The quiet American

Summary:

Fowler is a Journalist and he has left his wife. Then he lived in Saigon during the French-Vietnamese war, along with a Chinese woman, Phuong. An American diplomat, Pyle will also feature. He has read books about China, which have influenced his thinking throughout, because he has quite a few strange ideas about the course of the war. Pyle is also in love with Phuong

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Fowler goes a few days to the battlefield at Phat Diem, where he describes the situation. To his amazement Pyle will also show up, to tell that he wants to marry Phuong. He made the trip in spite of all the dangers to tell Fowler that he must not go to Phuong before Fowler is back. When Fowler is back goes he, Pyle en Phuong talk about her future. Phuong says nothing. Then goes Fowler to a special place 50 miles north of Saigon. There he sees Pyle. Because his belly is broken, he goes back with Fowler. Then they are without gasoline. They go to a guard tower along the road. Then there are soldiers but the soldiers don’t see the tower. Pyle and Fowler managed to escape, but thereto Fowler breaks a leg.

Romanisatie weergevenPyle brings him to a hospital, and so he saves his life. Romanisatie weergevenPhuong comes to visit him in hospital, but after a few weeks she finally chooses to Pyle. Romanisatie weergevenShe leaves Fowler because he can’t marry her. In the meanwhile Pyle supports the third army. Romanisatie weergevenLater, a bomb is not stopped when a military parade had been cancelled. When Fowler come off this, he enabled his own connections to murder Pyle. After that Romanisatie weergeven

Fowler and Phuong are back together and happy.

Analysis & interpretation

Genre:

A psychological war novel, because the main character has lots of troubles during war.

Theme’s:

War : the story is set during the war in Vietnam.

Relations: in the story, two friends named, Fowler an Pyle, are fighting about the love of a girl named, Phuong.

Structure:

There are many flashbacks, so the story is not chronological.

The book contains three parts. Those three parts contain out of four chapters.

In the end Pyle dies, so the end is closed.

Characters:

There are three main characters in the story:

• Fowler: A journalist.

• He is a person with guts, but doesn’t always take everything for granted.

• Pyle: he is involved in the war as an American diplomat.

• he is an honest person and he has much trust in other people.

• Phuong: She is a Vietnamese woman. She is the fiancée of Pyle, but after he was murdered, she married Fowler. She is easily suppressed, and she Quigley does what other people tell her to do.

Time:

The story is set during the Vietnamese war between the Vietminh and the French.

It’s exactly from March 1952 till June 1955.

Perspective:

The story is told by Pyle.

space:

the story is set in Saigon and Hanoi. Those are the biggest towns in Vietnam.

Language and style:

The story language is English dialogue. There are much conversations between the main character and another person. The story is pretty serious because there are not much comic moments in the story.

Personal opinion

Opinion Corné

I tought the book was very confusing for somewhone how never red a english book. In the first pages was one of the main characters ,Pyle, dead, but in the other pages he was alive. After al I new it was a flashback but I didn’t new that before. But it was a exciting book because war had a major role. I always like books where war played a major role. When I must read a book for Dutch, I prefer book with war. Those books are exciting and sometimes the contain humor. Humor is also a major factor for a book. Humor didn’t sit in The quiet American. That was very unfortunate. In the end it was a exciting book but I don’t think I will read it again. There was to many humor and it was confusing. I think I must have a book without flashbacks. A book with no flashbacks reads a lot better.

Opinion Martijn

I think this book is very good written. The was in the book is very well describe and it is very realistic.

I found the book very bold, this is mainly because the story takes place during the war. A very big drawback of this book is that there very difficult words are used. This is very difficult to get into the story and it is much harder to understand the story. And it is especially difficult if you’re bad in English, like me.

The characters in the book will fit well into the story home, also the characters are very realistic. This makes the book more attractive

So if someone like it to read English books , than is this book a real must.

Opinion Jogchum

This book was hard for me to understand, because there are many difficult words in the book, and I’m not really good at English. I think this book was exciting, because it goes about war, and mostly books about war are exciting.

I found the book well written, because the characters that the author used well described. Furthermore, the author has much knowledge of war, because he used this knowledge, you could notice that many things from the war emerged. Romanisatie weergeven

I thought it was a realistic book, because it could happen in real life.

Opinion Jochum

In my opinion, this book wasn’t really a exiting book. It was pretty hard to read and because of that it became a little bit boring. That it was hard to read was because it was English. Not that I have trouble reading English, but the book contained a lot of English proverbs. When I read English I just translate the words, but here I had much misunderstandings. There were proverbs like: ‘Slow fire ah boil hard cow-heel’. There were also a lot of difficult words like, vaguely, reassuring and crippled. I also had a continuous feeling that the phrases were grammatically incorrect, but that could be, because that this is an old book or that this book is written in a different dialect. The story was pretty exiting tough, because it was about war. And war is an exiting time. Unfortunately I didn’t really understand the story, because of the difficult words and proverbs.

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Background Information of Graham Greene

Graham Greene was an english author, play wright and literary critic. Unfortunately he is deceased. He was born on the 2th of october 1904 and was passed away on the 3th of april 1991. His father was director of his school. He went below to the balliol college on the unversity of Oxford. His first book was published in 1925. He where Catholic after he graduated. He where a journalist but this wasn’t a succes. He caused the bankruptcy of the magazine he worked for. His books are modern-realistic style. It contains often people who doubt themselves and the darkside. His books were divided into thrillers with entertainment, but those books had philosophical side. His reputation was built on the literary books as the power and the glory. He becames famous because he brought together the entertainment and literature.