John le Carre
John le Carre
David John Moore Cornwellis a British author of espionage novels. During the 1950s and the 1960s, he worked for the Security Service and the Secret Intelligence Service, and began writing novels under a pen name. His third novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, became an international best-seller, and remains one of his best-known works. Following the success of this novel, he left MI6 to become a full-time author...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth19 October 1931
strong book writing
I've never been able to write a book without one very strong character in my rucksack.
bribery blackmail
Blackmail is more effective than bribery.
mean government ruthless
I mean, you can't be less ruthless than the opposition simply because your government's policy is benevolent, can you now?
writing spy desperate
I was the British spy who had come out of the woodwork and told it how it really was, and anything I said to the contrary only enforced the myth. And since I was writing for a public hooked on Bond and desperate for the antidote, the myth stuck.
giving bows strings
I've got more than one string to my bow, and I thought I'd give this one a twang.
religious war israel
The religious cant that will send American troops into battle is perhaps the most sickening aspect of this surreal war-to-be. Bush has an arm-lock on God. And God has very particular political opinions. God appointed America to save the world in any way that suits America. God appointed Israel to be the nexus of America's Middle Eastern policy, and anyone who wants to mess with that idea is a) anti-Semitic, b) anti-American, c) with the enemy, and d) a terrorist.
cells hands political
On one hand we go like hell for every terror cell we can find, we penetrate it, we destroy it. On the other hand, there is a much bigger need for a political solution.
light goes-on building
The one thing you can bet is that spying is never over. Spying is like the wiring in this building: It's just a question of who takes it over and switches on the lights. It will go on and on and on.
war battle done
You can't make war against terror. Terror is a technique of battle. It's a tactic that has been employed since time immemorial. You can conduct clandestine action against terrorists, and that must be done.
feelings age sometimes
When you're my age, you have the feeling sometimes that you're seeing the show come round again.
writing hands literature
I happen to write by hand. I don't even type.
cowboy thinking play
What do you think spies are: priests, saints and martyrs? They're a squalid procession of vain fools, traitors too, yes; pansies, sadists and drunkards, people who play cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten lives.
spy world couches
For decades to come the spy world will continue to be the collective couch where the subconscious of each nation is confessed.
cat writing watches
A good writer can watch a cat pad across the street and know what it is to be pounced upon by a Bengal tiger.