About this title: Querry, a world famous architect, is the victim of a terrible attack of indifference: he no longer finds meaning in art of pleasure in life. Arriving anonymously at a Congo leper village, he is diagnosed as the mental equivalent of a 'burnt-out case', a leper who has gone through a stage of mutilation. However, as Querry loses himself in work for ...
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Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1962
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Nice soft cover, read once, light shelf wear to cover, light creases on spine, slight slant to book, light aging, stk #2273x5. 196 p. read more
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Penguin Books
Date Published: 1977
ISBN-13:9780140018943ISBN:0140018948
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Pages tanned and unmarked with text clean. Corner fold to one page plus several minor creases, no stains or tears. Cover is moderately worn with scuffs, creases, edge wear and discoloration. Sound book, 199 pages. Mass market (rack) paperback. Glued binding. 199 p. read more
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Penguin Books
Date Published: 1977
ISBN-13:9780140018943ISBN:0140018948
Description: Fair. No dust jacket as issued. Still fairly tightly bound, covers rather pliable, some edge and cover wear, pages clean but age-toned some. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 200 p. Audience: General/trade. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Viking Press
Date Published: 1961
Description: Acceptable. First Edition. Ex-Library-First Edition--248 pages. Interior has usual library markings, otherwise clean. Boards have light signs of aging. Spine is slightly cocked. -Publish Place: New York-Size: 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. read more
Edition: 1967 reprint.
Binding: paperback
Publisher: New York: Bantam
Description: 196pp. paperback: Very Good+ [ink name; text is age browned; else VG+] English novelist Graham Greene's (1904-91) psychological tale set in the Congo. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Heinemann, London
Date Published: 1960
Description: A wonderful copy with some minor edgewear to the cover. Dust Jacket may have chips and close tears. -, Hard Cover, Very Good / Good. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1962
Description: VG Used, Very Good in VG jacket. PAPERBACK, VG/VG, Bantam, 1962, 8th printing, 1967, 4.1 oz. This copy has visible but minimal creasing of the spine, is in otherwise Very Good condition. Note: expect tanning of any paperback more than a few years old, regardless of condition. read more
Binding: Mass market pb
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York
Date Published: 1962
Description: Very Good. No dust jacket, as issued. Unknown printing. Illustrated by. 196 p. ; . Mark on front cover where there was a sticker at some point. Otherwise a clean copy. read more
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam, New York
Date Published: 1967
Description: Good. 12mo-over 6¾"-7¾" tall. 196pp. S3525. 7th prtg. Frnt cov creased at sp. Sp lightly creased; edges & ends a bit worn. Stamp inside frnt cov. He was a celebrated success as a builder of churches and a collector of women. But his desires had dried up; his soul was burnt-out. All Querry wanted was refuge. He found it in the furthest desolate reaches of a mud-thick African river. It was a leper colony run by priests and nuns. Her name was Marie, and she was still almost a child. Her husband ... read more
"A few weeks back I wrote in my review of Barbara Kingsolver's 'The Poisonwood Bible' about Greene (and Conrad) looking at Africa through a very white male perspective. At the time I was thinking of 'The Heart of the Matter', but 'A Burnt-Out Case' is a book - like 'The Poisonwood Bible' - set in the Congo, and once again it's white males to the fore.
I admire Greene a lot, but far prefer him when he isn't banging on about Catholicism. True, 'The End of the Affair' has its moments, and I love 'Brighton Rock' (although I take Orwell's point about how would a Brighton street-thug know this much about the Catholic faith?) 'A Burnt-Out Case' is the worst example I've come across though. Chapter after chapter of men in rooms debating the nature of faith in the most dry and tedious way imaginable. Even if you really want to read about The Holy Roman Church, I imagine there are text-books more gripping than this."
"It's interesting to find an author who can skillfully and playfully alter his whole style of writing completely between one novel to the next. Greene had two totally different modes of writing - the first he called "entertainments," in other words his spy books and more genre writing. The second were his more serious novels, of which A Burnt-Out Case is an exemplar. I've now read one of each type, and totally loved them both! Can't wait for more of both.
But I suppose that's not really a review of this book. So, this novel fits within the paradigm of what I'd call "post-colonial guilt / exoneration." Perhaps there's a more skillful or succinct phrase bandied about the academy, but I never took any English classes in college so I don't know it. Anyway, the hallmark is a deconstruction of western anxiety and chronic subcutaneous guilt over the colonialization of a region by a country or, in this case, the colonialization of a region by Christianity. The natives are humanized (perhaps overhumanized) through a dehumanizing portrayal of the colonists, and through this ritual (and honestly voluntary) dehumanization, the colonists are exonerated and redeemed.
Beyond this critical veil is a simple and charming story of a famous lothario who reaches the "end of the road," and takes the plane going the farthest from his home. He ends up in an African leper colony at the edge of the world run by Catholic Europeans, and ultimately finds that not everyone gets a second chance at becoming a decent person, no matter how hard they try.
Greene captures the physical quality of the deep African jungle the way that Bowles and Camus were able to capture Northern Africa - that is, with a careful and photographic intensity that lingers days and weeks after reading. Highly recommended."
"I really liked this book. I found Querry's struggle with apathy and disillusionment to be quite relevant for me personally and I suspect the same for our post-modern culture."
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