- Jubilee offer: spend £10 or more on any product sold by Amazon.co.uk on or before June 6 and you can buy The Diamond Jubilee A Classical Celebration Album for just £2.50 Here's how (terms and conditions apply)
The Human Factor (Vintage classics)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Special Offers and Product Promotions
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
'As fine a novel as he has ever written...funny, shocking, above all compassionate' Anthony Burgess, Observer
Book Description
With a new introduction by Colm Toibin
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This gripping cold-war spy story will keep you reading way past your bedtime - even when I was on the penultimate page, I had not guessed how this brilliantly characterised novel would end. Graham Greene paints a picture of the most confidential 'department of the Foreign Office' (aka 'the firm') as one staffed by emotionally stunted heavy-drinkers who return to their lonely flats with no-one to telephone for a chat. The (anti-)hero of the novel, Maurice Castle, is strikingly contrasted from this grey bureaucratic backdrop from the beginning. The telephone motif weaves its way throughout the novel, becoming an ever-more sinister symbol for deceit, betrayal, and ultimately leading to a chilling denouement.
This novel has more in common with the Melita Norwood school of spying than with James Bond, and is all the more convincing as a result. Just remember to watch for all the clues once you've become engrossed in the plot!
This novel has more in common with the Melita Norwood school of spying than with James Bond, and is all the more convincing as a result. Just remember to watch for all the clues once you've become engrossed in the plot!
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The Human Factor is a rare thing, a novel about spies and spying that reveals the humanity beneath the actions of spies and (double) agents. Castle has to work with his former enemy, the BOSS agent who killed his friend and plotted against his now-wife Sara in the old apartheid South Africa. Castle is also working for the Russians. To say more would be to spoil the suspense of the book, but the more revelations that come out of the real-life espionage world of that era (1960's and 1970's), the more authentic the spying parts of this book seem. Sit back and enjoy it.
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book turned me into a Greene afficionado and I read his books whenever I could find them. But after reading nearly his entire life's output, I came to realize that this book is the best of them all. It is the work of a mature mind and it nearly broke my heart. I could say more, but I will leave it at this: If you want to know Greene at the height of his talent and skill, this is the book you must read. If you want to convince a friend to read Greene, this is the novel you should give that person. It succeeds on every level--a true thriller, a love story, a character study of a man divided against himself.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A Greene classic
Graham Greene is an author I've always wanted to really get into but some of his books leave me a bit cold. I brought this on a whim and I found it totally gripping. Read more
Published 12 days ago by A. Stanhope
The Very Best of Graham Greene
Maurice Castle is a desk officer in MI6, handing minor stuff from some African countries. He had previously worked in the embassy in South Africa, but had been forced to leave... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Brian R. Martin
A great read
Being a fan of espionage and of Graham Greene, it seems that this book was made for me.
The story has all the elements necessary to interesting: secrets, lies, human... Read more
The story has all the elements necessary to interesting: secrets, lies, human... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Anita Carvalheira
Really Good Read
First Graham Greene novel I've read and found it engaging from the start.Takes you back to the 1970's and the political/spy scene then. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Judy Otter
Stupendous spy novel
The late Graham Greene (1904-1991) surely is in the top-3 list of best writers not to have won the Noble Prize for Literature. Read more
Published 13 months ago by P. A. Doornbos
Spies, emotions and jokes about chocolate
One of the problems faced by authors of printed novels is that however engrossing the story, each time the reader turns the page there is that physical indication of how far away... Read more
Published 13 months ago by Mark Pack
Very Late Work, But Not Too Shabby
"The Human Factor" was authored Graham Greene (1904-1991), who was one of the more illustrious British writers of the 20th century, enjoyed a very long life, and a long, prolific... Read more
Published 24 months ago by Stephanie DePue
Typically excellent
Greene's writing is always correct, deft and engrossing without the flash of pomp or needless audacity. Nor is it terse or markedly clipped. Read more
Published on 5 Nov 2007 by J. Pierson
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
The craftsmanship in THE HUMAN FACTOR is superb, with Greene creating a carefully balanced cast of characters whose decisions and actions regarding marriage, friendship,... Read more
Published on 10 Jun 2007 by Ethan Cooper
Excellent audiobook
Mr Tim Pigott-Smith’s performance as a reader of Graham Greene’s “The Human Factor” in this audiobook is truly stunning. Read more
Published on 8 Jan 2004 by HORAK
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
