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The Third Man - Radio Script
Radio script adaption of Graham Greene's famous novel.
65 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1950
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12449 people want to read
About the author
Graham Greene
806 books6,158 followersHenry Graham Greene was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading novelists of the 20th century.
Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquired a reputation early in his lifetime as a major writer, both of serious Catholic novels, and of thrillers (or "entertainments" as he termed them). He was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature several times. Through 67 years of writing, which included over 25 novels, he explored the conflicting moral and political issues of the modern world. The Power and the Glory won the 1941 Hawthornden Prize and The Heart of the Matter won the 1948 James Tait Black Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the Best of the James Tait Black. Greene was awarded the 1968 Shakespeare Prize and the 1981 Jerusalem Prize. Several of his stories have been filmed, some more than once, and he collaborated with filmmaker Carol Reed on The Fallen Idol (1948) and The Third Man (1949).
He converted to Catholicism in 1926 after meeting his future wife, Vivienne Dayrell-Browning. Later in life he took to calling himself a "Catholic agnostic". He died in 1991, aged 86, of leukemia, and was buried in Corseaux cemetery in Switzerland. William Golding called Greene "the ultimate chronicler of twentieth-century man's consciousness and anxiety".
Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquired a reputation early in his lifetime as a major writer, both of serious Catholic novels, and of thrillers (or "entertainments" as he termed them). He was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature several times. Through 67 years of writing, which included over 25 novels, he explored the conflicting moral and political issues of the modern world. The Power and the Glory won the 1941 Hawthornden Prize and The Heart of the Matter won the 1948 James Tait Black Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the Best of the James Tait Black. Greene was awarded the 1968 Shakespeare Prize and the 1981 Jerusalem Prize. Several of his stories have been filmed, some more than once, and he collaborated with filmmaker Carol Reed on The Fallen Idol (1948) and The Third Man (1949).
He converted to Catholicism in 1926 after meeting his future wife, Vivienne Dayrell-Browning. Later in life he took to calling himself a "Catholic agnostic". He died in 1991, aged 86, of leukemia, and was buried in Corseaux cemetery in Switzerland. William Golding called Greene "the ultimate chronicler of twentieth-century man's consciousness and anxiety".
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,268 reviews
December 8, 2023
Can’t catch a break.
Occupied Vienna, 1945. Rollo Martins is a penniless author of cheap western novels barely scraping by, and always getting into incidents, especially with the ladies. His luck seemingly taking a good turn when his friend Harry Lime invites him to Vienna to spend some time. Rollo happily jumps at the opportunity and eagerly travels to meet his long esteemed friend, only to find him dead the day before. Dude can’t catch a break!
This was a fairly neat whodunit mystery. Not mind blowing by a long shot, yet not disappointing either. The Vienna of 1945 occupied by Soviet, American, British and French forces felt wildly contrived, but, to my surprise, bewildering realistic. Intermittently entertaining, occasionally amusing and sporadically funny. The characters and execution were done right, the ending left a bit to be desired. On the whole, just a sufficiently good enough novella to spend the time. Not a bad choice mind you, for a used book. You can always count on good ol’ Greene to give you a solid one.
*** Still remaining, the movie (1949)
-----------------------------------------------
PERSONAL NOTE :
[1949] [157p] [Mystery] [Conditional Recommendable] [Anna Schmidt]
-----------------------------------------------
★★★☆☆ The Third Man
★★★☆☆ Doctor Fischer of Geneva
★★★☆☆ The Return of A.J. Raffles [2.5]
-----------------------------------------------
Nunca una buena.
Viena ocupada, 1945. Rollo Martins es un pobre autor de novelas baratas del oeste apenas sobreviviendo el día a día, y siempre metiéndose en incidentes, especialmente con las señoritas. Su suerte parece tomar un cambio afortunado cuando su amigo Harry Lime lo invita a Viena a pasar un tiempo. Rollo felizmente toma la oportunidad y ansiosamente viaja para reencontrarse con su largamente estimado amigo, sólo para hallarlo muerto el día anterior. ¡Al tipo nunca le sale una!
Este fue un decentemente buen misterio de quién lo hizo. Por lejos nada que vuele la cabeza, pero no por eso decepcionante. La Viena de 1945 ocupada por fuerzas soviéticas, americanas, británicas y francesas se sintió increíblemente artificial, pero, para mi sorpresa, asombrosamente realista. Intermitentemente entretenida, ocasionalmente divertida y esporádicamente graciosa. Los personajes y ejecución estuvieron bien hechos, el final dejó un poco que desear. Dentro de todo, una novela corta suficientemente buena para pasar el rato. No una mala elección debo decir, para un libro usado. Siempre podés contar con el buen y viejo Greene para entregarte una sólida.
*** Queda pendiente, la película (1949)
-----------------------------------------------
NOTA PERSONAL :
[1949] [157p] [Misterio] [Recomendable Condicional] [Anna Schmidt]
-----------------------------------------------
Occupied Vienna, 1945. Rollo Martins is a penniless author of cheap western novels barely scraping by, and always getting into incidents, especially with the ladies. His luck seemingly taking a good turn when his friend Harry Lime invites him to Vienna to spend some time. Rollo happily jumps at the opportunity and eagerly travels to meet his long esteemed friend, only to find him dead the day before. Dude can’t catch a break!
This was a fairly neat whodunit mystery. Not mind blowing by a long shot, yet not disappointing either. The Vienna of 1945 occupied by Soviet, American, British and French forces felt wildly contrived, but, to my surprise, bewildering realistic. Intermittently entertaining, occasionally amusing and sporadically funny. The characters and execution were done right, the ending left a bit to be desired. On the whole, just a sufficiently good enough novella to spend the time. Not a bad choice mind you, for a used book. You can always count on good ol’ Greene to give you a solid one.
*** Still remaining, the movie (1949)
-----------------------------------------------
PERSONAL NOTE :
[1949] [157p] [Mystery] [Conditional Recommendable] [Anna Schmidt]
-----------------------------------------------
★★★☆☆ The Third Man
★★★☆☆ Doctor Fischer of Geneva
★★★☆☆ The Return of A.J. Raffles [2.5]
-----------------------------------------------
Nunca una buena.
Viena ocupada, 1945. Rollo Martins es un pobre autor de novelas baratas del oeste apenas sobreviviendo el día a día, y siempre metiéndose en incidentes, especialmente con las señoritas. Su suerte parece tomar un cambio afortunado cuando su amigo Harry Lime lo invita a Viena a pasar un tiempo. Rollo felizmente toma la oportunidad y ansiosamente viaja para reencontrarse con su largamente estimado amigo, sólo para hallarlo muerto el día anterior. ¡Al tipo nunca le sale una!
Este fue un decentemente buen misterio de quién lo hizo. Por lejos nada que vuele la cabeza, pero no por eso decepcionante. La Viena de 1945 ocupada por fuerzas soviéticas, americanas, británicas y francesas se sintió increíblemente artificial, pero, para mi sorpresa, asombrosamente realista. Intermitentemente entretenida, ocasionalmente divertida y esporádicamente graciosa. Los personajes y ejecución estuvieron bien hechos, el final dejó un poco que desear. Dentro de todo, una novela corta suficientemente buena para pasar el rato. No una mala elección debo decir, para un libro usado. Siempre podés contar con el buen y viejo Greene para entregarte una sólida.
*** Queda pendiente, la película (1949)
-----------------------------------------------
NOTA PERSONAL :
[1949] [157p] [Misterio] [Recomendable Condicional] [Anna Schmidt]
-----------------------------------------------
November 23, 2025
First a coincidence: I don’t usually read film scripts or plays but this is the second book in a row I have read not realizing ahead of time that they were, in effect, film scripts. I just finished reviewing Marguerite Duras’ Hiroshima Mon Amour, a film script.
Now Third Man comes along and it turns out that Graham Greene wrote this initially as a film script and re-wrote it as a novella after the movie came out. In fact, in the preface he tells us it “was never intended for publication” and “The film, in fact, is better than the story…” LOL I guess you can say these things when you are an accomplished author and you know that you have an automatic audience that will read your stuff.
It's a decent story, I guess I’d call it a thriller. Cloak and dagger. The GR blurb from the book gives a good summary without giving away plot so I will use that:
"Rollo Martins' usual line is the writing of cheap paperback Westerns under the name of Buck Dexter. But when his old friend Harry Lime invites him to Vienna, he jumps at the chance. With exactly five pounds in his pocket, he arrives only just in time to make it to his friend's funeral. The victim of an apparently banal street accident, the late Mr. Lime, it seems, had been the focus of a criminal investigation, suspected of nothing less than being "the worst racketeer who ever made a dirty living in this city." Martins is determined to clear his friend's name, and begins an investigation of his own..."
I liked the way the author alternates use of the main character’s name. He calls him Rollo when he says or does something stupid; otherwise he’s Martins. It’s set in Vienna right after WW II so we still have bombed out buildings and streets blocked with rubble.
Martins' good friend from schooldays was struck and killed by a car. The main character is suspicious so he starts his own investigation. The more he finds out from police reports and witnesses and from the dead man’s woman friend, the more suspicious he becomes. His suspicion centers on a “third man” at the accident scene, who somehow disappeared because only one witness swears he saw him. One of the witnesses gets murdered and Martins knows he’s on to something.
A side story, which is kind of a pun for the author, is that Buck Dexter (the main character’s pen name) is scheduled to speak at book clubs in Vienna about “the Christian novel.” Greene is having fun with us because as an author he was considered by many to be a 'Catholic novelist,' although he did not consider himself one. Another thread is that Rollo start to fall in love with his friend’s woman.
A decent story and a quick read. Not something memorable by Greene, known for more serious work. I’ll give it a ‘4’ for a thriller and a ‘3’ for its literary value. I have not seen the movie but I imagine it could be good because it’s a simple but good plot. It's a British film from 1949 starring Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles. I'm surprised that no one has a done a re-make of the 1949 movie.
Graham Greene is one of my favorite authors and I have read seven or eight of his novels. Below are links to my reviews of other novels of his:
The End of the Affair
The Quiet American (set in Vietnam)
Brighton Rock
The Power and the Glory (set in Mexico)
The Comedians (set in Haiti)
The Heart of the Matter (set in British West Africa)
Stills from the movie: Top from newstatesman.com; middle from bfi.org.uk
The author (1904-1991) from theguardian.com.uk
Now Third Man comes along and it turns out that Graham Greene wrote this initially as a film script and re-wrote it as a novella after the movie came out. In fact, in the preface he tells us it “was never intended for publication” and “The film, in fact, is better than the story…” LOL I guess you can say these things when you are an accomplished author and you know that you have an automatic audience that will read your stuff.
It's a decent story, I guess I’d call it a thriller. Cloak and dagger. The GR blurb from the book gives a good summary without giving away plot so I will use that:
"Rollo Martins' usual line is the writing of cheap paperback Westerns under the name of Buck Dexter. But when his old friend Harry Lime invites him to Vienna, he jumps at the chance. With exactly five pounds in his pocket, he arrives only just in time to make it to his friend's funeral. The victim of an apparently banal street accident, the late Mr. Lime, it seems, had been the focus of a criminal investigation, suspected of nothing less than being "the worst racketeer who ever made a dirty living in this city." Martins is determined to clear his friend's name, and begins an investigation of his own..."
I liked the way the author alternates use of the main character’s name. He calls him Rollo when he says or does something stupid; otherwise he’s Martins. It’s set in Vienna right after WW II so we still have bombed out buildings and streets blocked with rubble.
Martins' good friend from schooldays was struck and killed by a car. The main character is suspicious so he starts his own investigation. The more he finds out from police reports and witnesses and from the dead man’s woman friend, the more suspicious he becomes. His suspicion centers on a “third man” at the accident scene, who somehow disappeared because only one witness swears he saw him. One of the witnesses gets murdered and Martins knows he’s on to something.
A side story, which is kind of a pun for the author, is that Buck Dexter (the main character’s pen name) is scheduled to speak at book clubs in Vienna about “the Christian novel.” Greene is having fun with us because as an author he was considered by many to be a 'Catholic novelist,' although he did not consider himself one. Another thread is that Rollo start to fall in love with his friend’s woman.
A decent story and a quick read. Not something memorable by Greene, known for more serious work. I’ll give it a ‘4’ for a thriller and a ‘3’ for its literary value. I have not seen the movie but I imagine it could be good because it’s a simple but good plot. It's a British film from 1949 starring Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles. I'm surprised that no one has a done a re-make of the 1949 movie.
Graham Greene is one of my favorite authors and I have read seven or eight of his novels. Below are links to my reviews of other novels of his:
The End of the Affair
The Quiet American (set in Vietnam)
Brighton Rock
The Power and the Glory (set in Mexico)
The Comedians (set in Haiti)
The Heart of the Matter (set in British West Africa)
Stills from the movie: Top from newstatesman.com; middle from bfi.org.uk
The author (1904-1991) from theguardian.com.uk
August 14, 2025
Two funerals and a great Ferris Wheel
The dark was almost down; the snow had ceased for a while to fall,and the grey statues of the Ring, the prancing horses, the chariots and the eagles, were gun-shot grey with the end of evening.
Conceived as a kind of mood board to nurture the writing of the screenplay of the film, as a piece “never written to be read but only to be seen”, I thought Graham Greene’s short novel The Third Man nonetheless well-worth reading in its own right, although it is hard (if not impossible) to say if it would be as powerful and engrossing without having first watched Carol Reed’s film classic. Dark and grim, the book is a page-turner, masterly suspenseful even if one remembers the clue plot revelations of the film – and how could one forget those?
In his preface, Greene generously acknowledges that the "the film, in fact, is better than the story because it is in this case the finished state of the story" but why bother if such is true (or if Greene was honest), if one unlike the cake can have them both? Whether the film or the book are the whipped cream on top of the cake or the other way around, they make a good pair. On top, it was great fun to read The Third Man in a lovely pocket edition which hold explanatory notes translating the vocabulary in German.
Having only read two short stories of Greene before (The End of the Party and A Shocking Accident) for me it was the perfect introduction to Graham Greene’s longer fiction, as well as a refreshing, welcome and entertaining excursion to a fiction genre of which I cannot remember when I was in its thrall for the last time, the crime thriller.
Set in the rubble and confusion of postwar Vienna, divided up in zones among the four powers, the novel’s sense of place and time is compelling and the prose so evocative of the atmosphere that only the facile platitude of its cinematic quality seems able to capture the strength of it. Propelled by sharply cut dialogue, the ‘ugly’ and gritty noir story unfolds: nocturnal and cemetery scenes, murder and other crimes and misdemeanours, heavy doses of cynicism and dubious morality, misunderstandings, official and amateur shadow investigations, lots of smoking and alcohol in bars, a beautiful woman (‘girl’) (of not much importance to the plot), a “cheerful fool” learning how bad the world is the hard way, snow and fog, cemetery and manhunting in sewers. Yet beneath the thrilling story the disturbing subconscious of the city looms, enabling Greene to present poignant questions on friendship, loyalty and integrity in tough times of wreckage and poverty – and how they relate to human greed and evil.
The tears of a boy ran down his thirty-five-year-old face.
Considering the victims of the penicillin racket, Harry Lime’s cynic musing that looking down from the Great wheel, people are merely dots and his rhetorical question “if would you really feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving – for ever?” inevitably conveys our present time. It is a chilling and sobering echo from the past what one can imagine on the mind of those deciding to condemn thousands of people to death without even blinking an eye.
The multiple moral questions the novel already poses aside, there is that famous line from the film that is simply too good hold back, even if it is not in the book:
In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed – they produced Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce…? The cuckoo clock.
The sublime scene in which Rollo Martins, Harry Lime’s friend from schooldays and writer of Western novels, is mistaken for Dexter, a dainty and stylist highbrow author in the vein of Henry James and, unprepared, is brought before an audience of earnest and constant readers expecting a discussion on James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Gertrude Stein is not only hilarious, it also seems to echo Greene’s views on literature, in which entertaining the reader shouldn’t be a sin.
According to a lady attending Rollo Martins/Dexter’s haphazard lecture “a novel should tell a good story”. If you think the same, you definitely cannot go wrong with The Third Man.
The dark was almost down; the snow had ceased for a while to fall,and the grey statues of the Ring, the prancing horses, the chariots and the eagles, were gun-shot grey with the end of evening.
Conceived as a kind of mood board to nurture the writing of the screenplay of the film, as a piece “never written to be read but only to be seen”, I thought Graham Greene’s short novel The Third Man nonetheless well-worth reading in its own right, although it is hard (if not impossible) to say if it would be as powerful and engrossing without having first watched Carol Reed’s film classic. Dark and grim, the book is a page-turner, masterly suspenseful even if one remembers the clue plot revelations of the film – and how could one forget those?
In his preface, Greene generously acknowledges that the "the film, in fact, is better than the story because it is in this case the finished state of the story" but why bother if such is true (or if Greene was honest), if one unlike the cake can have them both? Whether the film or the book are the whipped cream on top of the cake or the other way around, they make a good pair. On top, it was great fun to read The Third Man in a lovely pocket edition which hold explanatory notes translating the vocabulary in German.
Having only read two short stories of Greene before (The End of the Party and A Shocking Accident) for me it was the perfect introduction to Graham Greene’s longer fiction, as well as a refreshing, welcome and entertaining excursion to a fiction genre of which I cannot remember when I was in its thrall for the last time, the crime thriller.
Set in the rubble and confusion of postwar Vienna, divided up in zones among the four powers, the novel’s sense of place and time is compelling and the prose so evocative of the atmosphere that only the facile platitude of its cinematic quality seems able to capture the strength of it. Propelled by sharply cut dialogue, the ‘ugly’ and gritty noir story unfolds: nocturnal and cemetery scenes, murder and other crimes and misdemeanours, heavy doses of cynicism and dubious morality, misunderstandings, official and amateur shadow investigations, lots of smoking and alcohol in bars, a beautiful woman (‘girl’) (of not much importance to the plot), a “cheerful fool” learning how bad the world is the hard way, snow and fog, cemetery and manhunting in sewers. Yet beneath the thrilling story the disturbing subconscious of the city looms, enabling Greene to present poignant questions on friendship, loyalty and integrity in tough times of wreckage and poverty – and how they relate to human greed and evil.
The tears of a boy ran down his thirty-five-year-old face.
Considering the victims of the penicillin racket, Harry Lime’s cynic musing that looking down from the Great wheel, people are merely dots and his rhetorical question “if would you really feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving – for ever?” inevitably conveys our present time. It is a chilling and sobering echo from the past what one can imagine on the mind of those deciding to condemn thousands of people to death without even blinking an eye.
The multiple moral questions the novel already poses aside, there is that famous line from the film that is simply too good hold back, even if it is not in the book:
In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed – they produced Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce…? The cuckoo clock.
The sublime scene in which Rollo Martins, Harry Lime’s friend from schooldays and writer of Western novels, is mistaken for Dexter, a dainty and stylist highbrow author in the vein of Henry James and, unprepared, is brought before an audience of earnest and constant readers expecting a discussion on James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Gertrude Stein is not only hilarious, it also seems to echo Greene’s views on literature, in which entertaining the reader shouldn’t be a sin.
According to a lady attending Rollo Martins/Dexter’s haphazard lecture “a novel should tell a good story”. If you think the same, you definitely cannot go wrong with The Third Man.
November 27, 2023
“We never get accustomed to being less important to other people than they are to us.”
Greene expertly sets the tone, heightening the suspense, where anything is possible. Vienna, post World War II, feels very dangerous with political instability, a city divided, a man is dead and kidnappings abound.
Rollo Martins arrives in Vienna at the invitation of his old friend, Harry Lime. Because of regulations, Martins can’t bring any money with him. As a result, Harry Lime will provide Martins with financial support.
But there is a catch.
Unbeknownst to Martins, Lime is dead.
How did Lime die? What will Martins discover about his old friend, and will that change the way he thinks about him?
There is a lot to love in this novella. Martins is quite a character; he doesn’t take himself too seriously, and he creates several laugh-out-loud moments. One of them in particular is quite memorable. The setting is sublime, a powder keg, where the danger is so high that anything could happen at any time. Greene also selects a unique narrator, and he pulls it off flawlessly.
Unlike most superficial mysteries that just barely skim the surface, this tale is rousing. It stirs the soul, raising questions of friendship and unconditional love.
How much I spent:
Softcover text – Free through Troy Public Library
Audiobook – Free through Libby
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Greene expertly sets the tone, heightening the suspense, where anything is possible. Vienna, post World War II, feels very dangerous with political instability, a city divided, a man is dead and kidnappings abound.
Rollo Martins arrives in Vienna at the invitation of his old friend, Harry Lime. Because of regulations, Martins can’t bring any money with him. As a result, Harry Lime will provide Martins with financial support.
But there is a catch.
Unbeknownst to Martins, Lime is dead.
How did Lime die? What will Martins discover about his old friend, and will that change the way he thinks about him?
There is a lot to love in this novella. Martins is quite a character; he doesn’t take himself too seriously, and he creates several laugh-out-loud moments. One of them in particular is quite memorable. The setting is sublime, a powder keg, where the danger is so high that anything could happen at any time. Greene also selects a unique narrator, and he pulls it off flawlessly.
Unlike most superficial mysteries that just barely skim the surface, this tale is rousing. It stirs the soul, raising questions of friendship and unconditional love.
How much I spent:
Softcover text – Free through Troy Public Library
Audiobook – Free through Libby
Connect With Me!
Blog Twitter BookTube Facebook Insta
June 13, 2024
I believe Greene’s opening paragraphs describing the war shattered streets and ruined buildings of Vienna, the litter of mangled tanks and debris that lay everywhere in those immediate post-war years are not much short of poetry.
Now I love the movie. I really love the movie. I see it as often as I can find an arthouse showing. But for pacing, atmosphere, pin-sharp description and sheer interest, when you compare the two openings the novel has it hands down. No question. Still what can you expect? The movie voice-over scene setting has it all wrapped up in one minute flat. Greene’s written introduction is a solid five-minute read – more still if you pore over and juice it. And I do.
What the book can’t compare with though is the power and immediacy of images still so raw in November 1948, they hurt. Carol Reed captures a Vienna where winter’s coming. Cold is falling out the sky in slabs. A veil of streetlight carves shadows out the old Jewish quarter, devastated by Allied bombing even before the Red Army arrived to finish the job. It's a perfect setting for a breathless nighttime foot chase. One of many, that words alone can’t ever capture.
So if I had to choose? Ask me again this time next year.
Now I love the movie. I really love the movie. I see it as often as I can find an arthouse showing. But for pacing, atmosphere, pin-sharp description and sheer interest, when you compare the two openings the novel has it hands down. No question. Still what can you expect? The movie voice-over scene setting has it all wrapped up in one minute flat. Greene’s written introduction is a solid five-minute read – more still if you pore over and juice it. And I do.
What the book can’t compare with though is the power and immediacy of images still so raw in November 1948, they hurt. Carol Reed captures a Vienna where winter’s coming. Cold is falling out the sky in slabs. A veil of streetlight carves shadows out the old Jewish quarter, devastated by Allied bombing even before the Red Army arrived to finish the job. It's a perfect setting for a breathless nighttime foot chase. One of many, that words alone can’t ever capture.
So if I had to choose? Ask me again this time next year.
March 5, 2022
IL PRIMO UOMO
Il gioco delle ombre.
Uno dei primi esempi di novelization della storia: la sceneggiatura del film scritta da Greene è del 1949, il romanzo (racconto lungo, novella) del 1950.
Holly Martin/Joseph Cotten e Anna Schmidt/Alida Valli.
Tra film e romanzo cambia il punto di vista, la voce narrante: nel libro a raccontare è il colonnello inglese Calloway (Trevor Howard), ufficiale dei servizi segreti britannici che deve bloccare un traffico di contrabbando (medicinali scaduti, avariati, più specificamente, penicillina) - nel film è lo stesso protagonista, lo scrittore Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) che arriva a Vienna subito dopo la liberazione (1945) per scoprire che fine ha fatto il suo amico d’infanzia Harry Lime (Orson Welles) nei cui loschi traffici finisce invischiato.
Il che trasforma la narrazione letteraria in un tono più disincantato e ironico, donandole la capacità di sorridere e non prendersi sul serio, cogliendo l’aspetto ridicolo di circostanze invece drammatiche.
Harry Lime/Orson Welles.
Io però preferisco il film, senza se e senza ma. Greene scrittore mi è più caro altrove.
Lo stesso Greene considerava superiore la pellicola al libro.
Il film è un miracolo dell’arte cinematografica.
Vienna era la location perfetta per i traffici illegali: bombardata, cosparsa di rovine e macerie, abbandonata, terra di tutti e nessuno, divisa in quattro zone di occupazione militare come Berlino (inglese, francese, russa e statunitense). Una città distrutta e allo sbando offriva riparo e humus a personaggi che necessitavano, o preferivano, muoversi nell’ombra, come Harry Lime.
Appuntamento alla ruota panoramica del Prater.
Holly Martins, scrittore di libri d’evasione (si tratta di romanzetti western presumibilmente non eccelsi), è il perfetto pollo per un luogo dove si giocano partite come quella messa in piedi dal suo amico Harry Lime: Holly è un ingenuo, impiega un tempo smisurato prima di decidere che il suo amico d’infanzia è diventato un lestofante. Si rifiuta di credere a quello che Calloway gli racconta, e vuole convincere l’agente inglese che il suo amico di sempre, che lui venera e idealizza, è innocente.
Più Lime è avido, spregiudicato, immorale, manipolatore e senza scrupoli, più Martins è all’opposto puro, ingenuo, rigorosamente etico, romantico, quasi sciocco.
Vienna dopo la guerra.
Holly (già dal nome si capisce che è un pedone, non certo un alfiere) arriva a Vienna per ‘indagare’ sulla morte di Lime: non crede alla versione ufficiale ed è convinto che il suo amico sia stato assassinato.
Omicidio al quale hanno assistito tre uomini, uno dei quali è sparito nel nulla.
Uno dei due testimoni, il portiere del palazzo dove abita Anna, viene ammazzato.
Holly Martins cerca il terzo uomo, colui che potrebbe risolvere il mistero, e finisce col trovare il finto morto (nella tomba di Harry Lime si scopre il cadavere di un altro).
Altro personaggio basilare è Anna Schmidt (Alida Valli), profuga ungherese con passaporto austriaco, attrice professionista, innocente pur se costretta a vivere di espedienti, e innocente anche se sinceramente innamorata di Harry Lime.
Anche lei, come Holly Martins, fa molta fatica a credere ai racconti di Calloway su Harry Lime, a convincersi che l’uomo che ama è uno spregiudicato truffatore.
Rifiuta e respinge sempre l’amore che Holly prova immediatamente per lei.
La fuga nelle fogne di Vienna.
Il terzo protagonista, il vertice del triangolo, è quindi proprio Harry Lime, un villain perfetto per l’arte di Orson Welles, che amava questi personaggi negativi ai quali sapeva dare vitalità, leggerezza, simpatia e carica umana come nessun altro: ironicamente melodrammatici, simpaticamente gigioni, misuratamente teatrali, erano personaggi divertenti e affascinanti benché loschi e corrotti.
Harry Lime è prima di tutto un’ombra, si muove nascosto dall’ombra, è un fantasma creduto morto per buona parte della storia (a parte da Calloway che lo vuole acciuffare): quando fa la sua prima apparizione ha indosso un cappotto che sembra un mantello e un cappello scuro.
Credo che la battuta aggiunta al dialogo del film dallo stesso Welles (parola di Greene) renda perfettamente lo spirito dell’uomo Harry Lime:
In Italia, sotto i Borgia, per trent'anni hanno avuto guerre, terrore, assassinii, massacri: e hanno prodotto Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci e il Rinascimento. In Svizzera, hanno avuto amore fraterno, cinquecento anni di pace e democrazia, e cos'hanno prodotto? Gli orologi a cucù.
Il film pur se diretto dal bravo Carol Reed, è il film più à la Welles che si possa immaginare: nell’uso del bianco e nero (fotografia di Robert Krasker), della profondità di campo, delle inquadrature sghembe e dal basso, nell’ironia, nel gioco di specchi, di rimandi, di travestimenti, nel gioco di maschere, nell’incastro di scatole narrative.
Nella stessa trama, che si potrebbe descrivere anche così: venuto in soccorso dell’amico, man mano Holly si trasforma in segugio, in inseguitore a sua volta però inseguito, vittima e carnefice, nel tentativo di districarsi da fili che lo controllano a sua insaputa.
Nella prima apparizione di Lime, protetto dalle tenebre, invisibile finché non si mostra, trionfo del ‘fuori campo’ che diventa fulcro narrativo, cinema arte del visibile che diventa arte dell’invisibile.
L’ombra di Welles regista è presente in ogni inquadratura proprio come l’assenza del personaggio che interpreta è vitale in ogni momento della storia.
È il prototipo del film cult.
A cominciare dalla colonna sonora (il motivo musicale di Anton Karas con la cetra), la fuga di Lime nelle fogne di Vienna, l’incontro tra Holly e Harry sulla ruota panoramica del Prater, la lunga camminata finale di Anna.
Un capolavoro da vedere decine di volte con lo stesso piacere.
Anna rifiuta l’amore di Holly e rimane fedele al ricordo di Harry.
Il gioco delle ombre.
Uno dei primi esempi di novelization della storia: la sceneggiatura del film scritta da Greene è del 1949, il romanzo (racconto lungo, novella) del 1950.
Holly Martin/Joseph Cotten e Anna Schmidt/Alida Valli.
Tra film e romanzo cambia il punto di vista, la voce narrante: nel libro a raccontare è il colonnello inglese Calloway (Trevor Howard), ufficiale dei servizi segreti britannici che deve bloccare un traffico di contrabbando (medicinali scaduti, avariati, più specificamente, penicillina) - nel film è lo stesso protagonista, lo scrittore Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) che arriva a Vienna subito dopo la liberazione (1945) per scoprire che fine ha fatto il suo amico d’infanzia Harry Lime (Orson Welles) nei cui loschi traffici finisce invischiato.
Il che trasforma la narrazione letteraria in un tono più disincantato e ironico, donandole la capacità di sorridere e non prendersi sul serio, cogliendo l’aspetto ridicolo di circostanze invece drammatiche.
Harry Lime/Orson Welles.
Io però preferisco il film, senza se e senza ma. Greene scrittore mi è più caro altrove.
Lo stesso Greene considerava superiore la pellicola al libro.
Il film è un miracolo dell’arte cinematografica.
Vienna era la location perfetta per i traffici illegali: bombardata, cosparsa di rovine e macerie, abbandonata, terra di tutti e nessuno, divisa in quattro zone di occupazione militare come Berlino (inglese, francese, russa e statunitense). Una città distrutta e allo sbando offriva riparo e humus a personaggi che necessitavano, o preferivano, muoversi nell’ombra, come Harry Lime.
Appuntamento alla ruota panoramica del Prater.
Holly Martins, scrittore di libri d’evasione (si tratta di romanzetti western presumibilmente non eccelsi), è il perfetto pollo per un luogo dove si giocano partite come quella messa in piedi dal suo amico Harry Lime: Holly è un ingenuo, impiega un tempo smisurato prima di decidere che il suo amico d’infanzia è diventato un lestofante. Si rifiuta di credere a quello che Calloway gli racconta, e vuole convincere l’agente inglese che il suo amico di sempre, che lui venera e idealizza, è innocente.
Più Lime è avido, spregiudicato, immorale, manipolatore e senza scrupoli, più Martins è all’opposto puro, ingenuo, rigorosamente etico, romantico, quasi sciocco.
Vienna dopo la guerra.
Holly (già dal nome si capisce che è un pedone, non certo un alfiere) arriva a Vienna per ‘indagare’ sulla morte di Lime: non crede alla versione ufficiale ed è convinto che il suo amico sia stato assassinato.
Omicidio al quale hanno assistito tre uomini, uno dei quali è sparito nel nulla.
Uno dei due testimoni, il portiere del palazzo dove abita Anna, viene ammazzato.
Holly Martins cerca il terzo uomo, colui che potrebbe risolvere il mistero, e finisce col trovare il finto morto (nella tomba di Harry Lime si scopre il cadavere di un altro).
Altro personaggio basilare è Anna Schmidt (Alida Valli), profuga ungherese con passaporto austriaco, attrice professionista, innocente pur se costretta a vivere di espedienti, e innocente anche se sinceramente innamorata di Harry Lime.
Anche lei, come Holly Martins, fa molta fatica a credere ai racconti di Calloway su Harry Lime, a convincersi che l’uomo che ama è uno spregiudicato truffatore.
Rifiuta e respinge sempre l’amore che Holly prova immediatamente per lei.
La fuga nelle fogne di Vienna.
Il terzo protagonista, il vertice del triangolo, è quindi proprio Harry Lime, un villain perfetto per l’arte di Orson Welles, che amava questi personaggi negativi ai quali sapeva dare vitalità, leggerezza, simpatia e carica umana come nessun altro: ironicamente melodrammatici, simpaticamente gigioni, misuratamente teatrali, erano personaggi divertenti e affascinanti benché loschi e corrotti.
Harry Lime è prima di tutto un’ombra, si muove nascosto dall’ombra, è un fantasma creduto morto per buona parte della storia (a parte da Calloway che lo vuole acciuffare): quando fa la sua prima apparizione ha indosso un cappotto che sembra un mantello e un cappello scuro.
Credo che la battuta aggiunta al dialogo del film dallo stesso Welles (parola di Greene) renda perfettamente lo spirito dell’uomo Harry Lime:
In Italia, sotto i Borgia, per trent'anni hanno avuto guerre, terrore, assassinii, massacri: e hanno prodotto Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci e il Rinascimento. In Svizzera, hanno avuto amore fraterno, cinquecento anni di pace e democrazia, e cos'hanno prodotto? Gli orologi a cucù.
Il film pur se diretto dal bravo Carol Reed, è il film più à la Welles che si possa immaginare: nell’uso del bianco e nero (fotografia di Robert Krasker), della profondità di campo, delle inquadrature sghembe e dal basso, nell’ironia, nel gioco di specchi, di rimandi, di travestimenti, nel gioco di maschere, nell’incastro di scatole narrative.
Nella stessa trama, che si potrebbe descrivere anche così: venuto in soccorso dell’amico, man mano Holly si trasforma in segugio, in inseguitore a sua volta però inseguito, vittima e carnefice, nel tentativo di districarsi da fili che lo controllano a sua insaputa.
Nella prima apparizione di Lime, protetto dalle tenebre, invisibile finché non si mostra, trionfo del ‘fuori campo’ che diventa fulcro narrativo, cinema arte del visibile che diventa arte dell’invisibile.
L’ombra di Welles regista è presente in ogni inquadratura proprio come l’assenza del personaggio che interpreta è vitale in ogni momento della storia.
È il prototipo del film cult.
A cominciare dalla colonna sonora (il motivo musicale di Anton Karas con la cetra), la fuga di Lime nelle fogne di Vienna, l’incontro tra Holly e Harry sulla ruota panoramica del Prater, la lunga camminata finale di Anna.
Un capolavoro da vedere decine di volte con lo stesso piacere.
Anna rifiuta l’amore di Holly e rimane fedele al ricordo di Harry.
March 12, 2022
Novela de espías al uso. Un escritor que viaja a la Viena ocupada por las fuerzas vencedoras de la II Guerra Mundial para ver a un viejo amigo. Cuando llega resulta que ha muerto en extrañas circunstancias y hay multitud de versiones sobre su muerte: asesinato, accidente, venganza, acusaciones, etc. El amigo escritor decide abrir una investigación por su cuenta que estará plagada de peligros y doble juego.
Una novela interesante. Muy entretenida. Básicamente, se basa en el juego del gato y el ratón. La película "El tercer hombre" se basó en esta misma novela con guión del mismo Greene, aunque el autor nos explica al principio que la película necesitó cambios "obligados" y no es estrictamente fiel.
Por lo demás, un libro sin mucho artificio, unos buenos personajes, una buena ambientación y una situación temporal (la Viena post-nazi) que la hace doblemente interesante.
Es una novela que da para mucho más y se me ha hecho demasiado corta. Se nota que es como un guión preliminar hecho un poco con prisa, lo que no le quita mérito.
---------------------------------------------
Usual spy novel. A writer travels to Vienna, occupied by the victorious forces of World War II, to see an old friend. When he arrives, it turns out that he has died in strange circumstances and there are a multitude of versions of his death: murder, accident, revenge, accusations, etc. The writer friend decides to open an investigation of his own that will be fraught with danger and double-dealing.
An interesting novel. Very entertaining. Basically, it is based on the game of cat and mouse. The film "The Third Man" was based on this same novel with a screenplay by Greene himself, although the author explains at the beginning that the film needed "forced" changes and is not strictly faithful.
Otherwise, a book without much artifice, good characters, a good setting and a temporal situation (post-Nazi Vienna) that makes it doubly interesting.
It is a novel that could have been much more and it was too short for me. You can tell that it's like a preliminary script written in a bit of a hurry, but that doesn't detract from its merit.
Una novela interesante. Muy entretenida. Básicamente, se basa en el juego del gato y el ratón. La película "El tercer hombre" se basó en esta misma novela con guión del mismo Greene, aunque el autor nos explica al principio que la película necesitó cambios "obligados" y no es estrictamente fiel.
Por lo demás, un libro sin mucho artificio, unos buenos personajes, una buena ambientación y una situación temporal (la Viena post-nazi) que la hace doblemente interesante.
Es una novela que da para mucho más y se me ha hecho demasiado corta. Se nota que es como un guión preliminar hecho un poco con prisa, lo que no le quita mérito.
---------------------------------------------
Usual spy novel. A writer travels to Vienna, occupied by the victorious forces of World War II, to see an old friend. When he arrives, it turns out that he has died in strange circumstances and there are a multitude of versions of his death: murder, accident, revenge, accusations, etc. The writer friend decides to open an investigation of his own that will be fraught with danger and double-dealing.
An interesting novel. Very entertaining. Basically, it is based on the game of cat and mouse. The film "The Third Man" was based on this same novel with a screenplay by Greene himself, although the author explains at the beginning that the film needed "forced" changes and is not strictly faithful.
Otherwise, a book without much artifice, good characters, a good setting and a temporal situation (post-Nazi Vienna) that makes it doubly interesting.
It is a novel that could have been much more and it was too short for me. You can tell that it's like a preliminary script written in a bit of a hurry, but that doesn't detract from its merit.
June 9, 2023
Graham Greene to my mind somewhat stuffily separated his narrative books for much of his career into two categories—fiction and “entertainments”—such as this noir novel, The Third Man. The book was written (or at least published) after the screenplay he produced for the film by the same name (1949, directed by Carol Reed, featuring Joseph Cotton and Orson Welles). I saw the film decades ago, and since I was reading all these mysteries and detective fiction, and because I had just reread two of his finest novels, The Heart of the Matter and The Power and the Glory, I thought I would listen to the novel written by a celebrated novelist I admire, but the only thing available on my audiobook service was this adaptation for the stage of the screenplay. Since two of the actors include Kelsey Grammer and John Mahoney (Frasier), I jumped, and enjoyed. I just don’t see the distinction between novels and entertainments; great writing is great writing.
The Third Man is a really well-written thriller, short and taut and efficient, about a crime ring that sells diluted penicillin on the black market in Vienna in the aftermath of World War II. Novelist Holly Martins is haunted by the news of the death of his friend Harry Lime, who had offered him a job. Who killed Lime? And why? Or is he possibly still alive? Martins enlists the help of Anna Schmidt, Lime’s girlfriend. There’s some great dialogue and some happy surprises along the way. The focus of the criminal material also, not surprisingly for the Catholic Greene, involves an ethical concern: The children who are victims of (Lime's) diluted penicillin, become brain-damaged as a result of meningitis.
Lime, at one point confronted, makes a brutal and heartless case for arguing in favor of greed over “the dots” (human beings, the masses, the countless poor) he observes from a several stories high perspective:
“You know what the fellow said – in Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace – and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”
Highly recommended, but you have to actual see the film if you not yet seen it. The British Film Institute deemed it in 1997 the best British film in history!
I revise my review after reading the graphic novel, The Prague Coup, which asserts a theory that this film was somehow a message to Greene's friend and former MI6 colleague, Kim Philby, a convicted spy and traitor who sold secrets to the Soviet Union.
PS: I saw again, for maybe the third or fourth time, the terrific film by Carol Reed. Robert Krasker won the Academy Award for cinematography for his black and white, atmospheric use of lighting and unsettling "Dutch angles." Seeing it through the perspective of this book, the late scene in the sewer system where Hollis (Holly) Martins confronts his friend, Harry Lime, for unforgivable crimes; well, Greene himself did not do the same to his friend and traitor/spy Kim Philby. So it's a complicated message.
Here's the short trailer for Carol Reed’s justifiably famous film:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9yyD...
The Third Man is a really well-written thriller, short and taut and efficient, about a crime ring that sells diluted penicillin on the black market in Vienna in the aftermath of World War II. Novelist Holly Martins is haunted by the news of the death of his friend Harry Lime, who had offered him a job. Who killed Lime? And why? Or is he possibly still alive? Martins enlists the help of Anna Schmidt, Lime’s girlfriend. There’s some great dialogue and some happy surprises along the way. The focus of the criminal material also, not surprisingly for the Catholic Greene, involves an ethical concern: The children who are victims of (Lime's) diluted penicillin, become brain-damaged as a result of meningitis.
Lime, at one point confronted, makes a brutal and heartless case for arguing in favor of greed over “the dots” (human beings, the masses, the countless poor) he observes from a several stories high perspective:
“You know what the fellow said – in Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace – and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”
Highly recommended, but you have to actual see the film if you not yet seen it. The British Film Institute deemed it in 1997 the best British film in history!
I revise my review after reading the graphic novel, The Prague Coup, which asserts a theory that this film was somehow a message to Greene's friend and former MI6 colleague, Kim Philby, a convicted spy and traitor who sold secrets to the Soviet Union.
PS: I saw again, for maybe the third or fourth time, the terrific film by Carol Reed. Robert Krasker won the Academy Award for cinematography for his black and white, atmospheric use of lighting and unsettling "Dutch angles." Seeing it through the perspective of this book, the late scene in the sewer system where Hollis (Holly) Martins confronts his friend, Harry Lime, for unforgivable crimes; well, Greene himself did not do the same to his friend and traitor/spy Kim Philby. So it's a complicated message.
Here's the short trailer for Carol Reed’s justifiably famous film:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9yyD...
April 15, 2020
فیلم مرد سوم را که کارول رید کارگردانی کرده قبلا با فاصله زمانی، دو بار دیده بودم. چقدر فیلم خوبی بود. چقدر اورسن ولز دوست داشتنی و عالی بود. خلاصه به خاطر این فیلم مشتاق شدم کتاب گراهام گرین را بخونم. من که از فیلم خیلی بیشتر از کتاب لذت بردم. در صورتی که فیلم را ندیدید حتما ببینید.
(The third man, 1949, 8.2; Meta: 97)
********************************************************************************
این قدر اخم نکن رفیق. به هر حال همه چی این قدرها هم افتضاح نیست. یکی میگفت سی سال تو ایتالیایی که خانوادهی بورجا بهش حکومت کردند فقط درگیری بود و وحشت و قتل و خونریزی. ولی از دلش میکلآنژ و لئوناردو داوینچی و رنسانس هم در آمد. مردم سوئیس عشق برادرانه داشتند؛ پانصد سال
دموکراسی و صلح، به کجا رسید؟ ساعت خروسدار. خداحافظ هالی. ص17 کتاب. دقیقه 81 فیلم. دیالوگی که اورسن ولز شخصا نوشته و اضافه کرده.
فيلم «مـرد سوم» بلافاصله بعد از پايان جنگ جهـانی دوم، در وين سـاخته شـد. شخصـيت فيلم، هری لايم، متأثر از تأثيرات جنگ پشت سر گذاشته شده، می گويد: «با اين حال، همه چيز وحشتناک نبود . . . در ايتاليا طی دورهی بورگياس، يـک جنـگ سی سـاله جريـان داشت و با ترور و قتل و خون ريزی همراه بود، اما آنها ميکل آنجلو، لئوناردو داوينچی و عصر روشن گری را آفريدند. در سوئيس عشق برادارنه و ۵۰۰ سال دمکراسی و صـلح حاکم بود. اما آنها چه چيزی از خود به جا گذاشتند؟ يک ساعت کوکو». تقريبا تمام اطلاعات لايم اشتباه بود. سـوئيس شـايد خون آلـودترين گوشهی اروپـای نـوين بـود و صادرات عمدهاش سربازان مواجب بگير بود. و ساعت کوکو هم در آلمان ابداع شد. امــا اين حقايق، در مقايسه با نظر او، از اهميت کمتری برخوردار بود. و نظر او اين بود کــه تجربهی جنگ، انسان را به سوی دستاوردهای جديد سوق میدهـد. جنگ به انتخاب طبيعی آزادی عمل میدهد و ضعيف را از ميـان بـر میدارد و بـه مهـاجم و بلنـدپرواز پاداش میدهد. جنگ حقيقت را در بارهی زندگی نمايان میکنـد و اشـتياق بـه قـدرت، عظمت و پيروزی را بيدار میکند. نيچه اين را با اين گفته جمع بندی کرد که "جنـگ مدرسهی زندگی است" و "آنچه که مرا نکشد، قوی تر خواهد ساخت". انسان خدا گونه: یوال نوح هراری: ص 401 کتاب
گاهی نابودی گذشته آدمی را وا میدارد به اینکه دست رد بزند به سینهی آینده، به اینکه چشم به راه رسیدن آینده نباشد و خیال نکند که آینده چیز بهتری است. آینده، شاید، صورت تغییر یافتهی همین امروز است و امروز، شاید، چیزی نیست غیر صورت دگرگون شدهی دیروزی که عملا، به دست فراموشی سپرده شده است. این آدم است که فرق میگذارد بین دیروز و امروز، بین امروز و فردا. موخره مترجم، ص148 کتاب.
(The third man, 1949, 8.2; Meta: 97)
********************************************************************************
این قدر اخم نکن رفیق. به هر حال همه چی این قدرها هم افتضاح نیست. یکی میگفت سی سال تو ایتالیایی که خانوادهی بورجا بهش حکومت کردند فقط درگیری بود و وحشت و قتل و خونریزی. ولی از دلش میکلآنژ و لئوناردو داوینچی و رنسانس هم در آمد. مردم سوئیس عشق برادرانه داشتند؛ پانصد سال
دموکراسی و صلح، به کجا رسید؟ ساعت خروسدار. خداحافظ هالی. ص17 کتاب. دقیقه 81 فیلم. دیالوگی که اورسن ولز شخصا نوشته و اضافه کرده.
فيلم «مـرد سوم» بلافاصله بعد از پايان جنگ جهـانی دوم، در وين سـاخته شـد. شخصـيت فيلم، هری لايم، متأثر از تأثيرات جنگ پشت سر گذاشته شده، می گويد: «با اين حال، همه چيز وحشتناک نبود . . . در ايتاليا طی دورهی بورگياس، يـک جنـگ سی سـاله جريـان داشت و با ترور و قتل و خون ريزی همراه بود، اما آنها ميکل آنجلو، لئوناردو داوينچی و عصر روشن گری را آفريدند. در سوئيس عشق برادارنه و ۵۰۰ سال دمکراسی و صـلح حاکم بود. اما آنها چه چيزی از خود به جا گذاشتند؟ يک ساعت کوکو». تقريبا تمام اطلاعات لايم اشتباه بود. سـوئيس شـايد خون آلـودترين گوشهی اروپـای نـوين بـود و صادرات عمدهاش سربازان مواجب بگير بود. و ساعت کوکو هم در آلمان ابداع شد. امــا اين حقايق، در مقايسه با نظر او، از اهميت کمتری برخوردار بود. و نظر او اين بود کــه تجربهی جنگ، انسان را به سوی دستاوردهای جديد سوق میدهـد. جنگ به انتخاب طبيعی آزادی عمل میدهد و ضعيف را از ميـان بـر میدارد و بـه مهـاجم و بلنـدپرواز پاداش میدهد. جنگ حقيقت را در بارهی زندگی نمايان میکنـد و اشـتياق بـه قـدرت، عظمت و پيروزی را بيدار میکند. نيچه اين را با اين گفته جمع بندی کرد که "جنـگ مدرسهی زندگی است" و "آنچه که مرا نکشد، قوی تر خواهد ساخت". انسان خدا گونه: یوال نوح هراری: ص 401 کتاب
گاهی نابودی گذشته آدمی را وا میدارد به اینکه دست رد بزند به سینهی آینده، به اینکه چشم به راه رسیدن آینده نباشد و خیال نکند که آینده چیز بهتری است. آینده، شاید، صورت تغییر یافتهی همین امروز است و امروز، شاید، چیزی نیست غیر صورت دگرگون شدهی دیروزی که عملا، به دست فراموشی سپرده شده است. این آدم است که فرق میگذارد بین دیروز و امروز، بین امروز و فردا. موخره مترجم، ص148 کتاب.
January 4, 2024
In The Third Man, Graham Greene uses an interesting narrative technique. It is told in first person – from the point of view of Inspector Calloway while he spies on Rollo Martins, a writer of American pulp westerns who has arrived in Vienna at the behest of a man named Harry Lime. But Inspector Calloway mostly takes a back seat and narrates how the lecherous but clever Rollo Martins solves the case of Harry Lime’s mysterious death in a car accident. Rollo Martins is the main character while Calloway provides context – the post-war Vienna with its scenes of devastation, under a power sharing agreement between America, France, Britain and Russia.
I think Rollo Martin the writer of pulpy American westerns is supposed to represent impending American cultural hegemony after World War 2. The film was released in 1949 and the book in 1950, so if this is what the Greene intended, then it was very prophetic.
Some of the characters (like the book enthusiast who invites Rollo to a book discussion) were inserted just to make the plot more complicated. Maybe it was intended as comic relief in what is a pretty depressing novel.
The book is quite critical of American enterprise. The Harry Lime character could be symbolic of American capitalism and attitude towards life. Or maybe he represents nihilistic post-war attitudes that are characteristic of the devastated psyches of those who witnessed the atrocities of war. Rollo reminds Harry that he was a Catholic. But Harry brushes him away. I was struck by a couple of religious references. Like the ones in the chapter where Rollo meets Dr.Winkler who was present at the scene of Harry’s accident. Rollo is enamored by Winkler’s waiting room which is like an antique shop filled with crucifixes and reliquaries some of which according to Winkler were made of animal bones.
"If they were genuine what an odd fate it was, for a portion of Saint Susanna's knuckle to come to rest in Dr Winkler's waiting room." – Rollo wonders to himself.
I think Greene’s point was that even though Dr.Winkler’s room helped in putting up this front that he was pious, it was all lies and deceit beneath.
I think Rollo Martin the writer of pulpy American westerns is supposed to represent impending American cultural hegemony after World War 2. The film was released in 1949 and the book in 1950, so if this is what the Greene intended, then it was very prophetic.
Some of the characters (like the book enthusiast who invites Rollo to a book discussion) were inserted just to make the plot more complicated. Maybe it was intended as comic relief in what is a pretty depressing novel.
The book is quite critical of American enterprise. The Harry Lime character could be symbolic of American capitalism and attitude towards life. Or maybe he represents nihilistic post-war attitudes that are characteristic of the devastated psyches of those who witnessed the atrocities of war. Rollo reminds Harry that he was a Catholic. But Harry brushes him away. I was struck by a couple of religious references. Like the ones in the chapter where Rollo meets Dr.Winkler who was present at the scene of Harry’s accident. Rollo is enamored by Winkler’s waiting room which is like an antique shop filled with crucifixes and reliquaries some of which according to Winkler were made of animal bones.
"If they were genuine what an odd fate it was, for a portion of Saint Susanna's knuckle to come to rest in Dr Winkler's waiting room." – Rollo wonders to himself.
I think Greene’s point was that even though Dr.Winkler’s room helped in putting up this front that he was pious, it was all lies and deceit beneath.
April 25, 2017
Rollo Martins, incurable ladies’ man and author of trashy novels set on The Wild West, accepts an invitation from his best friend Harry Lime and arrives in Vienna just in time to attend his funeral. But what’s really happened ? Seemingly accident, but testimony from eyewitnesses and Harry’s new friends are, to tell the truth, not credible. So Rollo, like a noble sheriff from his own stories, decides to solve the mystery. Well, easier said than done. With empty pockets, friendless in strange city it seems to be practically unfeasible. But as ones say fortune favours fools and Rollo by a happy coincidence mistaken for a known writer gains time, accommodation and some money. So he goes into town.
Vienna, beautiful city vibrant with life, full of monuments and green parks, resounded with Strauss music. No, no, we don’t get Vienna like that. In Greene’s novel Vienna, divided up in four occupation zones is a real ghost town, leveled to the ground, with Great Wheel on Prater overlooking the ruins . It is simply a city of undignified ruins which turned that February into great glacier of snow and ice .
To put it mildly that what Rollo would know about Harry was not too flattered. Involved in under-the-counter trade, what’s worse dealing in diluted penicillin ? Harry, this charming, witty Harry ? A racketeer ? No, it can’t be true. But if …?
The Third Man then is a depressing story enhanced by picture of destroyed city with some unexpectedly amusing moments, to mention Rollo’s soiree. It’s a story about disillusioned man, exposed criminal and broken friendship. Poor Rollo. Poor all of us, when you come to think of it .
But poor Harry ?
August 10, 2022
“In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”---Harry Lime, summing up evil and good in THE THIRD MAN. Twas both ironical and inevitable that Orson Wells should have delivered the most iconic line in British cinema (see above) and American cinema, "Rosebud". Harry is the wickedest person you can conceive, peddling fake penicillin to children and other unfortunates in post-war Vienna, yet that does not stop Graham Greene from using him to explore the perennial Greene theme of "what is loyalty and to whom is it due?". Lime's best friend, Martins, a writer of pulp Western hugely popular in the States, arrives in Vienna and at first finds it inconceivable Harry would ever perpetrate such horror. When the British military police show him incontrovertible proof, he hears morality calling and sells out Lime. Not so his mistress, who sees the same evidence and concludes her love for Harry is a higher calling than the law. Which one is right? Greene always leaves such questions to the reader. This is an ethical tale wrapped inside an exciting mystery: Is Harry Lime still even alive? You can enjoy THE THIRD man both as a dialogue on loyalty and betrayal and a great yarn on living the underground life, literally and figuratively.
July 10, 2018
One of my alltime movie favourites!
May 26, 2020
Wow. I suppose I shouldn't be all that surprised that Graham Greene's novella, (yes, the Orson Welles movie) was a very well-written and tight mystery/thriller.
I am surprised, however, at how relevant and interesting it is after all these years.
It's tight, interesting, fast-paced, and often surprising. But above all, it grabs you. :) It also happens to accomplish a ton in a short time, doesn't digress forever in weird, inconsequential directions, and it kinda shames a lot of the modern thriller models. :)
It makes me wonder if I ought to go on a true Noir kick and see just how good they really were... or if this just happens to be a truffle among pigs. :)
I am surprised, however, at how relevant and interesting it is after all these years.
It's tight, interesting, fast-paced, and often surprising. But above all, it grabs you. :) It also happens to accomplish a ton in a short time, doesn't digress forever in weird, inconsequential directions, and it kinda shames a lot of the modern thriller models. :)
It makes me wonder if I ought to go on a true Noir kick and see just how good they really were... or if this just happens to be a truffle among pigs. :)
August 17, 2021
This short novella is very intriguing. With constant shifting of allies...betrayal. Once a beautiful city Vienna after the war is left to rubble.
This mystery is full of suspense as told by a British Police, Calloway who has these interesting mind thinking conversations with Rollo. He is a bit cynical but a proper policeman.
Rollo comes to Vienna as his friend Harry ask him to write about his (inmoral) work with the refugees, but once there discovers he arrives in time for Harry's funeral. Rollo not understanding the death, Harry hit by a car, sets out to form his own detective skills using Harry's girlfriend Anna, who is devoted to Harry.
The plot has twist and turns as one would expect with some tension thrown in for good measure.
“We never get accustomed to being less important to other people than they are to us.”
This mystery is full of suspense as told by a British Police, Calloway who has these interesting mind thinking conversations with Rollo. He is a bit cynical but a proper policeman.
Rollo comes to Vienna as his friend Harry ask him to write about his (inmoral) work with the refugees, but once there discovers he arrives in time for Harry's funeral. Rollo not understanding the death, Harry hit by a car, sets out to form his own detective skills using Harry's girlfriend Anna, who is devoted to Harry.
The plot has twist and turns as one would expect with some tension thrown in for good measure.
“We never get accustomed to being less important to other people than they are to us.”
September 26, 2025
This book is miles better than it really has any right to be - it wasn't originally intended for publication, but was written (largely, I can't believe that it didn't go through another draft or two) as the treatment of this story before Greene embarked on the script written for the legendary film directed by Carol Reed and starring Orson Welles.
Presumably the success of the film led to Greene and his publishers realising that a quick buck could be made on its back, and, in his very interesting short preface, Greene writes about the differences of writing for the page and the screen and how collaboration and the accidents of production can transform what's on the page into movie magic: Reed's fortuitous discovery of zither player Anton Karas who created the iconic 'Harry Lime Theme', for example, and Welles writing his own dialogue for Harry Lime, which Greene freely admits beats everything he'd written for the character into a cocked hat, including the film's most famous lines about the Swiss and Cuckoo Clocks.
The opening pages are absolutely superb, from the frozen ground of Vienna in February where the gravediggers have to use electric drills to break up the ground in order to bury Harry Lime, before they cover Lime's coffin 'with soil like bricks'. And possibly Greene's greatest ever line of prose: "We never grow accustomed to being less important to others than they are to us" - which is profound genius.
I've reduced to 4 stars because even though it's a short book it does start to drag a bit in the second half: action that is captivating on the screen can be duller on the page, but it's still a great cold war read.
Greene was always sniffily dismissive of what he called his "Entertainments", perhaps because he found them pretty easy to write, but they are, in my opinion, undoubtedly his best work and are what he will ultimately be remembered for.
Presumably the success of the film led to Greene and his publishers realising that a quick buck could be made on its back, and, in his very interesting short preface, Greene writes about the differences of writing for the page and the screen and how collaboration and the accidents of production can transform what's on the page into movie magic: Reed's fortuitous discovery of zither player Anton Karas who created the iconic 'Harry Lime Theme', for example, and Welles writing his own dialogue for Harry Lime, which Greene freely admits beats everything he'd written for the character into a cocked hat, including the film's most famous lines about the Swiss and Cuckoo Clocks.
The opening pages are absolutely superb, from the frozen ground of Vienna in February where the gravediggers have to use electric drills to break up the ground in order to bury Harry Lime, before they cover Lime's coffin 'with soil like bricks'. And possibly Greene's greatest ever line of prose: "We never grow accustomed to being less important to others than they are to us" - which is profound genius.
I've reduced to 4 stars because even though it's a short book it does start to drag a bit in the second half: action that is captivating on the screen can be duller on the page, but it's still a great cold war read.
Greene was always sniffily dismissive of what he called his "Entertainments", perhaps because he found them pretty easy to write, but they are, in my opinion, undoubtedly his best work and are what he will ultimately be remembered for.
March 23, 2025
5★
“I had paid my last farewell to Harry a week ago, when his coffin was lowered into the frozen February ground, so that it was with incredulity that I saw him pass by, without a sign of recognition, among the host of strangers in the Strand.”
Graham Greene wrote in 1947, that this was the sentence he had scribbled on the back of an envelope as an idea for a story. I think it sums up the opening perfectly, whether or not he remembered exactly.
This has had many lives as a story, screenplay, and dramatized audio, which is what I listened to. I think it is often accepted that the film versions are better than the written story, which I can’t judge, since I listened to the recording with Kelsey Grammer and John Mahoney, which was excellent.
The main character’s name underwent a few transformations -Rollo, Holley, Holly – Martins, so I’ll simply say that Martins has arrived in Vienna after World War II at the paid invitation of his old friend Harry Lime.
Vienna was still occupied territory, split into four zones - Russian, British, American, French – with an inner sector of public buildings and statues controlled by all four powers. Four military police – one from each power – patrolled together, with communication between often limited to the language of their enemy, German. Ironic.
It is a dangerous city with everyone suspicious of everyone else. While Martins is waiting for Harry to pick him up, someone tells him that he’s almost missed Harry’s funeral. He makes connections with some of Harry’s acquaintances, including his girlfriend, and tries to find out how Harry died. Then, when he’s sure he spots Harry in the street, the story becomes a thriller.
A famous line from the movie, which is also used in the Audible audio, was apparently written by Orson Welles, who collaborated on the script and starred in the original film. When Martins protests about crooks capitalising on wartime shortages of medicines, he is told:
“ ‘In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.’”
I gather that the Swiss later informed Welles that the cuckoo clock came from Bavaria, Germany, but as far as I know, the line remains. Artistic licence, I assume. 😊
So much for philosophy.
I haven’t seen the films, which have quite a collaborative history, but I can say that the LA Theatre Works full-cast performance with full sound effects is excellent. I listened to it as an Audible member, but I see it’s available on Spotify, Kobo and other places as well, and won an Audie award.
Interesting bit of background here: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytim...
“I had paid my last farewell to Harry a week ago, when his coffin was lowered into the frozen February ground, so that it was with incredulity that I saw him pass by, without a sign of recognition, among the host of strangers in the Strand.”
Graham Greene wrote in 1947, that this was the sentence he had scribbled on the back of an envelope as an idea for a story. I think it sums up the opening perfectly, whether or not he remembered exactly.
This has had many lives as a story, screenplay, and dramatized audio, which is what I listened to. I think it is often accepted that the film versions are better than the written story, which I can’t judge, since I listened to the recording with Kelsey Grammer and John Mahoney, which was excellent.
The main character’s name underwent a few transformations -Rollo, Holley, Holly – Martins, so I’ll simply say that Martins has arrived in Vienna after World War II at the paid invitation of his old friend Harry Lime.
Vienna was still occupied territory, split into four zones - Russian, British, American, French – with an inner sector of public buildings and statues controlled by all four powers. Four military police – one from each power – patrolled together, with communication between often limited to the language of their enemy, German. Ironic.
It is a dangerous city with everyone suspicious of everyone else. While Martins is waiting for Harry to pick him up, someone tells him that he’s almost missed Harry’s funeral. He makes connections with some of Harry’s acquaintances, including his girlfriend, and tries to find out how Harry died. Then, when he’s sure he spots Harry in the street, the story becomes a thriller.
A famous line from the movie, which is also used in the Audible audio, was apparently written by Orson Welles, who collaborated on the script and starred in the original film. When Martins protests about crooks capitalising on wartime shortages of medicines, he is told:
“ ‘In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.’”
I gather that the Swiss later informed Welles that the cuckoo clock came from Bavaria, Germany, but as far as I know, the line remains. Artistic licence, I assume. 😊
So much for philosophy.
I haven’t seen the films, which have quite a collaborative history, but I can say that the LA Theatre Works full-cast performance with full sound effects is excellent. I listened to it as an Audible member, but I see it’s available on Spotify, Kobo and other places as well, and won an Audie award.
Interesting bit of background here: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytim...
July 10, 2020
This is a short Graham Greene book - novella if you will.
It is a fast moving story, it doesn't hang about setting the scene, or going into in-depth descriptions, it just gets on with the mystery.
The way the story is told is interesting. The story is told as the recollections of Calloway, the English Colonel running the police in the British quarter of Vienna, post WWII. He explains the story of Rollo Martins, a novelist and friend of a British man living in Vienna, Harry Lime. Martins turns up in Vienna to visit Lime, only to find he died when hit by a car only a day before his arrival.
Calloway basically says to Rollo "just as well for him he died, we were about to pick him up for his criminal behaviour". Rollo is displeased, and disbelieving, and after taking a swing at Calloway, sets off on a crusade to prove his deceased friend innocent.
Tucking into too much more plot would require the use of spoilers, so I will leave it at that.
This is a novella that doesn't take itself too seriously. It self mocks the genre, and it is pretty funny.
I enjoyed a number of bits, this one was good. The International Patrol turn up to arrest Anna (The IP are made up of the duty officer from the Russian, British, American and French forces, who drive about and jointly make decisions in the evenings as a police force):
There is a lot of comedy in these situations if you are not directly concerned. You need a background of Central European terror, of a father who belonged to a losing side, of house -searches and disappearances, before the fear outweighs the comedy. The Russian, you see, refused to leave the room while Anna dressed: the Englishman refused to remain in the room: the American wouldn’t leave a girl unprotected with a Russian soldier, and the Frenchman – well, I think the Frenchman must have thought it was fun. Can’t you imagine the scene? The Russian was just doing his duty and watched the girl all the time, without a flicker of sexual interest; the American stood with his back chivalrously turned, but aware, I am sure, of every movement; the Frenchman smoked his cigarette and watched with detached amusement the reflection of the girl dressing in the mirror of the wardrobe; and the Englishman stood in the passage wondering what to do next.
Four Stars.
It is a fast moving story, it doesn't hang about setting the scene, or going into in-depth descriptions, it just gets on with the mystery.
The way the story is told is interesting. The story is told as the recollections of Calloway, the English Colonel running the police in the British quarter of Vienna, post WWII. He explains the story of Rollo Martins, a novelist and friend of a British man living in Vienna, Harry Lime. Martins turns up in Vienna to visit Lime, only to find he died when hit by a car only a day before his arrival.
Calloway basically says to Rollo "just as well for him he died, we were about to pick him up for his criminal behaviour". Rollo is displeased, and disbelieving, and after taking a swing at Calloway, sets off on a crusade to prove his deceased friend innocent.
Tucking into too much more plot would require the use of spoilers, so I will leave it at that.
This is a novella that doesn't take itself too seriously. It self mocks the genre, and it is pretty funny.
I enjoyed a number of bits, this one was good. The International Patrol turn up to arrest Anna (The IP are made up of the duty officer from the Russian, British, American and French forces, who drive about and jointly make decisions in the evenings as a police force):
There is a lot of comedy in these situations if you are not directly concerned. You need a background of Central European terror, of a father who belonged to a losing side, of house -searches and disappearances, before the fear outweighs the comedy. The Russian, you see, refused to leave the room while Anna dressed: the Englishman refused to remain in the room: the American wouldn’t leave a girl unprotected with a Russian soldier, and the Frenchman – well, I think the Frenchman must have thought it was fun. Can’t you imagine the scene? The Russian was just doing his duty and watched the girl all the time, without a flicker of sexual interest; the American stood with his back chivalrously turned, but aware, I am sure, of every movement; the Frenchman smoked his cigarette and watched with detached amusement the reflection of the girl dressing in the mirror of the wardrobe; and the Englishman stood in the passage wondering what to do next.
Four Stars.
May 16, 2019
یادم نمیاد چرا این کتاب رو "وانْت تو رید" زدم ولی احتمالا ریویویی چیزی توجهمو جلب کرده بوده! بعد از دو تا کتابِ نسبتا حجیم، ترجیح دادم یه کتاب کم حجم بخونم و " مرد سوم" رو برداشتم! تو یکی دو صفحه ی اول حس کردم از اون کتاباست که زورکی فقط باید تمومش کنم! اما تا به خودم اومدم دیدم رسیدم به صفحه ی آخر!
بخشی از موخرهی مترجم:
مرز خوبی و بدی، درست و نادرست، ایمان و بیایمانی و البته خیانت و وفاداری در داستانهای گراهام گرین همیشه خط بینهایت باریکی است که باید در نهایت دقت از آن گذشت. "مرد سوم" هم مثل باقی داستان های او روی همین خط بی نهایت باریک اتفاق میافتد و آدمهایش با اینکه از مهر و دوستی و چیزهایی از این دست حرف میزنند، به وقتش گوی سبقت را در خیانت و نابودی یکدیگر از هم میربایند و دست آخر، آنچه میماند حس و حال یک بازندهی حقیقی است؛ آدمی که همه چیز را باخته، همهی چیزهایی که بنظرش حقیقی بودهاند، ناگهان خرد شدهاند و ریختهاند روی زمین و حالا با تماشای این تکههای خردشده و پراکنده، این حقیقت رسواکننده، به گذشتهای فکر میکند که شک دارد ارزشش را داشته است یا نه، به گذشتهای که شاید همهی ما شک داریم که ارزشش را داشته یا نه!
پ ن: کل کتاب یه طرف، موخره ی مترجم یه طرف👌🏻
بخشی از موخرهی مترجم:
مرز خوبی و بدی، درست و نادرست، ایمان و بیایمانی و البته خیانت و وفاداری در داستانهای گراهام گرین همیشه خط بینهایت باریکی است که باید در نهایت دقت از آن گذشت. "مرد سوم" هم مثل باقی داستان های او روی همین خط بی نهایت باریک اتفاق میافتد و آدمهایش با اینکه از مهر و دوستی و چیزهایی از این دست حرف میزنند، به وقتش گوی سبقت را در خیانت و نابودی یکدیگر از هم میربایند و دست آخر، آنچه میماند حس و حال یک بازندهی حقیقی است؛ آدمی که همه چیز را باخته، همهی چیزهایی که بنظرش حقیقی بودهاند، ناگهان خرد شدهاند و ریختهاند روی زمین و حالا با تماشای این تکههای خردشده و پراکنده، این حقیقت رسواکننده، به گذشتهای فکر میکند که شک دارد ارزشش را داشته است یا نه، به گذشتهای که شاید همهی ما شک داریم که ارزشش را داشته یا نه!
پ ن: کل کتاب یه طرف، موخره ی مترجم یه طرف👌🏻
October 18, 2017
داستان خوبی داشت اما زیاد سلیقه من نبود
شاید بیشتر بهعنوان طرح فیلم میتونست جذاب باشه.
ترجمه آقای آزرم هم البته خیلی خوب بود!
شاید بیشتر بهعنوان طرح فیلم میتونست جذاب باشه.
ترجمه آقای آزرم هم البته خیلی خوب بود!
August 1, 2021
"One never knows when the blow may fall. When I saw Rollo Martins first I made this note on him for my security police files: "In normal circumstances a cheerful fool. Drinks too much and may cause a little trouble. Whenever a woman passes raises his eyes and makes some comment, but I get the impression that really he'd rather not be bothered. Has never really grown up and perhaps that accounts for the way he worshiped Lime." I wrote there that phrase "in normal circumstances" because I met him first at Harry Lime's funeral. It was February, and the gravediggers had been forced to use electric drills to open the frozen ground in Vienna's Central Cemetery. It was as if even nature were doing its best to reject Lime, but we got him in at last and laid the earth back on him like bricks."
fantastic film....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1LTn...
fantastic film....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1LTn...
October 31, 2023
I know it's an old story but it does feel dated... and abridged (though it isn't)... and really written for the screen (which it is). Disappointing.
November 8, 2017
Ο Γκριν είναι ένας από τους αγαπημένους μου συγγραφείς. Με έχει κερδίσει ολοκληρωτικά το χιούμορ του, η διεισδυτικότητά του στην ανθρώπινη φύση που δίνει μια πλούσια σε καυστικότητα γραφή. Γράφει νουάρ, γράφει για τον Β Παγκόσμιο, γράφει ψυχροπολεμικές ιστορίες, για τυχάρπαστους, ερωτευμένους - γράφει πολλά και ίσως η κατηγοριοποίηση να αδικεί έναν τέτοιον άνθρωπο: γράφει λογοτεχνία όπως ελάχιστοι έγραψαν, γράφουν και θα γράψουν.
Το The Third Man έχει την πρωτοτυπία να είναι συνακόλουθο δημιούργημα μιας ταινίας. Όταν ζητήθηκε από τον Γκρίν να γράψει το σενάριο για την ομώνυμα ταινία με πρωταγωνιστή των Όρσον Γουέλς , ο μόνος τρόπος να τα καταφέρει ήταν να γράψει πρώτα αυτό το βιβλίο. Τέοιου είδους πληροφορίες τοποθετούν σε ένα λίγο πιο στιβαρό πλαίσιο την ανάγνωση ενός γραπτού. Εμένα όμως με ξετρελαίνουν καθώς για μια στιγμή βλέπω λίγο μέσα στα μεγάλα μυαλά των δημιουργών. Μικρές εξομολογήσεις που ίσως αποκαλύπτουν ανθρώπινες αδυναμίες για εμένα αποτελούν μικρές εμμονές μια ευφυίας.
Η ιστορία είναι μικρή, εξαιρετικά γραμμένη, γρήγορη. Το ταλέντο του Γκριμ στην σκιαγράφηση της συλλογικής ματαιότητας των επιδιώξεών μας είναι παρόν, σίγουρα όμως τιθασευμένο. Ωστόσο πουθενά δεν προδίδεται ότι σκοπιμότητα του βιβλίου είναι εξυπηρετήσει την δημιουργία ενός κινηματογραφικού σεναρίου. Είναι αυθύπαρκτο, μια κινηματογραφική περιπέτεια της εποχής από μόνο του.
Διασκεδαστικό, για όποιον γνωρίζει τον Γκράχαμ Γκριν και θέλει μια μικρή δόση από την πένα του. Για τους υπόλοιπους ας ξεκινήσουν από αλλού. Όχι γιατί δεν είναι καλό τούτο εδώ, αλλά οι 160 σελίδες του θα φανούν τόσο λίγες σε μια πρώτη γνωριμία με τον σπουδαίο Βρετανό!
Το The Third Man έχει την πρωτοτυπία να είναι συνακόλουθο δημιούργημα μιας ταινίας. Όταν ζητήθηκε από τον Γκρίν να γράψει το σενάριο για την ομώνυμα ταινία με πρωταγωνιστή των Όρσον Γουέλς , ο μόνος τρόπος να τα καταφέρει ήταν να γράψει πρώτα αυτό το βιβλίο. Τέοιου είδους πληροφορίες τοποθετούν σε ένα λίγο πιο στιβαρό πλαίσιο την ανάγνωση ενός γραπτού. Εμένα όμως με ξετρελαίνουν καθώς για μια στιγμή βλέπω λίγο μέσα στα μεγάλα μυαλά των δημιουργών. Μικρές εξομολογήσεις που ίσως αποκαλύπτουν ανθρώπινες αδυναμίες για εμένα αποτελούν μικρές εμμονές μια ευφυίας.
Η ιστορία είναι μικρή, εξαιρετικά γραμμένη, γρήγορη. Το ταλέντο του Γκριμ στην σκιαγράφηση της συλλογικής ματαιότητας των επιδιώξεών μας είναι παρόν, σίγουρα όμως τιθασευμένο. Ωστόσο πουθενά δεν προδίδεται ότι σκοπιμότητα του βιβλίου είναι εξυπηρετήσει την δημιουργία ενός κινηματογραφικού σεναρίου. Είναι αυθύπαρκτο, μια κινηματογραφική περιπέτεια της εποχής από μόνο του.
Διασκεδαστικό, για όποιον γνωρίζει τον Γκράχαμ Γκριν και θέλει μια μικρή δόση από την πένα του. Για τους υπόλοιπους ας ξεκινήσουν από αλλού. Όχι γιατί δεν είναι καλό τούτο εδώ, αλλά οι 160 σελίδες του θα φανούν τόσο λίγες σε μια πρώτη γνωριμία με τον σπουδαίο Βρετανό!
July 6, 2019
Hollo Martins chega em uma Viena pós guerra e descobre que seu amigo de colégio Harry Lime acaba de morrer em um acidente ;tendo sido atropelado por um veículo. Hollo acha as circunstâncias da morte do amigo muito suspeitas e Seguindo sua consciência, decide investigar por conta própria para tentar limpar o nome do amigo que está sendo acusado de vários crimes pela polícia local. Em sua investigação descobre várias coisas sobre seu amigo e descobre também que havia um terceiro homem na cena do acidente que pode ser crucial para a resolução desse acidente.
Um grande clássico cheio de intrigas e suspense.
Um grande clássico cheio de intrigas e suspense.
January 17, 2011
A breathless read.
Set in Vienna at the end of World War II, the reader is immediately struck off balance by a turbulent, blighted world. Gone is the gracious city of old-world coffee houses. Every street is in ruins, the scars of war blanketed by snow. Side by side on the same block are lovely old apartment houses and blackened craters. Shops flourish at street level, the floors above them bombed out of existence. To add to the sense of displacement, the city is divided into four zones ruled by the Allied victors, Russia, America, France and England.
Into this confused landscape falls Rollie Martins, a writer of westerns and cheap thrillers. Invited for a visit by his oldest friend, Harry Lime, he arrives at his apartment only to discover that his beloved school chum has died in a car accident. Immediately, discrepancies develop in the story. Rollie tearfully vows to reconstruct the events of what really happened to his fallen hero.
It's obvious that GG didn't write this for publication, but as a sketch for a screenplay; though his characterizations are, as always, razor-sharp, the finessing of words is not as keenly honed as in, say, The Heart of the Matter, or The End of the Affair. Still, the plot, the setting, the dilemmas and the betrayals are all Greene at his absolute best. Having seen the movie years ago, I knew the story and the ending, and I still couldn't put the book down. I actually preferred this Harry Lime, a reckless, amoral schoolboy, to Orson Welles' ominous, obvious heavy.
This is a jaded, cynical, discomfiting little story. No one comes out well. God, I wish I could write like this.
Set in Vienna at the end of World War II, the reader is immediately struck off balance by a turbulent, blighted world. Gone is the gracious city of old-world coffee houses. Every street is in ruins, the scars of war blanketed by snow. Side by side on the same block are lovely old apartment houses and blackened craters. Shops flourish at street level, the floors above them bombed out of existence. To add to the sense of displacement, the city is divided into four zones ruled by the Allied victors, Russia, America, France and England.
Into this confused landscape falls Rollie Martins, a writer of westerns and cheap thrillers. Invited for a visit by his oldest friend, Harry Lime, he arrives at his apartment only to discover that his beloved school chum has died in a car accident. Immediately, discrepancies develop in the story. Rollie tearfully vows to reconstruct the events of what really happened to his fallen hero.
It's obvious that GG didn't write this for publication, but as a sketch for a screenplay; though his characterizations are, as always, razor-sharp, the finessing of words is not as keenly honed as in, say, The Heart of the Matter, or The End of the Affair. Still, the plot, the setting, the dilemmas and the betrayals are all Greene at his absolute best. Having seen the movie years ago, I knew the story and the ending, and I still couldn't put the book down. I actually preferred this Harry Lime, a reckless, amoral schoolboy, to Orson Welles' ominous, obvious heavy.
This is a jaded, cynical, discomfiting little story. No one comes out well. God, I wish I could write like this.
January 16, 2012
[9/10] this was a bit too short and I thought the movie format suited the story better. I am not implying the novella is not worth checking out. Graham Greene is a deft hand at conveying emotion with elegance and an economy of words that hint at a lot of passion behind the stiff upper lip British attitude.
Vienna in the immediate aftermath of World War II is a desolate place, scoured by chill winds, with mountains of rubble barely hidden under the snow, tensions between the occupying powers and a flourishing black market that attracts the more unsavoury elements of the human race.
Rollo Martins is a convincing characer as the writer of pulp westerns, lonely but always on the look out for love, drunk, angry, torn by the struggle between keeping faith with his childhood friend and condemning his crimes.
Harry Lime, even without the famous "cuckoo clock" quote, is a chilling villain, a dangerous psychopat without an ounce of empathy for his victims, always looking out for number one - himself.
The romantic element is another highlight of the novella, reminding me of broken dolls trying to piece themselves back together, cynics with little faith in the possibility of happy endings.
One memorable scene for me was the Literary soiree with some biting arrows thrown at literary critics and the elitist debate of the merits of Joyce or Galsworthy while Rollins agonizes over his actions that probably led to the death of an innocent man.
Then there's the ride on the great wheel in Prater and the chase through the sewers that were so effective on film. Worked well here, too.
Vienna in the immediate aftermath of World War II is a desolate place, scoured by chill winds, with mountains of rubble barely hidden under the snow, tensions between the occupying powers and a flourishing black market that attracts the more unsavoury elements of the human race.
Rollo Martins is a convincing characer as the writer of pulp westerns, lonely but always on the look out for love, drunk, angry, torn by the struggle between keeping faith with his childhood friend and condemning his crimes.
Harry Lime, even without the famous "cuckoo clock" quote, is a chilling villain, a dangerous psychopat without an ounce of empathy for his victims, always looking out for number one - himself.
The romantic element is another highlight of the novella, reminding me of broken dolls trying to piece themselves back together, cynics with little faith in the possibility of happy endings.
One memorable scene for me was the Literary soiree with some biting arrows thrown at literary critics and the elitist debate of the merits of Joyce or Galsworthy while Rollins agonizes over his actions that probably led to the death of an innocent man.
Then there's the ride on the great wheel in Prater and the chase through the sewers that were so effective on film. Worked well here, too.
November 7, 2022
Greene's post-war Vienna classic might be light on substance but by god is great when it comes to atmosphere.
The mystery itself surrounding that of Harry Lime, while intriguing, is overshadowed by the vivid images of a wrecked Vienna: its silent streets; its feeling of paranoia. I don't think it works so well having already seen the film countless times, which, I still say, is better than the book, but reading it over the course of an afternoon I was sucked into the world of crime and racketeering; of false identities; of untrustworthy suspicions, with the feeling of wanting to look over my shoulder as I took a walk later than evening.
When it comes to the remnants of WW2, and the emergence of Cold War politics, this brief but memorable British classic is right up there as one of the great noirs of the 20th century.
It might not feel as complete as the film, but Greene is still no doubt masterly when it comes to handling his subjects.
September 10, 2023
Using postwar Vienna divided between the English, Americans, French, and Russians as the setting was genius. The faked death of Harry Lime - a seller of black market penicillin - and his subsequent escaping through the sewer into the Russian zone were terrific plot devices.
I found it hard to follow which dodgy characters knew what about Harry's fake death. The British policeman relating what Rollo Martins, the protagonist, was up to reminded me of Conrad's Lord Jim - a slightly detached narrator telling us what we could've got directly from the protagonist with less confusion.
I'm Keen to watch the film again after reading this. I also wanted to read this before attempting the new biography of Greene "Russian Roulette" by Richard Greene - no relation.
F.E. Beyer is the author of Buenos Aires Triad
I found it hard to follow which dodgy characters knew what about Harry's fake death. The British policeman relating what Rollo Martins, the protagonist, was up to reminded me of Conrad's Lord Jim - a slightly detached narrator telling us what we could've got directly from the protagonist with less confusion.
I'm Keen to watch the film again after reading this. I also wanted to read this before attempting the new biography of Greene "Russian Roulette" by Richard Greene - no relation.
F.E. Beyer is the author of Buenos Aires Triad
July 3, 2016
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07jl9mnDescription: Rollo Martins' usual line is the writing of cheap paperback Westerns under the name of Buck Dexter. But when his old friend Harry Lime invites him to Vienna, he jumps at the chance. With exactly five pounds in his pocket, he arrives only just in time to make it to his friend's funeral. The victim of an apparently banal street accident, the late Mr. Lime, it seems, had been the focus of a criminal investigation, suspected of nothing less than being "the worst racketeer who ever made a dirty living in this city." Martins is determined to clear his friend's name, and begins an investigation of his own...
Can't go on without the theme tune. 
March 4, 2024
Der Dritte Mann.
"Er hegte nicht mehr den geringsten Zweifel daran, dass ein Mord geschehen war oder warum hätten sie ihn über den Zeitpunkt des Todes angelogen. Und der dritte Mann? Wer war dieser dritte Mann?
Wien 1945 Russen, Amerikaner, Franzosen und Briten haben die Stadt gemeinsam besetzt und in Zonen aufgeteilt.
Rollo Martins Jugendfreund Harry Lime hat einen Unfall und Rollo versucht Licht ins Dunkle zu bringen.
Unser Wanderbuch bei Literat.
Lohnt es sich ein Buch zu lesen, welches legendär verfilmt wurde?
In diesem Fall bestimmt.
Erstens - hatte ich eine wunderschöne und illustrierte Ausgabe der Büchergilde.
Zweitens - hatte das Buch eine wirklich gute Atmosphäre und Sprache.
Ironisch, witzig und auch spannend.
Es lohnt sich auf jeden Fall es zu lesen !
"Er hegte nicht mehr den geringsten Zweifel daran, dass ein Mord geschehen war oder warum hätten sie ihn über den Zeitpunkt des Todes angelogen. Und der dritte Mann? Wer war dieser dritte Mann?
Wien 1945 Russen, Amerikaner, Franzosen und Briten haben die Stadt gemeinsam besetzt und in Zonen aufgeteilt.
Rollo Martins Jugendfreund Harry Lime hat einen Unfall und Rollo versucht Licht ins Dunkle zu bringen.
Unser Wanderbuch bei Literat.
Lohnt es sich ein Buch zu lesen, welches legendär verfilmt wurde?
In diesem Fall bestimmt.
Erstens - hatte ich eine wunderschöne und illustrierte Ausgabe der Büchergilde.
Zweitens - hatte das Buch eine wirklich gute Atmosphäre und Sprache.
Ironisch, witzig und auch spannend.
Es lohnt sich auf jeden Fall es zu lesen !
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