Two African Journals
In Search of a Character Two African Journals
The Bodley Head, 1961.
First edition. Quarter bound in red cloth with grey papered boards in a decorative dustwrapper. Author's presentation copy, inscribed on the title page, "For Moura with love from Graham" A fine copy in a near fine dustwrapper.
Inscribed to Baroness Moura Budberg, Ukraine-born socialite and double agent for Russia and Britain during the WW1 who was imprisoned in 1918 under suspicion of spying for the British. She was briefly H.G. Wells' mistress and came to live in England in 1933. Possibly through Wells or through his own links with the European intelligence services, Greene was helped by Budberg to gather information for his 1934 trip to the Baltic states. The pair struck up a long sustained friendship and met and corresponded thereafter.
The two journals in the title refer to the notes Greene kept whilst travelling through parts of Africa, upon which he based his novels A Burnt Out Case and The Heart of the Matter. "Neither of these journals were kept for publication, but they may have some interest as an indication of the kind of raw material a novelist accumulates." [Introduction]
Stock ID: 35483
£1,500.00
