- Paperback: 221 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Books; Reissue edition (27 Jun 2006)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0143039733
- ISBN-13: 978-0143039730
- Product Dimensions: 19.7 x 13.3 x 1.1 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 2,771,490 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Lawless Roads (Vintage Classics)
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Product Description
Review
"Greene's originality lay in his gifts as a traveller. He had the foreign ear and eye for the strangeness of ordinary life and its ordinary crises"--The Guardian
"Infuses the geography of distant places with an intense understanding of individual human destiny at play under startling and oppressive social conditions"--Newsday
"The Lawless Roads, a masterpiece, embraces the spiritual and political conflict of the twentieth century, the cruelty of social engineers, the corruption of politicians and the wan humanity of martyrs made heroic by grace"--The Independent
"Greene's work is a crucial link between the two most dynamic cultures of the present day, the Hispanic and the Anglo-American"--The Observer --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
"Infuses the geography of distant places with an intense understanding of individual human destiny at play under startling and oppressive social conditions"--Newsday
"The Lawless Roads, a masterpiece, embraces the spiritual and political conflict of the twentieth century, the cruelty of social engineers, the corruption of politicians and the wan humanity of martyrs made heroic by grace"--The Independent
"Greene's work is a crucial link between the two most dynamic cultures of the present day, the Hispanic and the Anglo-American"--The Observer --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
Book Description
An account of Greene's travels in 1930's Mexico after the anti-clerical purges which inspired The Power and the Glory
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Incredibly vivid description of a journey in Mexico in the late thirties. For avid travellers like myself one cannot help noticing that inspite of the passing of time, the real essence of traveling hasn't changed much. This is not a story, it is just a journey and therefore it feels more real, it is small things, normal people that we meet while travelling that we remember and enjoy.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Reading Graham Greene is quite chastening. It makes me realise what a poverty stricken grasp of imagination and the English language that I have. Millions of readers are of course not wrong! He was a hugely gifted writer. What is less well known is that he was also a fine film critic, and the author of two superb travel books in "Journey Without Maps", and the subject of this review "The Lawless Roads". Commissioned to visit Mexico in the late thirties to report on how the ordinary people had reacted to the anti-clerical purges of President Calles, he paints a vividly entertaining picture of this country during that time period, which remains amazingly fresh to this day. Greene is your typical Englishman abroad at times complaining of mosquito's, bad food, the oppressive heat and the casual violence that was so common in Mexico then, and from what I read still is today. But he is also full of amusing dry humour, and I liked him for that.
His journey took him through Mexico City and then into the remoter southern states of Tabasco and Chiapas. Given the instability of the country and the general dislike of Gringo's, this was a genuinely dangerous journey to undertake, some of which was done on mule back. Greene makes it quite clear what he thinks of Mexico early on in the book. He says on one occasion, "I loathed Mexico - but there were times when it seemed there worse places", which was one of the nicer things he said about the country. His prose sparkles throughout with descriptions that paint a vivid description for the reader. He describes the hands of one old Indian as "like last year's leaves", and a slumped drunk as "like a doll from which the sawdust has run". This Mexico is still a country of armed pistoleros, where death potentially lurks around every corner. On another occasion he arrives at a small piece of paradise hewn out of the jungle, only to be reminded of the casual violence when he sees a bullet hole through the front door. Welcome to Mexico!
Perhaps most interesting of all for the reader, are the characters who are forged by misfortune that populate the pages. There seemed to be a lot of misfortune in Mexico following years of turmoil. Think "El Presidente is dead,long live El Presidente". It was also not that many years since Zapata's peasant revolt! As a Catholic, Greene was genuinely sympathetic for the plight of the church. He visits many ruined churches and speaks to the despairing people. Perhaps most touching of all is when a poverty stricken, half starved Indian family share what little they have with Greene and his disconsolate muleteer. I am fascinated by Mexico, through watching far too many westerns, although sadly I have never visited the place. This is the next best thing! Greene is a truly great writer who is also entertaining in the same way that Bill Bryson is today. In fact I suspect Bryson may well have read these books, and been influenced, given the style similarities. It seems incomprehensible to me that this book has been out of print for so long. This is one of the finest travel books I have read in a very long time.
His journey took him through Mexico City and then into the remoter southern states of Tabasco and Chiapas. Given the instability of the country and the general dislike of Gringo's, this was a genuinely dangerous journey to undertake, some of which was done on mule back. Greene makes it quite clear what he thinks of Mexico early on in the book. He says on one occasion, "I loathed Mexico - but there were times when it seemed there worse places", which was one of the nicer things he said about the country. His prose sparkles throughout with descriptions that paint a vivid description for the reader. He describes the hands of one old Indian as "like last year's leaves", and a slumped drunk as "like a doll from which the sawdust has run". This Mexico is still a country of armed pistoleros, where death potentially lurks around every corner. On another occasion he arrives at a small piece of paradise hewn out of the jungle, only to be reminded of the casual violence when he sees a bullet hole through the front door. Welcome to Mexico!
Perhaps most interesting of all for the reader, are the characters who are forged by misfortune that populate the pages. There seemed to be a lot of misfortune in Mexico following years of turmoil. Think "El Presidente is dead,long live El Presidente". It was also not that many years since Zapata's peasant revolt! As a Catholic, Greene was genuinely sympathetic for the plight of the church. He visits many ruined churches and speaks to the despairing people. Perhaps most touching of all is when a poverty stricken, half starved Indian family share what little they have with Greene and his disconsolate muleteer. I am fascinated by Mexico, through watching far too many westerns, although sadly I have never visited the place. This is the next best thing! Greene is a truly great writer who is also entertaining in the same way that Bill Bryson is today. In fact I suspect Bryson may well have read these books, and been influenced, given the style similarities. It seems incomprehensible to me that this book has been out of print for so long. This is one of the finest travel books I have read in a very long time.
Format:Paperback
I am a huge fan of Graham Greene and have read many of his novels, including 'the Power and the Glory', which drew on his journey through Mexico. Greene is a fantastic stylist and 'the Lawless Roads' doesn't disappoint. His descriptive powers are in full flow and he tells some great anecdotes. He doesn't hold back from exposing his own frailties in his account of his journey through Tabasco and Chiapas either.
A major theme of 'the Lawless Roads' is Greene's bemoaning of the suppression of the Catholic Church in 1930s Mexico. He really labours this theme in a way that I found slightly irritating as he rather assumes that the demise of the Church could only be regarded as a spiritual and cultural disaster. While I have some sympathy for his view, there is perhaps too much of the zealous convert in this for me and a blindness to the more repressive aspects of traditional Catholicism.
My biggest criticism though is not of Greene's writing but of his dismissal of Mexico and the Mexican people. Throughout he patronises, he condescends, and he demeans the Mexicans. I found this distasteful. No doubt his views would have struck his contemporaries as fairly moderate but in today's world they seem to border on racist.
However, I would still strongly recommend reading the book. It reminds me somewhat of Carlo Levi's 'Christ Stopped at Eboli' in its descriptive richness and its ability to enable one to see, hear, smell, and even touch the landscape and the people.
A major theme of 'the Lawless Roads' is Greene's bemoaning of the suppression of the Catholic Church in 1930s Mexico. He really labours this theme in a way that I found slightly irritating as he rather assumes that the demise of the Church could only be regarded as a spiritual and cultural disaster. While I have some sympathy for his view, there is perhaps too much of the zealous convert in this for me and a blindness to the more repressive aspects of traditional Catholicism.
My biggest criticism though is not of Greene's writing but of his dismissal of Mexico and the Mexican people. Throughout he patronises, he condescends, and he demeans the Mexicans. I found this distasteful. No doubt his views would have struck his contemporaries as fairly moderate but in today's world they seem to border on racist.
However, I would still strongly recommend reading the book. It reminds me somewhat of Carlo Levi's 'Christ Stopped at Eboli' in its descriptive richness and its ability to enable one to see, hear, smell, and even touch the landscape and the people.
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