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Graham Greene's Unlikely Hero
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Graham Greene’s Unlikely Hero Heroism can be evident to everybody except the hero. Those who are selfless enough to risk their lives for others are often the only people who deny that their actions are heroic at all. The whisky priest in Graham Greene’s The Power and the Glory exhibits this self-doubt, even as he is knowingly sacrificing his own life to bring God to one dying murderer. During an anti-clerical purge in Mexico, the priest remains one step ahead of the authorities, stopping in one place just long enough to bring the church to his faith-starved parishioners. Finally, confronted with a choice between freedom and certain death, he chooses death by turning back to give last rites to the fading killer as the police close in around him. Graham Greene’s whisky priest embodies a hero who is unaware of the impact he is making on the lives of those around him and who is too wrapped up in his own failings to realize the faith and godliness that lies within him. From the novel’s outset, the priest makes it clear that he must continue spreading God’s word on his own to atone for the sins he committed before the purge. In chapter one, while waiting for the boat that could take him away and save his life, he turns back at the request of a boy whose mother is dying. He misses the boat over the objections of Mr. Tench, who says that there is no hope in helping a woman who is already dying. The priest, who has already lost hope for himself, refuses to let that hope die in others: ‘“I know these people. She will be no more dying than I am”’ (Greene 17; pt. 1, ch. 1). This is the first of many instances in which the nameless whisky priest puts his own safety on the line for the sake of those he was ordained to lead to the Church. The shortcomings he has as a person and a priest makes his desire to help others that much greater. His journey is more than an escape from the authorities; it becomes a race to bring God to a godless people. Yet while the priest realizes his duty, he thinks it odd for him, “a damned man putting God in the mouths of men: an odd sort of servant, that, for the devil” (Greene 60; pt. 2, ch. 1). He obviously feels there is no chance that the actions he takes in helping people now will cleanse him of the sins he committed in his time of despair.
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