Word: torrijo
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Dates: during 1977-1977
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Greene has a way of decoding signals of despair in a man's face--the hunger to destroy or the wish to die. In Torrijo's "lines of weariness around the eyes," Greene sees what he calls a "charisma of desperation." It communicates an impatience with the inert diplomacy over the Canal issue, but also a desire to leave a mark on history. If he doesn't do so on the dotted line on the document that restores sovereignty over the waterway to Panama, Greene hints he plans to leave it in blood...
...IDEALISM'S decay has touched Torrijo. He has power, and to Greene that alone amounts to a loss of moral legitimacy. He never lashes into the General directly, as he follows him on one of his visits to the countryside. But the implication is there, all the more hard-hitting for Greene's matter-of-fact style...
When yucca farmers clamor for an end to price ceilings on their produce, Torrijo confides to Greene under his breath (the politician's touch), "I'm going to grant it...I want to redistribute money...All the same I'll keep them guessing." In another town, the peasants, gathered like "a committee elected to arrange Christmas entertainments," try to shake the military men with angry, meaningless slogans. But the government's drum-rolls drown out their protest...
...right and wrong in Greene's moral universe, only suffocation. In yet another village, a peasant shouts out, "We have the moral authority of those who work for low wages." Greene lets it pass, almost conceding the assertion, until he describes the workers who stand behind the Torrijo regime because of its successful "banana war" against United Brands. Suddenly he strips off the portrait of worker dignity and lays bare his outsider's insight into the weekly flight that keeps them going: "They are inclined to begin after early Mass on Sunday. When drunk they bark like dogs...
Everyone in Greene's Panama is sick of the Canal situation: the businessman because it gives Torrijo too much leverage; Torrijo because he doesn't quite know how to use it; the peasants for a century worth of reasons. To revolt is not always to fulfill a class or national destiny, Greene suggests--perhaps a people may just get bored with peace...