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Latin America and its way of life is the setting to Graham Green's story. It is a story of terror and kidnap, a story of two men's love to a woman out of a brothel. All this is a discussion about the love & honour in a person, in a violent atmosphere. The Honorary Consul is a book of conflicts and paradoxes, which will be discussed in this book report. The main character in the book is Doctor Eduardo Plarr. Dr.
Plarr is the only Doctor in a small town. He was half English, half Spanish. The English part of him was in prison or dead, and the Spanish part was a fat woman in Buenos Aires who loved cakes. In fact, Eduardo's mother love for cakes is the only real love in the book.
A reader could hesitate if Eduardo loved Clara (Clara is a girl out of a brothel, the wife of Charley Fortnum, the British honorary consul who was kidnapped), but he couldn't do it in this cakes. It affected Dr. Plarr, for he didn't love people. He only committed adultery with them and saved their lives. Although Dr Plarr was born in Argentina, he did not see himself as Spanish.
He didn't touch people when he spoke to them, he didn't gossip with them in the cafe, and preferred to speak English when possible. One of many themes in the book is the theme of the Catholic belief. According to the Catholic belief (and many other religions) life is holy. Dr. Plarr did everything he could to save people's life, even when they couldn't pay him. Along the book, he tries to save the life of Charley Fortnum, the British honorary consul who was kidnapped by mistake.
Why Dr. Plarr is so brazen to save Fortnum's life? Is it because life is holy, or because he is a doctor and he is obliged to save one's life? Plarr was not a Catholic, and not a great believer.
He committed adultery with Fortnum's wife- a great breach of the religious law. It is interesting to contemplate how such a man could be judged by others. A believer would probably say that Plarr's errand in this world is to save people. A scholar would say that Plarr is loyal to his job as a doctor. A priest may say that Plarr is a sinner. And this doctor, sinner, saint, Englishman, whatever one could call him, was the only one who tried to save Fortnum's life.
Eduardo saved Charley's life, but his life was taken instead. God made us all, we became doctors, consuls, sinners, kidnappers, and all this "party" is living on one world. How would we look, if we make efforts to save other's life instead of taking it? I'm sure we " ll look well.
There " re three metaphysic factors in our world. One is fate, the second is coincidence, and the third is the "Hand of God." One can't know for sure which of this was responsible for Fortnum's kidnap by mistake. Again, we have three different views. The atheist will say it was a coincidence, the astrologist will say it was fate, and the believer will say it was the "Hand of God." In fact, as I have already mentioned, religion is an important theme in our book, so I think that the answer is the "Hand of God." Charley Fortnum was the British honorary consul. He drank whiskey like it was water. There was alcohol in his veins instead of blood.
He was a fool, and married a girl out of a brothel. For sure, he was not one of the town's backbones. He was even kidnapped by mistake (the kidnappers' plan was to take the American ambassador), because he hung a diplomatic number plate on his car, although he was forbidden to do so. He was in love with his car, to which he called "Fortnum's Horse." There is an opinion which says that the fools are very brave, for they don't know how to fear death. It can be considered as a fact, in the case of Fortnum. He was a fool, so he tried to run away from the kidnapper's hiding place, in hope that the Indian who stands ten meters near him won't shoot (Fortnum was hit in the leg).
He didn't even know that his wife betrays him, when the entire town knew. It is important to understand that no one bothered to save Fortnum because he was such a fool. As far as I know, everyone's life is holy, even the lives of sinners, and Charley did not even sin. Will the holiness of one's life stay in the books forever?
Life was given to us as a gift from the good Lord and we must live it, and we must try to save the lives of others. Although Charley was a fool, he showed a sparkle of understanding in the end of the book. He reproached Clara why she didn't cry when Dr. Plarr died? Priests often appear in Graham Green's books. Green was born a Protestant, and accepted the Catholic religion later, that is why he writes about it.
The priest in our book is Leon. He is the chief of the group who kidnapped Charley Fortnum. After seeing the behaviour of the rich Bishops, while the poor believers are starving, Leon left the church and got married. Altogether, he stayed a priest. He couldn't go away when he heard a confession, and couldn't resist to people who were asking for Mass. Towards the end of the book, Dr.
Plarr is being kidnapped too. In a conversation between Leon and Eduardo, Eduardo asks Leon why he left the church. Here is what Leon answered: "I have told you- I never left the church. Mine is only a separation, Eduardo, a separation by mutual consent, not a divorce. I shall never belong wholly to anyone else.
Not even to Marta [Leon's wife]."Thou shall not murder (Deuteronomy, 5, 17) says the Holy Scriptures. But Leon said that if there will be need to assassin Charley; he is the one who will do it. It is interesting to think who he took the responsibility. I think that there " re two options: one- Leon is the chief of the group and he must do the unpleasant job; second- Leon is still a priest and he didn't want the "innocent believers" to commit sin.
The existence of love is also a conflict in the book. Here is what Leon says to Eduardo about love: "Was it love which sent six millions Jews to the gas ovens? You are a doctor, you must often have seen intolerable pain- a child dying of meningitis. Is that love? It was not love which cut off Aquino's fingers... " Leon was a good man, who cared about people, and I think it is more important than being a priest.
Every place has its own meanings about life. In Latin America, the meaning is "machismo." The exact translation of this word is manhood. But in the life of Latin America "machismo" is more than just manhood. "Machismo" is the pride of a man. "Machismo" is a man's heroic deed. "Machismo" is a man's life. The town where the story takes place was full of "machismo." The men were ready to do everything to save the life of another in a "Gone with the Wind" like scene, with a big deal of fire and smoke.
But unfortunately, another seems to be everyone except the unofficial town's fool- Charley Fortnum. It seems that in the town's terms, the life of the town's fool is not worthy to save. Only Dr Plarr, the same man who committed adultery with Charley's wife, did every effort he could to save Fortnum and died. But it is hard to except from a "Gone with the Wind" watcher who is full of "machismo" to do something to save the town's fool life.
But one could expect something from the backbones of the society, and one of them was Dr. Humphries. Dr. Humphries was a doctor for literature and an Englishman. Like everyone else in town, he did absolutely nothing to save Charley's wife.
A doctor for literature is supposed to be very human. He must have written wonderful essays about humanity in literature, but he acted like a whore, who cared about nothing. In conclusion, I would like to recommend this book to everyone who enjoys reading, and represent it as a list of paradoxes. It is about an adulterer who died like a saint, saving Fortnum's life. It is about the backbones of society who acted like whores and did nothing to save the life of a man. It is about Charley Fortnum, a fool, who became to understand things.
It is about a priest, who became a kidnapper and altogether stayed a priest. May God help us respect the lives of others, Amen.
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