a master novelist! A thought piece extraordinaire!

Without doubt a masterpiece, investigating the nature of God, love and fatherhood during a hostage crisis in a slum on the Argentinian side of its riverine border with Paraguay. The nameless small town has only three British passport holders: nebulous English teacher 'Doctor' Humphries, half-Paraguayan medical doctor Eduardo Plarr (33) and alcoholic, landowner/farmer-cum-UK Honorary Consul Charley Fortnum (61). When a motley team of Paraguayans try to abduct the US ambassador to secure the release of ten comrades back home, they make a terrible mistake: they seize Charley, hardly a bargening chip.
What follows is awesome, right up to the final page and for readers to explore and enjoy.
Graham Greene was a worrying Catholic, questioning the Vatican's close alignment with rulers and dictators, ignoring the plight of the poor and downtrodden wherever its message was dominant. Greene was also critical of US involvement in e.g. Haiti, Vietnam, Cuba, here in Paraguay, providing food aid that made people wilt, too weak to rebel. When shortlisted for the Nobel prize for literature in the mid-1960s, he was blackballed by supporters of these powers.
His characterizations here are spot-on: Plarr a sentimental cold fish and unbeliever, Rozas a poor leader and confused ex-priest, poor Charley a lovable lush. Minor characters are equally well portrayed. Great quotables esp near the end: pps 208, 219, 237. Savour and admire.
Fantastic novel and eye-opener. Highly recommended.

A masterful novel by a reliably brilliant author who invariably dips below the surface to grip the complexities of the human heart.

Graham Greene wrote over thirty novels. ‘The Honorary Consul,’ published when he was sixty-nine was one of his later works. It was not one of his most popular books but does provide readers with a stimulating, funny and quirky narrative about three men of British heritage who live in a nondescript South American town.

The plot revolves around the kidnapping by rebels of one of them, Charley Fortnum, to hold him for ransom until some of their compadres will be released from prison. Fortnum, who is a British Honorary Consul, was actually mistakenly kidnapped in place of an American Ambassador by the inept perpetrators. Most of the narrative is from the point of view of a Dr Eduardo Plarr, South American born, the son of an English father who is one of the prisoners whose release is being sought. The third man with a British connection is Humphries, an eccentric professor of English. Add to this cast an unsuccessful but prolific Brazilian novelist, an uneducated poet philosopher, a Catholic Priest who has been expelled due to cohabiting with a female, a devious army Colonel, a collection of prostitutes, and representatives of British bureaucracy, for a fine mix of mayhem.

Greene’s writing is rich with metaphors, ironies and absurdities. The characters can one moment be free-wheeling devil-may-care reprobates and at other times torn by self-doubt, guilt and contrition. The true nature of love is an insolvable conundrum. The relevance of faith and the existence or non-existence of God is a frequent topic of conflicting theorizing. There is a lot of sardonic verbal sparring which drifts in circuitous aimlessness. The writer plays constantly with his reader’s sense of humour. The comedic ubiquity is what most succinctly characterizes the novel and makes it successful.

Graham Greene was a brilliant writer whose work is timeless. He was concerned with the moral questions of the world,,,,,how does one learn to live, how does one learn to choose the right thing to do in a complicated situation etc. This is an author whose body work can be reread over and over, each time finding something new to ponder and appreciate. In my view, the Nobel committee missed out by not awarding him that honor. I recommend him to anyone who wishes to read something capable of making you both think and to also feel deeply.