Bonte and Gustavo Duran Papers

Graham Greene (1904-1991) was a British author who wrote extensively in the 20th century. Born on October 2, 1904, in Berkhamsted, England, he graduated from Oxford University. Greene worked as a reporter for the Nottingham Journal and the London Times. Greene embarked on the career of a writer after the publication of his first novel in 1929. He worked for the foreign office during World War II. The popularity of his books enabled him to split his time between the French Riviera and England. Greene's works include "Stamboul Train" (1932), "This Gun for Hire" (1936), "Brighton Rock" (1938), "The Confidential Agent" (1939), "The Power and the Glory" (1940), "The Heart of the Matter" (1948), "The Third Man" (1949), "The End of the Affair" (1951), "The Quiet American" (1955), "Our Man in Havana" (1958), "A Burnt-Out Case" (1961), "The Comedians" (1966), "The Honorary Consul" (1973), and "The Human Factor" (1978). Graham Greene died on April 3, 1991, in Vevey, Switzerland. [Source: "Encyclopedia Britannica Online"]

Gustavo Duran (1906-1969) was a Spanish-American diplomat who became representative of the United Nations Development Program in Greece in 1965. He had been a ballet composer, Divisional Commander in the Spanish Civil War, friend of Ernest Hemingway, and State Department aide. Gustavo Duran was born in Barcelona. He studied music under Paul Dukas in Madrid and Paris. He composed and conducted a ballet at the young age of 21. He was a general during the Spanish Civil War, and he escaped to England at the close of the conflict. There, he married Bonte Crompton of Rye, New York. They came to America in 1940. Hemingway had Duran read the galley proofs of and correct the Spanish in "For Whom the Bell Tolls." Subsequently, Duran worked as part of Hemingway's anti-Nazi intelligence network in Havana in 1942, as an aide to the U.S. Ambassador to Cuba, as a social affairs officer for the United Nations, as a regional social affairs officer in Chile in 1955 to 1958, and as a political affairs officer in the Congo in 1960. Juan Peron in 1946 and Joseph R. McCarthy in 1950-1951 separately charged that Duran was a communist, but the charges were unfounded. Gustavo Duran died on March 26, 1969. [Source: "New York Times" p. 47 March 27, 1969.]