Graham Greene, The Ministry of Fear: An Entertainment

Christopher Gonzalez (Ohio State University)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.09: English Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary Britain , 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Gina Lyle (University of Glasgow), Graham MacPhee (University of Manchester), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Jenni Ramone (The Nottingham Trent University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1943

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel
Spy and Espionage

Resources

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Frequently excluded from lists of his major works, Graham Greene’s

The Ministry of Fear

is often classified as genre fiction, in this case as a spy novel. Such a classification held little literary significance in Greene’s time, despite the example of Joseph Conrad’s

The Secret Agent

(1907), John Buchan’s

Greenmantle

(1915) and Somerset Maugham’s

Ashenden

(1928). However, Greene’s “entertainments” — notably including the highly perceptive Vietnam-novel

The Quiet American

(1955) and the comic

Our Man in Havana

(1958) — raised the status of the spy novel through the blending of his fine storytelling prowess with astute commentary on the geopolitical state of the world. Tracy Lee Simmons of the

National Review

characterized Graham Greene as writing “thrillers for…

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2924 words

Citation: Gonzalez, Christopher. "The Ministry of Fear: An Entertainment". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 20 January 2009 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=23517, accessed 25 April 2024.]

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