Rod Mengham reads Five Short Stories by Graham Greene

Dr. Rod Mengham (Fellow and Director of Studies in English, Jesus College, Cambridge), who specialises in the study of nineteenth and twentieth century English Literature, has published on Emily Brontë, Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Henry Green and others. He has a particular affinity for the literature of the 1930s and '40s, and in the Town Hall, Berkhamsted (UK), on Friday 2nd October 2009 he delivered a conference paper to the Graham Greene International Festival on five short stories by Greene. Four were written in the 30s, and one in 1940.

In “I Spy” Rod found an abiding interest in espionage --- surveillance and observation --- as a child’s mind resolves questions of loyalty and betrayal. He saw emulation and mimicry in “A Day Saved”, which combines the mundane and the menacing, and he identified confused identity along with loyalty and betrayal in “Brother” and “The Basement Room”. He found that at the beginning of the war Greene returned to these preoccupations in “The Lieutenant Died Last”, as he imagined Nazi uniforms in an English pub and a battle in an English country house.

Rod’s talk was distinguished by the closeness of his reading of the chosen texts, the meticulous quality of his argument, and the mellifluousness of his delivery.

Jeremy Lewis on "The Other Greenes"

On Friday 2nd October 2009 in the Town Hall (top right) Berkhamsted (UK), Jeremy Lewis (right) opened the first day of informal talks and conference papers at the twelfth annual Graham Greene International Festival. A writer, editor and historian, Jeremy is currently writing a book (to be published by Jonathan Cape in 2010) on the Greene family. He revealed some of his fascinating research in a highly informative talk, as he declaimed urbanely without notes, demonstrating encyclopaedic knowledge of his field coupled with wise and sympathetic understanding of his characters on both sides of the family tree --- “The Intellectual Greenes” and “The Hall Greenes”.

Before he introduced Jeremy Lewis to his avid listeners, the audience cheered, as festival director, Dermot Gilvary, reminisced that in Berkhamsted School on the morning of this same date in October Graham Greene was born --- one hundred and five years earlier --- in the year 1904.

Greene Festival celebrates The Third Man's Sixtieth Anniversary at The Rex

On Thursday 1st October 2009 in front of a full house in the beautiful art deco environment of The Rex Cinema, Berkhamsted (UK), the twelfth annual Graham Greene International Festival began its celebration of the sixtieth anniversary of the release of The Third Man in the UK by screening the classic thriller, which was written by Graham Greene and directed by Carol Reed. The film was introduced by Peter Mikl (above), the director of the Austrian Cultural Forum in London, and preceded by the gorgeous harmonies of Cornelia Mayer (above centre), the celebrated Viennese zither player, as she gave a short selection of popular film scores composed by Austrians.

Creative Writing Award for Berkhamstedians

At the opening event of the Graham Greene International Festival 2009 Rebekah Lattin-Rawstrone (top right) launched the competition for the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust's Creative Writing Award 2010 for any writer from Berkhamsted School. In a dynamic and interactive workshop organised by Rachael Guy, the School Librarian, and supported by the School's English Department, Rebekah was assisted by Creina Mansfield (University of Manchester) and David Strickland (University of East Anglia), as each gave advice on creative writing and tips on how to prepare entries for the competition. Writers may offer a prose text or a screenplay. For prose writers the prescribed first words of the story must be: “A whistle blew, and the train trembled into movement….” For screenwriters the same words must be embedded somewhere in the text. The closing date for receipt of entries is 1st April 2010. The complete rules of the competition are posted on the Trust's website, and writers may discuss their work on the Facebook page named Creative Writers and Graham Greene.