The first thing that comes to mind when one thinks about spies and espionage is probably James Bond, perhaps not the version of Bond as written by Ian Fleming but more the version given to us by the producers of the Bond films and portrayed by a succession of actors like Sean Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore and latterly Daniel Craig.
The spy stories of John le Carré are really quite different. There are stories about people in offices who become greedy and pass documents and information to the other side for money. Perhaps they want better lives or they want money to impress women or for a thousand other reasons. They are set in seedy dull worlds where the jet setting glamour of 007 rarely intrudes.
John le Carré is actually the pen name of David Cornwell who began writing while serving with MI5 and later MI6 which was why he had to use a nom de plume. When his writing career took off with the great success of his third novel The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, John le Carré left the intelligence services to become a full time author.
He wrote a number of novels, all with a spying or espionage theme and many featured his famous spy, George Smiley. Smiley is an older man, a quiet and easy going but intelligent operative who plods along as he investigates and analyses information.
George only appears in the background to The Spy Who Came in From the Cold. Taking centre stage are Control, the head of the secret service and his Berlin agent, Alec Leamas. The secret service is known in John’s books as the ‘circus’ as it is based in Cambridge Circus in London and he introduces us to other elements of his secret world such as the ‘lamplighters’ and ‘scalphunters’ and many others, all nicknames for the various elements of the ‘circus’.
In The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, Alec Leamas is head of the Berlin Station and is recalled to London after the capture of one of his agents in East Berlin. Control has a new task for Leamas, that of discrediting the head of East German Intelligence, Mundt. The task calls for Leamas to pretend to become disillusioned by MI6 and offer himself as an informant.
In the splendid film version, Leamas is played by Richard Burton. He plays the part superbly. After leaving British Intelligence Leamas gets a job in a small private library where he becomes involved with a fellow librarian Liz, although her name was changed in the film version to Nan so as not to invite comparison with Burton’s real life wife, Elizabeth Taylor. Burton apparently wanted Liz Taylor to play the part of Nan but director Martin Ritt insisted on casting Clare Bloom.
When Leamas arrives in Europe to give his information he meets Fiedler played by Oskar Werner who is to interrogate him. Acting on information given by Leamas, he begins to feel that Mundt, the head of East German Intelligence, is actually a traitor but then the story is flipped on its head as we find that Leamas’ mission is actually to discredit Fiedler and protect Mundt, who actually is working for the west.
I was probably first introduced to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by the 1979 TV series starring Alec Guinness as George Smiley. In the story Smiley has retired but he is brought back into the intelligence fold after Lacon, the senior civil servant responsible for the service, asks him to investigate a story that has been brought to him by a missing agent named Ricki Tarr. The story concerns a ‘mole’ working for British Intelligence but passing information to the Soviet Union.
I read the book shortly afterwards but not long ago I picked up a paperback version linked to the recent film version in which Gary Oldman plays George Smiley.
The story was influenced by the defection of Kim Philby to the Soviet Union who was the original ‘mole’ at the heart of British Intelligence.
Smiley has to check out the story of Ricki Tarr and along the way interviews many former ‘Circus’ employees who left the service after the death of Control. Control was convinced of the existence of a spy at the centre of the organisation and sent agent Jim Prideux on a mission to Czechoslovakia. During that mission, Prideux was shot and captured and the circus went into meltdown.
Kathy Burke plays Connie Sachs, an old Soviet watcher who became convinced Soviet diplomat Polyakov was a spy but her idea was rejected by the new Circus leaders but Smiley realises Connie might have been on to something. There are various suspects for the mole and they have all been given code names by Control; Tinker, Tailor, Poorman and so on. Control expected Prideux to come back with a code word but he did not and by the time he was exchanged and returned to the UK, the poorly Control had passed away.
Control had given another name to the mole; he called him Gerald and Smiley realises that Gerald must have been planted in the circus years ago by ‘Karla’, the head of Soviet Intelligence. Smiley had once tried to recruit Karla as a British agent but Karla, played by Patrick Stewart in the TV series took Smiley’s offered cigarettes and lighter but declined Smiley’s offer. Why? Smiley thought it was because Karla had an ace in the hole, Gerald, already burrowing into British Intelligence.
Another element in the story is the unseen Ann, Smiley’s wife. She has had various affairs and Smiley has left her but on the night of the Prideux shooting it appears she was with Bill Haydon played by Colin Firth in the film. Who then is the mole?
The mole of course is unmasked at the end of both the book, the TV series and the film. The book, although interesting, moves slowly along and both the TV series and the film emulate the book’s slow pace. I’m not sure I particularly cared for the film but the book was an enjoyable read and it’s interesting how the author holds on to all the various elements of the story and is still able to throw a little spanner into the works with the suggestions about Ann’s dalliance with Bill Haydon.
All of John le Carré’s books are rather slow moving stories that simmer along gently and one other book I tried to read recently, Our Kind of Traitor, was one I put down permanently as I really didn’t have enough interest in the story to continue.
John le Carré wrote 26 novels. In later life he was disillusioned with the UK over Brexit and in fact he was so upset that he decided to become an Irish citizen. He died in 2020 aged 89.
I’ve always been a writer, even as a school kid I was writing stories and screenplays. I used to write scripts and do all the casting. Not sure whether Steve McQueen would have appreciated the roles I was planning for him though.
Well, more of the same really. I’ve begun to work on a follow up novel to Floating in Space but a novel is hard work and I sometimes wonder if I’m up to the task. Even my latest book, Timeline, which is just a collection of stories and blog posts was pretty hard work. The big problem is just me, being motivated and just getting myself geared up to work and write. Writing short stories is much more enjoyable and I’m really pleased at how my stories have turned out. A few are available for readers to download and enjoy, just click on the download link above.
I did read some news snippets over the previous weekend indicating Starmer was planning to resign on the Monday but I pretty much dismissed that as just a rumour without any background. Of course journalists have their contacts within government and certainly whoever started that rumour off must have had a good source because he was proved fully correct.
Those memories and other ones always come back every time I look at that picture. I happened to be looking at it this week as I scanned through some of my old posts looking for inspiration. The photo only took a moment to take but it’s nice to think about that house and all the happy times I had there. Not only that, my Grandmother and Grandfather lived there before us. They later moved to Prestatyn in Wales and my Mum and Dad took over the house when they were first married so it’s almost like a little bit of Higgins’ history, wrapped up in a picture.
Dad worked for Manchester Highways and his job title was, if I remember correctly, a flagger’s mate. His job was to lay pavement flags throughout Wythenshawe in south Manchester as well as to work tarmacing roads and repairing potholes. He rode to work on his bicycle every day of his working life armed only with his backpack containing his lunch; his sandwiches made by my mother and his brewcan. He used to use that brewcan even when he retired. Where he got the hot water from when working on the roads I don’t know unless he either went back to the Highways office or perhaps asked people where he was working to top up his brewcan.
In 1956 over in Liverpool, John Lennon formed a skiffle band called the Quarrymen. On the 6th July 1957 Lennon met Paul McCartney at the Woolton village fete and invited him to join the band. A year later in 1958 McCartney asked his school friend George Harrison to join but Lennon declined thinking the 15 year old George was too young. The two kept on at Lennon and he finally allowed George to join up after hearing him play guitar on the top deck of a bus.
Also in 1963 the Rolling Stones first single was a cover version of Chuck Berry’s Come On which rose to 21 in the UK singles chart. Their second single was a Lennon/McCartney song, I Wanna be Your Man.
Behind the scenes there was a good deal of mutual respect between the Stones and the Beatles. In fact, John Lennon and Paul McCartney had helped the Stones early in their career by giving them the song “I Wanna Be Your Man”.
As a band, the Beatles had come to the end of the line. There were arguments about the cinema film, the final album mixes, whose songs were to be included on the final album and all sorts of business issues. Allen Klein became the Beatles’ new manager but Paul McCartney wanted John Eastman, his new father in law. He was overruled by the other Beatles and Klein became their business manager and Eastman their lawyer.
This week I seem to have arrived at Friday with only two partly written posts and one of those is a longer version of a post I’ve done before. I wasn’t sure what to do and then I came up with an idea. What about merging the two posts together?
One day, round about the beginning of our last week there, the heat suddenly ramped up very quickly. It was almost as if some unseen hand had switched on the exterior central heating and things went from cold -we were wearing fleeces and had the inside heating on- to T-shirt and shorts weather, in fact most of the time it was too hot for even a T shirt.
In the evening we would usually have a barbecue, made much easier these days by our little ‘Camping Gaz’ gas barbecue which means we don’t have to wait yonks for the barbecue to get going or have to have it relit (a common occurrence when I’m in charge of the coals). Yes, our little gas barby clips together in minutes, the gas bottle is slapped into place and we are ready for those burgers.
Slow Days, Fast Company
Red Strike by Chris Ryan
The Fry Chronicles by Stephen Fry
The Man who Died Twice by Richard Osman
Amanda appeared in Coronation Street for a number of years but I’ve always known her as the girl who played Cleopatra in the Carry On film Carry on Cleo, you know, the one where Kenneth Williams says ‘Infamy, infamy; they’ve all got it in for me!’
A few years ago a worrying situation occurred when a random warning light appeared on the dashboard of our van. A quick check on Google showed it to be an engine fault. I started to worry that the engine might be ready to conk out so we went to a friendly garage and they plugged in their diagnostic equipment. They weren’t sure what the problem actually was so they suggested we go to a Ford garage as our van was of course, a Ford. The garage wouldn’t accept any money so we went off to a Ford garage and after what seemed like hours they emerged from their garage and told us not to worry, the engine was ok to drive but you owe us 150 Euros!
I have to say that I’ve struggled to think of films about the UK Police without resorting to Google although there are quite a few TV shows I could mention. The obvious one that comes to mind is Dixon of Dock Green.
Occasional time on your own though can be good. It gives you time to think and do things that perhaps annoy your usual close partner. Playing music for instance or watching TV shows that your partner does not like. When you are alone you can eat early or eat late. You can get up early or you can get up late. You can even sit in the garden and read without any need to go back inside until you are good and ready. You can indulge in foods that are bad for you and no one will know. That cream cake that you should not have eaten is a secret between you and your inner self but you and you alone will know had good it tasted. Same goes for that Spam sandwich.
He gives advice on screenwriting and tells a number of film making/writing anecdotes. One I found particularly interesting was how directors want rewrites incorporating their ideas for the film. Then a big star comes aboard but doesn’t like it that his character dies at the end. New rewrite and the character is not killed. Then the star leaves the project and another star arrives. Cue new rewrite, this time the star wants to die but the director leaves and the new director wants to bring his own writer on board.
Letters from an Unknown Author! 