55 pages • 1-hour read
The End Of The Affair
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Book 1, Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Book 1, Chapter 1 Summary
The novel begins with the image of Henry Miles moving across the Common on a wet January night in 1946. “I hated Henry,” the narrator Maurice Bendrix confesses, “I hated his wife Sarah too” (4). Maurice has been to the local pub, and while walking home, he realizes that he took the wrong umbrella. As he crosses toward the “wrong—the south—side of the Common” (4) where he lives, he sees Henry. Bendrix wonders whether he should ignore Henry before reluctantly saying hello.
They share a stilted conversation, during which Bendrix makes a point of asking about Sarah, even though “any suffering she underwent would lighten” (5) his mood. Bendrix wishes that Sarah was dead, though his narration reveals a jealousy about her. A year-and-a-half has passed since Bendrix last saw Henry, he admits as they enter a pub. Bendrix first went out with Sarah with the intention of “picking the brain of a civil servant’s wife” (5), as he intended to write a novel about such a character. The two began an affair, even though Sarah remains deeply loyal to Henry.
The men sit in the pub and drink rum while they talk. Eventually, Henry confesses that he is worried. He admits that Sarah’s behavior has been concerning but wants to discuss the matter at home. Henry invites Bendrix back to his house. Sarah is out, so they enter Henry’s study and drink whisky. Henry reveals a letter about hiring a detective agency; Bendrix’s reply is stifled by jealousy, although he feigns ignorance of any possible infidelity. Bendrix recommends that Henry visit the detective, but when Henry declines, Bendrix offers to go himself. He will “pretend to be a jealous lover” (9), and Henry burns the letter, just as Sarah arrives home. Bendrix greets her bitterly and they make perfunctory conversation.
Book 1, Chapter 2 Summary
Days later, as the memory of Sarah still haunts Bendrix, he decides to visit Mr. Savage, the private detective. He visits the detective in a Vigo Street office and feels “embarrassed and bitter” (11) as he asks Savage about the charges for detective services. Then, he tells Savage everything, especially Sarah’s “secrets” (12). Savage listens attentively, almost like a doctor, and takes down the details of the case.
When they reach the end, Savage outlines the charges: “three guineas a day, and expenses, ‘which must be approved of course’” (13). Then, the meeting is over and Bendrix leaves the office, almost convinced that it “was the kind of interview which happened to all men sooner or later” (13).
Book 1, Chapter 3 Summary
Bendrix returns to writing his book, though finds that he now has a problem: “[T]here are so many more facts, now that I have not to invent them” (14). He remembers the first time he met Sarah, when he attended a party thrown by Henry. Sarah treated Bendrix as “a human being rather than as an author” (14); later, when Bendrix took a walk along the Common with Henry, they discussed Sarah in complimentary terms. When they returned to the house, Bendrix saw Sarah separating from another person “as though from a kiss” (14) and realized that Henry either did not see it or did not care, although Bendrix later discovers that the scene was likely innocent. As he reflects on the past, he can “feel all of [his] hatred returning” (15).
Book 1, Chapters 1-3 Analysis
The novel opens halfway through the story. As the reader is introduced to Bendrix, Henry, and Sarah, the titular affair has already ended. Bendrix, a moderately successful writer, had a relationship with Sarah that ended 18 months before the beginning of the novel, and now he feels only hatred toward her. The book employs a fractured narrative, flicking back and forth between the present day (1946) and the memories of Bendrix and Sarah’s time together (1944). As the opening line states, “a story has no beginning or end” (4), and Greene begins the narrative in the middle of the story, eventually tying together the loose ends and slotting the fractured narrative together.
The opening chapters are also the audience’s initial introduction to Maurice Bendrix, who is commonly known as Bendrix. He is a writer, relating the story as though he were confessing it to his readers. Elsewhere in the book, there will be alternative authorial voices: Sarah and Parkis will both be able to supply their perspective through extended narrations in the form of letters. From the very beginning, Bendrix reveals himself to be a man fixated on emotions. He feels in very strong terms, telling the reader immediately that “I hated Henry—I hated his wife Sarah too” (4). His actions, however, are more reserved. Rarely does Bendrix display emotion in a conspicuous fashion. He is a reserved man, who expresses himself through his work (and, by extension, through the book’s narrative).
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