As part of an uninteresting attitude towards art in general I am now done with Greene's 'Catholic Novels'. It's like when I finished Tarantino: not really that impressive. I've seen the movie for this, and while it was bad enough to be used as a loaded reference in The End of the Affair, it established faces well, if not better, than the book. There's a swirling to this book from its urban specificity and religious knowledge, its combination of esoteric spirituality with noir designing, and it's the first time he found glory, in the artistic sense. While it's slow and tedious it's heavy, and while it's edgy it's methodical, and when it's empty it's at least readable. The Boy's aversion to sex, and to bodily contact with women, is one of those things that feels haphazardly orchestrated yet which becomes to our horror the cornerstone to his character and by proxy the entire story. For example, in the physical and spiritual devotion Rose gives him on their wedding night, it's an emotional climax for all, and yet, despite his enjoyment of it, nothing happens. Life is still "like dying", the wireless antennas still pockmark the sky, the waves come, sex happens harmlessly elsewhere, rich men swagger, rackets continue, poverty lingers, customs of God burn on, she nicely tidies his room, and he dreams of finally murdering her. All because, like always, we're back at the beginning, with the witnessing of a Saturday night ritual—and its aftermath—a boy who can't kiss because she makes him nervous. So simple and it's not hard to see why other people get it wrong (it's not their life).