The End of the Affair

Description

The narrator, Maurice Bendrix, purports to hate Henry Miles and his wife Sarah at the time he happens to run into Miles. It is 1946. Bendrix and Miles had not seen each other since June 1944. Henry Miles is a civil servant. He was an Assistant Secretary in the Ministry of Pensions. Later he was moved to the Ministry of Home Security. At his request Maurice follows Henry to his house. Henry is worried about Sarah. Sarah and Maurice Bendrix had been out of contact for eighteen months. The affair between the two had begun in 1939. When Sarah gets in touch with him after his meeting with Miles, Bendrix is elated. (He has just arranged with a private detective to have Sarah followed. Henry expressed to Maurice a sense of unease.) Well, that is the set up. The writing is sensitive, nuanced. Sarah had refused to leave Henry for Bendrix. Eventually, in 1946, Henry sees that Bendrix and Sarah had been lovers. In current parlance, Maurice accuses Henry of enabling the liaison. The book embodies Graham Greene's sincere embrace of Roman Catholicism in the 1940's. Much of the plot and the themes of the novel turn on the religious and spiritual understanding of the characters. Sarah Miles berates herself for having no trust in love. What vows, what promises must be kept to God and to man Sarah wonders. This is her dilemma, the dilemma of a fundamentally good person.

Subjects

Genres

• Drama.