In 1977, Clive James declared in the New York Review of Books, John le Carré’s The Honourable Schoolboy “is about as twice as long as it should be”. Two years later he wrote in The Observer of the television series Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy: “The first instalment fully lived up to the standard set by the original novel. Though not quite as incomprehensible, it was equally turgid.”
One wonders what Mr. James would make of A PRIVATE SPY: The Letters of John le Carré. I, for one, think it could have been twice as long again without fear of turgidity or incomprehensibility.
Edited by his son, Tim Cornwell, this collection of correspondence begins in 1945 and concludes with a letter to his long time friend, David Greenway, dated 25 November, 2020. Eighteen days later, John le Carré died.
A PRIVATE SPY spans 75 years of communiqué that is enlightening, engrossing and entertaining. It is an essential compendium to previously published autobiographical and biographical works and gifts readers with many unguarded moments, considered opinions and insights.
We get film reviews: Hated Carnal Knowledge, liked Five Easy Pieces and loved Valdez is Coming. Airline reviews: Lufthansa no better than BOAC, not as good as Swissair or SAS.
On Alec Guinness: “Smiley’s People is shooting now. Guinness is having the vapours as usual- this time it’s the director who is too something & not enough something else”.
On James Bond: “is the hyena that stalks the capitalist deserts, kept in good heart by by the charms of materialist society. Bond on his magic carpet takes us away from moral doubt, banishes perplexity with action, morality with duty.”
It’s interesting that two actors who portrayed James Bond on screen later played starring roles in a couple of his novels’ film adaptations.
Regarding Sean Connery in the film version The Russia House, le Carré writes: “has a feral strength that is disconcerting and for once very well applied”.
On Pierce Brosnan in the film version of The Tailor of Panama: “Pierce’s excellent acting and range do make it his movie.”
The showbiz and publishing stuff is the icing on the cake in this three quarters of a century odyssey of exchange.
The guts of this amassed mail are personal posts, to whit, to his wife, Jane and his sons, he writes: “Please take comfort from this. I had an amazing life, against the odds. I turned from a bad man to a much better one. I detest the mumbo jumbo of of organised religion, love the glory of creation and believe in some kind of triumph of that glory.”
His belief is thoroughly vindicated by the legacy of his books, a canon that rightfully encompasses and includes this volume.
A PRIVATE SPY The Letters of John le Carré, edited by Tim Cornwell is published by Penguin Viking.