Very little is written about The First Indochina War, the post-WWII (1946-1954) conflict involving French and French allied forces against native communist insurgencies. It is often overshadowed by the American Vietnam War, the Korean War, and contemporaneous events in Europe. But make no mistake, it was a long, savage, and destructive conflict that foreshadowed much of the American Vietnam experience.

The Quiet American takes place during this often overlooked conflict and is told from the perspective of Thomas Fowler, a middle age English correspondent who has been in Vietnam for several years when the events of the book take place. It tells the story of his experience with a naive and eager American, Alden Pyle (the eponymous Quiet American).

The two could not me more dissimilar. Where Fowler is old and world weary Pyle is young and ambitious; where Fowler is jaded by what he has seen, Pyle is full of optimistic energy by what he has read in books; where Fowler sees how things are, Pyle sees how things could be; where Fowler is disillusioned with religion and -isms Pyle is pious and a True Believer in Democracy and Freedom. They see the same world but perceive it in radically different ways.

In some circumstances this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Heck, the TV show The Odd Couple was premised on this sort of mismatch. But this isn't 1970's New York, it is early 1950's Vietnam, and there's a worldwide crusade against communism to be fought. On top of that Pyle falls for Fowler's (much, much younger) Vietnamese girlfriend (his ever suffering wife lives in England) and vows, in an absurdly civil manner, to win her and take her for his wife.

Oh, and Pyle is totally an American intelligent Agent dispatched to persecute said anti-Communist crusade.

So while on the surface this is a story of two men and a woman in a nation at war, it serves as a much larger observation about the state of world affairs. Post-WWII was a time of change. Europe was on the decline, having exhausted itself with war and attempting to maintain crumbling colonial empires. America was on the rise, bolstered by an absurd optimism that their way was THE way forward for human progress and freedom. Fowler and Pyle represent these two powers.

Fowler, like Europe, has been in country much longer than Pyle. He understands how Vietnamese culture works, what drives them, and what they are struggling with. But he lacks the energy or motivation to really get involved in the conflict. He has a fondness for the people of Vietnam, but knows that their priorities and motivations are unique to themselves and not universalized. He has few future prospects and merely strives for comfort through his aging years.

Pyle, on the other hand, is young, full of energy and direction. However he is woefully misinformed about the country. What knowledge he does have comes from an academic writing about the country after spending a very short time there. His mind is full of high ideas of what the Vietnamese people need and how to achieve it. He doesn't bother to actually ask the people what they want, merely assuming it is the same thing that Americans want (freedom and liberty). Heck, he doesn't even speak the language of the people he is trying to save (and if that is emblematic of an intervening American, I don't know what is).

Between them is Phuong, Fowler's girlfriend. He is by no means in love with her (he even doubts if he can love again), but is both fond of her and fears growing old alone. He provides material comfort for her and she provides companionship for him. It may not be a storybook relationship, but it seems to work for them, for the time being.

Pyle, on the other hand, is instantly smitten with her and vows marry her (lack of a common language aside). He puts her on a pedestal and ignores her qualities that would detract form this ideal version of her he has (like that she once worked in a "Dancing Hall'). He expects her to emigrate to America with him, join the local women's clubs, and generally behave like an American wife. Fowler warns him that Phoung does not conceptualize marriage and love the same way he does, that she wants support and comfort and that Pyle is projecting his own American ideals onto her.

It is pretty messy all around and neither man seems to treat Phuong as the person she is. In fact, given the limited viewpoint of this story (Fowler's) we don't even get to see Phoung as a total person. We know she has a life away from both men, but Fowler seems only interested in how she can make him feel better and Pyle sees only an idealized Phoung that doesn't exist. Once again we can see parallels between European and American views of third world countries during this time period.

What is interesting, however, is that for all the potential conflict between Pyle and Fowler, they actually remain on good (or at least amicable) terms with each other. Pyle is too courteous to truly get angry at Fowler and Fowler is somehow enchanted by Pyle's extreme innocence and Fowler tries to protect it to the degree he can.

n  That was my first instinct - to protect him. It never occurred to me that there was greater need to protect myself. Innocence always calls mutely for protection, when we would be much wiser to guard ourselves against it; innocence is like a dumb leper who has lost his bell, wandering the world, meaning no harm.n

Of course naiveté is no excuse for the Pyle's plans for Vietnam are ("I never knew a man who had better motives for all the trouble he caused.") and Fowler is finally forced from his aloofness to make a choice about what Pyle is doing. It is by no means an easy decision and the entire books sets up a very fascinating moral dilemma for Fowler.

I greatly enjoyed this read. It had challenging characters, prescient themes (this was published in 1955), and a very accessible writing style. It got a little slow in the middle but is a great, if quick, read about an often overlooked time and place. Even someone with no knowledge of Vietnam or international politics can still appreciate this story for its very human element.

(On a side note: This book was made into a movie twice. The first remake later in the 1950's completely altered the story, making Pyle out to be an innocent American caught in Fowler's evil machinations because he romanced Phoung (played by an Italian actress, because Hollywood). Sufficed to say, Greene was very unhappy with how his anti-war story was completely bastardized and turned into a "propaganda film for America")

A great novel, playing in Saigon, Vietnam, during the French colonization and the resistance against it, in the 1950s. The protagonists are a quenched British journalist and an idealistic American diplomat. Again a very ingenious composition, with different story levels. The central theme: is it possible not to be involved? Still one of the best novels of Greene. (rating 3.5 stars)

A slow moving but compelling romantic tragedy

THE QUIET AMERICAN is the tragically banal yet moving story of two white men living in Vietnam during the colonial war in French Indochina. Thomas Fowler, a British journalist covering the war, is world-weary and jaded, street smart, politically savvy and intelligently low key in the sense that he has learned to keep his head down to avoid attracting undue attention to himself and his activities, acclimated to the oriental culture, happy with a mediocre day to day existence, separated from his erstwhile wife in England and living with a local woman, Phuong, who is reputed to be one of the most beautiful women in Saigon.

Alden Pyle, newly posted to Saigon in some obscure bureaucratic capacity, is Fowler's very antithesis - brash and cocky with the arrogance and idealism of youth, naïve and uninformed, an intellectual theorist, egocentric, parochial and uninformed as to the Asian way of life, and brimful of a typical American attitude that looks down with unabashed disdain at cultures other than their own. He also happens to be hopelessly in love with Phuong whom he met when they were attending a soirée at the local Continental Hotel.

THE QUIET AMERICAN tells the story of the evolution of the love-like-hate-admire-ignore relationships that evolve in the Fowler-Pyle-Phuong triangle as Pyle hamhandedly courts Phuong and attempts to force her into a choice between himself and Fowler. When Pyle is murdered, Vigot, a French inspector at the Sûreté, investigates the death and makes it quite clear that he suspects Fowler is the killer.

Like a Shakespearean tragedy, THE QUIET AMERICAN is a rather blood-soaked tale that focuses its primary attention on ideas, characters and relationships. The wartime events in southeast Asia drive the story, to be sure, but ultimately, the tragedy ends on an unresolved "life goes on" note with Fowler learning that his wife has offered him a divorce and that he and Phuong can resume their lives without the clutter of Pyle's further attentions.

It is interesting to observe that, unlikely Pyle's and Fowler's exquisitely detailed personalities, Phuong remains ambiguous, fuzzy and ultimately unrevealed. Undoubtedly, this is Greene's nod in the direction of the western world's perception of the inscrutability of the Eastern mind.

On one level, THE QUIET AMERICAN is a workmanlike and enjoyable tale of wartime adventure, colonialism, murder and romance. But, on a deeper level, it is also obvious that THE QUIET AMERICAN is a heartfelt critique of American imperialism and their penchant for violently imposing their vision of democracy and an assumed superior western way of life on cultures other than their own. Indeed, in 1956 when it was first published, THE QUIET AMERICAN was loudly condemned as being anti-American. It has been suggested that American readers were particularly galled to listen to the criticisms largely being voiced through the mouth of a snobbish and opinionated middle class Englishman like Thomas Fowler.

In this era of continuing difficulties in the Middle East, Americans would be well-advised to consider reading this slow moving yet oddly compelling tragedy that had so much to say about American politics.

Paul Weiss

This novel is set during the first Indochina war and growing American involvement in Vietnam, set against the background of French colonialism and witnessed largely through the eyes of Thomas Fowler, a cynical, British journalist. Fowler has been in Vietnam for two years and has been living with Phuong, a young, beautiful, Vietmanese woman, who Fowler loves. Phuong’s sister wants her to marry, but Fowler has a wife in England who is unwilling to divorce him and so he cannot offer her the security that her sister wants.

Change comes with young, naïve Alden Pyle – the ‘Quiet American,’ of the title, who is involved with the CIA. Pyle is free with his opinions; largely based on books by an author named York Harding and his belief in the ‘third force.’ Pyle is extremely earnest and honourable, so, when he meets Phuong and falls immediately in love with her, he is keen to inform Fowler of his intentions. Obviously, Fowler is unwilling to give Phuong up and resentful of Pyle’s belief that Phuong will leave Fowler for him.

The book begins with a death and then the story unfolds, as we learnt what happened to lead to this event and the relationship between the main characters. Phuong remains something of an enigma and it is Fowler’s voice which leads us through the story. Although the opium addicted Fowler is unemotional and dry, he always seems to have Phuong on his mind and to know where she will be at any given time, so the reader is aware his world weariness does not extend to his feelings for Phuong. However, it is also uncertain whether it is own, bleak and lonely future he can see, which leads to his sorrow over the possibility of losing Phuong.

I must admit that this is not a period of history which I know a great deal about. However, Greene was excellent at painting a portrait of people, and places. You can picture Fowler, holed up in his small apartment, smoking endless pipes and wallowing in self-pity, of Pyle’s confident justification, of Phuong’s realistic acceptance of events. Excellent characters and an involving read.

”Рано или късно човек прави избора си и застава на нечия страна. Ако иска да остане човек.”

Войната в Индокитай, днешен Виетнам, през 50-те години. Онази, другата Виетнамска война, е още на десетилетие напред в бъдещето, но над горите се сипе напалм, оризовите полета за залети с кръв, а животът някак се опитва да оцелее и продължи напред. А френските пилоти, хвърлящи напалм, са лишени дори от утехата на лула с опиум след мисията, тъй като трябва да са във форма за следващата.

Томас Фаулър е репортер-ветеран, който предава от мястото на събитието (както е правил и самият Греъм Грийн), като най-важното никога не излиза във вестниците. Истински син на колониална стара Англия - изискан, ерудиран, циничен и без никакви илюзии и съответно пристрастия. Видял е твърде много от света, но все пак по-малко, отколкото сам подозира, когато се сдобива с неочакван приятел в лицето на наглед наивния американец Олдън Пайл, който ще му отнеме виетнамското момиче и неподозирано количество последни илюзии. Индокитай ще му предаде един последен урок по демокрация, геополитика, приятелство, журналистическа и човешка етика и съпричастност към страданието. Както и за цената на убежденията, които доближават или отдалечават от най-дълбокото, концентрирано и последно ядро на човечността.

Зад привидно простия сюжет - стар мъж, млад мъж и момиче - са разкрити с елегантна пестеливост и кинематографичност цяло кълбо от други конфликти. Колонизатори срещу местни. Стари колонизатори срещу бъдещи кандидат-колонизатори. Циничен стоицизъм срещу упорит идеализиъм. Вяра в непосредствените факти като истинско отражение на реалността и вяра в напасването на реалността към правилните възгледи. Старост срещу младост. Военни срещу политици. Журналистика срещу пропаганда. Наблюдатели срещу замесени...

Трети страни просто няма. Нито косвени жертви. А в часа за аперитива някъде избухва бомба, отнела човешки живот, и независимо колко “правилни” са причините за това, отговорността за избухването и трябва да бъде потърсена и понесена.

”Той цял живот ще си остане наивник, а наивниците не можеш да виниш; те сами по себе си са невинни. Трябва или непрекъснато да ги контролираш, или да ги премахнеш. Наивността е един вид невменяемост”.

П.П. Не особено добро издание от коректорска гледна точка, много пропуски. Дано я преиздадат в достойно издание.

My time on Earth will be brief, very brief, inconsequential really to things like North America's seasonal movements, Earth's orbit, and the galaxy's star patterns. Yet I, and pretty much everyone else with as brief a life as mine, continue the search for meaning and meaningful experience (stupid humans). Are we looking for profundity in the brevity, a way to either surpass our life's span or are we simply trying to forget about its paltry duration? Birthing, dying, birthing, dying....ad infinitum ad nauseam. But there it is. And perhaps, more than anything else, this is true: there is an end and a beginning. A beginning and an end. To everything. Change wins. It's not always the best feeling, or a pithy sentiment one should use while patting the back of the bereaved at a funeral.
Graham Greene wrote, "From childhood I had never believed in permanence, and yet I had longed for it. Always I was afraid of losing happiness. This month, next year...If not next year, in three years. Death was the only absolute value in my world. Lose life and one would lose nothing again for ever. I envied those who could believe in a God and I distrusted them. I felt they were keeping their courage up with a fable of the changeless and the permanent. Death was far more certain than God, and with death there would be no longer the daily possibility of love dying." And although not everyone can believe in God, we can all agree that the guy that wrote that so eloquently is dead. Change wins again.
Despite being the kind of person who simply cannot divorce myself from the concept of God, I understand the previous paragraph. I can see how this changeless and permanent idea is an aberration, but its calmative powers are not that insignificant. The idea that there is something greater than life and death, past all effort of comprehension. To think that sense just might be made of brutality and senseless war and that if a mind was large enough, distanced enough, unclouded by stupidity or bravery, fear or pride...that maybe it can be just enough to convince some to risk doing the right thing for some of the right reasons. Was this what Greene was getting at in TQA? I may never know. But these are the things through his writing that are getting to me.

I read this because it has been chosen as a group read by the Reading the 20th Century group, and it is only my second Greene after The Heart of the Matter.

Once again I found it easier to admire than love - Greene's analysis of 1950s Indo-China (later Vietnam) is perceptive and prescient, and his characters are undoubtedly full of human weaknesses, but I didn't find it very easy to empathise with either the cynical English journalist who narrates the story, or Pyle, the Quiet American of the title whose naive but well meaning interventions do more harm than good. The local woman who comes between them, Phuong, is rather sketchily drawn, and her motivations are not explored in any detail.

This is not a book that is short of reviews or readers, so I won't attempt a more detailed review.

Viewed as a classic - I, as I've always done, must stray from the flock.

Set during the French war in Vietnam and the early days of American interest in the arena.

I get the idea that the Brit represents the presence of British forces sat on the sidelines of this conflict dipping their toe in the water when they saw fit, the American, the pending arrival of the US military and the girl, a hapless citizen caught up in all the turmoil: none of that worked for me.

The story is told by the main character (ageing Brit, cynical, apathetic, opium smoking, journalist, shacking up with young Vietnamese woman who tends to the Brits whims and he sees as vacuous and begins in the present time with the murder of the younger, quiet, American who had previous to his demise managed to pry the young woman from the clutches of the drunken, drugged-up predator.

Once the death of the American is established we scoot back and forth learning of the events that transpired between the arrival of the young man and his untimely departure before relearn of the aftermath of this young man's death: I could never settle with the way in which the author chose to lay this out. When the arrival of the American triggers a series of events that end in his death, why not let the reader experience those events in their chronological order and allow them to judge for themselves where it all might end.

Graham Greene is a skilled narrator and at times the writing does shine through, but overall I struggled to keep going with it.

في الفصول الأولى من «الأمريكي الهادئ» لـ جراهام جرين تساءلتُ إن كنتُ سأضع الرواية في الرفِّ نفسه مع «قلب الظلمات» لـ جوزيف كونراد؛ أي إن كانت الرواية تكرِّس سردية استعمارية. اتضح أنّها على العكس من ذلك، وإذا ما كنتُ سأضعها إلى جانب كتاب آخر، فستكون تلك رواية «الصمت» العظيمة للياباني شوساكو إندو.
هذه رواية لا تدينُ الاستعمار فحسب، فحتى طفل السادسة يستطيع ذلك. بل هي تذهبُ أبعد، إلى استحالة تغيير مجتمع من خارجِه، وكمّ الغباء الذي تنطوي عليه فكرة «بيضاء» مثل هذه. الأمر الذي يذكرني ثانية باقتباسٍ لإندو: «لقد جعلتني أمي وأنا في الثالثة عشرة من عمري أرتدي ملابس غريبة، لا تناسبني، ومنذ ذلك اليوم أحاول دونما نجاح أن أجعل من هذه الملابس كيمونو»، مع اختلاف السياقات.
للرواية ثلاثة أبطال محوريين. الصُّحفي البريطاني «فاولر»، ساخر وشديد الذكاء، أكثر ذكاءً من التورّط في لعبة الاصطفاف - لكن إلى متى؟ - وهو مدجج بحكمةِ المستعمر القديم الذي يحاكمُ «المستعمرين الجدد»؛ الأمريكان ومشروع تدخلهم في ﭬـيتنام.
«بايل» عميل الاستخبارات الأمريكي، المثقل بالقيم «الصحيحة» مثل الديموقراطية والإصلاح، القادر على ارتكاب الفظائع من فرطِ سذاجته ورؤيته الاختزالية للأمور، وهو ما يضيف إلى الرواية زاوية شديدة الإمتاع بالنسبة لي؛ المحاكمة الأوروبية للعقلية الأمريكية.
و«فونج»، الـﭭينامية التي أحبها الرجلان، والتي تتحرّك في خضمّ هذا الصراع «الإمبريالي» وفق ما تقتضيه مصلحتها الخاصة بواقعية صريحة.
صدرت الرواية في 1955، وهذا يعني أنها قدمت رؤية استشرافية لطبيعة التدخل الأمريكي في ﭬـيتنام الذي استمرّ حتى 1975، مع إدانة مُسبقة جاءت - رغم كونها مسبقة - نافذة ولمّاحة مع حسٍّ متهكّم «حِمضي» على الطريقة الإنجليزية. اتهمت الرواية بأنها معادية لأمريكا، وفي نوفمبر 2019، أدرجت في قائمة الـ BBC News للروايات المئة الأكثر تأثيرًا.
بعيدًا عن السياسة، من الصَّعب ألا تتورط في قصة حب لرجلين وامرأة واحدة. وبقدر ما فعل الأمريكي «بايل» كل شيء بنُبل، وعلى نحو ما تقتضيه الفروسية، كان «فاولر» الذي لم يرفع في حياتِه شعارًا واحدًا، ولا حتى شعار الحُب، هو المنتصر - برأيي - في معركة «الجاذبية»، المعركة القديمة الدائرة بين المثاليين وأبناء الشوارع.
سيتضّح للقارئ لاحقًا بأن الشعارات البرّاقة لا تجعل حاملها أكثر إنسانية، بل إنها قد تصيبه ببلادةٍ وانفصال عن نتائج أعماله، فكل ضحاياهُ ماتوا بسبب «سوء الحظ» لأنهم وجدوا في المكان الخطأ، وسيظهرون في الشريط الإخباري بصفتهم أرقامًا، شيءٌ يذكّرنا بما ذكره زيجمونت باومان عن سيولة الشر، لكن ذلك كتابٌ آخر.
باختصار؛ «الأمريكي الهادئ» رواية آسِرة، رواية فنّانة.

On Recognising the Pattern of the Mosaic

My recollection of first reading “The Quiet American” at school 44 years ago is that it was a work of consummate realism with a moral dimension that revolves around war and what we would now call (state-sponsored) terrorism (it was published in 1955).

What I hadn’t recalled was how Graham Greene so skillfully structured his narrative. The chronology is fragmented, starting more or less at the end, with the assassination of the quiet American, Alden Pyle, a dispenser of foreign aid at the U.S. Legation in Saigon in the last days of French colonial rule (1954). By the time the plot returns full circle (or cycle, given the prominence of bicycles) to this event at the end of the novel, we have learned more about how it occurred and who was responsible, at least morally.

Graham Greene re-assembled the fragments into a mosaic-like structure. There’s a sense of recognition as the shape of the mosaic becomes apparent. Although Greene wouldn’t have appreciated the analogy (there was no love lost between the two men), the novel reminded me of Lawrence Durrell’s n  “Alexandria Quartet”n (the first volume of which was published two years after this novel).



Do Thi Hai Yen (as Phuong in the 2002 film)

On Running Down the American

The narrator, English reporter and libertine, Thomas Fowler, paints a picture of his rivalry with Pyle as one of his own age and Pyle’s youth, his own experience and Pyle’s innocence, his own wisdom and Pyle’s naivete, and his own cynicism and Pyle’s bright-eyed idealism. They happen to be rivals for the affection of a young Vietnamese woman, Phuong (with whom Fowler is living when the two men meet). Pyle wins, at least initially. It’s not clear to what extent sexual rivalry and jealousy motivate any of Fowler’s subsequent actions (Inevitably, Phuong returns to Fowler after Pyle's death). After all, Fowler acknowledges that:

“I began - almost unconsciously - to run down everything that was American...You know, it's lucky I'm not engagé, there are things I might be tempted to do - because here in the East, well, I don't like Ike.”

On Getting Involved

Fowler maintains a stance of objectivity, detachment and non-involvement in local politics as a condition of his journalistic ethics. He strives to be dégagé rather than engagé. Yet, he is warned “about all of us getting involved sooner or later in a moment of emotion...Sooner or later one has to take sides. If one is to remain human."

Fowler eventually crosses the line when he learns that Pyle’s worldly innocence has lured him into a dangerous level of engagement and interference in local politics. Despite the innocuous work he seems to be doing (distributing sewing machines to the Vietnamese), it turns out that Pyle works for O.S.S. (the precursor to the C.I.A.). He has read and become enthused by the political philosophy of a fictitious American journalist/writer, York Harding (Fowler says “He's a superior sort of journalist - they call them diplomatic correspondents. He gets hold of an idea and then alters every situation to fit the idea...”), who highlights the role of grand abstractions like God and Democracy in global politics. They are the satin gloves that disguise the iron fist of American aggression, even before the commencement of the Vietnamese War.



U.S. Embassy in Saigon (as at 1955)

On Arming the Shoddy Little Bandit

Pyle ends up supplying pipe and bicycle bombs to General Thé, the leader of a small rebel group which he thinks will become a Third Way or Third Force in Vietnamese politics that opposes both French colonialism and Chinese-inspired communism. In contrast, Fowler describes Thé as “a shoddy little bandit with two thousand men and a couple of tame tigers.” This type of organisation couldn’t survive without external financial support and weapon supplies, which O.S.S. is happy to provide from its secret budget.

Pyle isn’t the worst of the Americans. That honour belongs to Bill Granger, a loud-mouthed journalist, and to Joe, the Economic Attache. The Ugly American was somebody different, a term popularised by the 1958 novel of the same name.

Certainly, Fowler retrospectively comes to regret his treatment of Pyle, even if there is nobody to whom he can say he is sorry. Not being a Catholic, he can’t even go to confession. In the end, Fowler must live with his guilt...and with Phuong. Even this happy ending comes at a cost.


William Tanner Vollmann in Saigon (as Foretold by Graham Greene)(A Post-Modern Appropriation)

"‘You underrate yourself, Bill,’ the Economic Attache said. ‘Why, that account of Road 66 - what did you call it? Highway to Hell - that was worthy of a Pulitzer. You know the story I mean - the man with his head blown off kneeling in the ditch, and that other you saw walking in a dream…’

"‘Do you think I’d really go near their stinking highway? Stephen Crane could describe a war without seeing one. Why shouldn’t I? It’s only a damned colonial war anyway. Get me another drink. And then let’s go and find a girl. You’ve got a piece of tail. I want a piece of tail too.’" (35)

March 29, 2017

If books were strippers, this one would shock. Here's the story in the buff. Thomas Fowler, a middle-aged English journalist, worn out and worse from drink and drugs, strings along a young Vietnamese woman with promises that he never expects to keep in a country on the brink of all out war.

Did I look away? No! I was glued to the spot.

This raises the ultimate question. What has this book got? The answer is in the telling. The words. From the start and sustained throughout, The Quiet American has an intensity which is compelling. Its allure is heady as scent and as intimate. This being a Greene novel, the intimacy is of the soul because, even with his flaws, Fowler is a human being. And Greene is at his best when stripping us down to our essentials.

This was a well articulated story about human existence. It showed the human existence of people living their lives in the midst of war. Also the dichotomy of life existing parallel to the death and destruction of war. The story had two main characters also living in opposite internal mindsets. The first character was the older, mature, and cynical war correspondent Fowler. The second character, Pyle, was a young and motivated yet naive CIA operative believing he too could make a difference in the world.


The external world collided with these two individuals while in the middle of the French Indochina War. The basic psychosocial needs of love and belonging were personified with the love interest of both men, a local Vietnamese girl named Phuong. Even in war human nature lies underneath—love, jealousy, spite.

I enjoyed this and I wasn't expecting this type of read with subtle philosophical and existential viewpoints. I haven't seen the 1958 or 2002 movie so I don't know how they compare but I'd recommend the book for sure. Thanks!