The Man Within

Graham Greene’s first published novel represented for the author “one sentimental gesture towards his own past, the period of ambition and hope.” It tells the story of Andrews, a young man who has betrayed his fellow smugglers and fears their vengeance. The Man Within offers a foretaste of Greene’s recurring theme of religion and the individual’s struggles against cynicism and the indifferent forces of a hostile world.

Graham Greene's first published novel represented for the author “one sentimental gesture towards his own past, the period of ambition and hope.” It tells the story of Andrews, a young man who has betrayed his fellow smugglers and fears their vengeance. The Man Within offers a foretaste of Greene's recurring theme of religion and the individual's struggles against cynicism and the indifferent forces of a hostile world.

Library Journal

Released in 1929, The Man Within was Greene's first novel. His story of a hunted man one step ahead of his fate would play into many of his later efforts, including 1943's Ministry of Fear. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Known for his espionage thrillers set in exotic locales, Graham Greene is the writer who launched a thousand travel journalists. But although Greene produced some unabashedly commercial works -- he called them "entertainments," to distinguish them from his novels -- even his escapist fiction is rooted in the gritty realities he encountered around the globe.