34. The Quiet American

Book 34: The Quiet American by Graham Greene (B)

Brendan Fraser (Pyle) and Michael Caine 

(Fowler)

This book wasn't nearly as interesting as Nineteen Eighty-Four, but it had some bright moments. It takes place during the fighting between Vietnam and France after World War II and before America becomes involved. Fowler, a British journalist, is writing on the war while living with and loving on a Vietnamese woman named Phoung. Fowler refuses to become involved in anything! He stands on the sideline and watches what's happening around him. Along comes Pyle, an American CIA agent. Pyle is blissfully and annoyingly ignorant and naive about the way of life in Vietnam. He also falls in love with Phoung and decides he wants to marry her, asking Fowler's permission to do so. When Fowler loses Phoung to Pyle because Fowler's wife won't divorce him, Fowler begins to rethink his decision to stay on the sidelines and "not be involved." When Pyle's involvement in the Vietnam way of life starts to get out of hand, he forces Fowler to finally make a decision and jump into the world that Fowler had been not living in for so long.
Greene writes well and the book is clear and concise. I find Greene's interpretation of an American to be slightly offensive as Pyle comes out as loud, ignorant, and downright stupid. He's straight up obnoxious! The character is anything but "quiet," which gives the title an ironic twist. Maybe Greene is referring to that there's no such thing as a "quiet American."
The Quiet American is a classic for sure. It captures a time that many Americans don't understand or don't know much about. The way of life, particularly for a journalist, was the thing to have in colonist Vietnam, reporting on a war many only saw from afar. Greene does a marvelous job of capturing that.