The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene

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Graham Greene is a favourite author. As a young man I read his collected works. Perhaps his most famous novel is The Heart of the Matter, which is set in Freetown, Sierra Leone, where Greene worked for the Foreign Office during the war in 1941 to 1942. I decided to re-read this book before I arrived in Sierra Leone. 

The book is about the convergence of pity, love, and God. 

Scobie, the main character, is the deputy police commissioner in Freetown. After 15 year’s service he is passed over for the job as commissioner and his shallow wife wants to leave for South Africa. Scobie recognizes his wife is chronically unhappy. He pities her and feels responsible for her well-being. He loves her and recognizes that his love is a reflection of his pity. His wife leaves and a shipwreck survivor enters his life. This young woman is someone else to pity. She is not an attractive woman, has lost her husband, and is alone. They fall in love. Scobie is a Catholic with well-developed faith and the adulterous liaison festers at his religious core. His wife decides to return and this places Scobie in a terrible situation. He feels honour bound to respect his love for each woman but realizes he is causing them to suffer. He also realizes that he should confess his sins before God, with whom his moral turpitude has placed him at odds. Notwithstanding his commitment and love for God he decides that suicide is the best solution to end his moral ambiguity and the suffering of both women. He fakes his death as a heart attack so his wife can benefit from his life insurance. In this way he protects his wife with an inheritance and alleviates the suffering in his mistress who can now move on. 

Pity is Scobie's foundation for love. I needed to substitute the word empathy for pity to help me understand his thinking. His love for God is based on his empathy for God, who sacrificed his only son. 

 This is a very sad book. While filled with memorable phrases and insights, the book could have been set anywhere and offered little insight into Sierra Leone. 

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