This work presents a narrative of Graham Greene's early life - including a breakdown in his early teens, his years at Oxford, and his courtship of his future wife - uncovering the origins of his literary preoccupations and his reasons for conversion to Roman Catholicism. Greene's development as a novelist, from the early success of The Man Within to The Power and the Glory, is also explored in full. Winner of the 1990 Edgar Allan Poe Award for best critical/biographical study.