I must confess that John Le Carre is one of my favorite writers. His skill, style and language put him far above the pack of thriller writers and close to the top of the craft in general. That is, in my humble opinion. His acid depiction of British, American and other intelligence and government establishments have no peers after Evelyn Waugh doing a similar job on British upper classes.
Lately his books veered sharply from his beloved domain of espionage into the twilight zone of government conspiracies, dastardly deeds by right-wingers and corporate mayhem and became so politicized that it is sometimes hard to distinguish between a book by John Le Carre and a new production by a site like Prison Planet or WhatReallyHappened. Not that there is no truth in what he talks about, but his inordinate writing powers are doing much more effective job than all the conspiracy theorists together, and the resulting effect is akin to visiting the Devil’s kitchen.
I think that this abandonment of the original domain was a bit premature. The old villains haven’t disappeared and haven’t changed their thuggish ways and their lethal tricks. And here comes a reminder:
A former Russian spy and fierce critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin was fighting for his life in a London hospital after an apparent bid to kill him by poisoning.
Alexander Litvinenko, a former lieutenant colonel in Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) – successor to the Soviet KGB – fell ill after meeting a contact at a London sushi bar who purportedly had information on the murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, said the Mail on Sunday newspaper.
He had kidney damage, was constantly vomiting and suffered an almost total loss of white blood cells, The Sunday Times added. The paper said he had been poisoned with thallium and quoted a medical report which showed he had three times the maximum safe limit in his body, a potentially fatal dose. If Russia’s security services were behind the alleged poisoning, it would not be the first time that they have tried to silence critics on the streets of London.
Aside of the relatively novel venue – sushi bar (in the olden days it would have been a noisy, dirty and saturated by smoke to almost total invisibility pub) – the plot, the actors and the outcome are as old as Iron Felix. And the chief protagonists are the same, let’s not forget the protagonists, please.
So, dear Mr Le Carre, unless you think that colonel Litvinenko fell prey to a sushi that has gone off (surely a possibility, the stories about lethal sushi rolls abound, but thallium?), you may do well to take another look at the old villains. And maybe to shake off the mothballs from good old Mr. Smiley too.
With best wishes from your devoted reader.
P.S. And just in case you need some implausibility to spice the book, here it comes, from the same article:
The Sunday Times said he had met an Italian called Mario at the sushi restaurant, who said he had important information on the death of Politkovskaya.
Sunday Times, an Italian called Mario and a talking sushi restaurant – what else is needed for another super-thriller?
Update: Of course, it’s denials time now:
Russia has denied any involvement in the poisoning of a former KGB agent in London as Britain gave the investigation top priority, calling in counter-terrorism police to spearhead the probe.
Yep.
Cross-posted on SimplyJews
LeCarre, in my opinion, is a genteel anti-Semite of the old school. In Little Drummer Girl, he writes of an amoral Israeli intelligence officer having “a fine rabbinic anger” (whatever that is supposed to mean) and “who lied even in his prayers” (of course, the Mossad is filled with praying religious Jews, not hilonim). LeCarre ironically expresses his disgust that westerners can become Israeli citizens, but “native Palestinians”, in his view, cannot. He also tells us that Israel bombs innocent refugees in their camps, justifying bombing attacks on Israeli civilians — or at least the homes of Israeli diplomats.
Tailor of Panama is even worse; LeCarre drops the anti-Zionist facade and centers his book around a greedy, scheming but politically naive, morally and physically weak, philandering, lying “half Jew” and his embezzling and philandering Jewish arsonist uncle. The former ends up provoking an invasion and getting his trusting, idealistic gentile friend murdered through his greed and dishonesty.
Those are the only two LeCarre books I’ve read; I never had the stomach to try any others. I realize that many of his characters are far from paragons, but some at least have a redeeming feature or two. I’ve not seen him give us a Jewsih character with any redeeming features.
Yankev,
I read all of Le Carre books and respectfully disagree with your take on them. In the In Little Drummer Girl he shows all kinds of Jews and Palestinians, and it is a mistake in my opinion to base your conclusion on two negative remarks about one Mossad employee. A sure exaggeration on your part.
As for the Tailor of Panama – so Le Carre has chosen a half-Jew to be his chief protagonist. Cannot say I have never encountered a Jewish tailor and cannot claim all of them are of sterling character. And I quite liked that uncle, by the way – don’t know what exactly caused you such a reaction.
The body of work of Le Carre includes, probably, hundreds of negative characters, 99.9% of them non-Jewish. Should we blame him in being a secret Zionist? No, of course. He veered into the dark conspiracies lately, as I have already mentioned, and his books lost their appeal to me. But labeling him an anti-Semite? Nah…
BTW, if it will make you feel better, one of his friends was Joseph Brodsky RIP. Of course, it does not prove anything, as we know ;-)
Snoopy,
The married uncle who carried on an affair with his non-Jewish employee, and who hired the protagonist to commit arson as part of an insurance scam and then left the nephew to take the blame? Likeable fellow, I guess.
As for Little Drummer Girl, the one Mossad employee you mention is the only developed Jewish character. The other Israelis simply move the plot forward, with no insight into their character or motivation. The only remotely sympathetic characters are Charly (whom the Mossad agent manipulates), the Palestinian bomb maker and his sister. (Yes, there are unlikable Muslims in the book, such as the head of the training camp in the refugee village).
And reread LeCarre’s description in LDB of what the newspapers did NOT print but could have when the Israeli diplomat’s son was killed by the bomb –as though Israel deliberately targets civilians for its aerial bombings.
Yes, most of LeCarre’s non-Jewish characters are no prizes either, but every now and then he presents someone admirable. If LeCarre has ever presented an admirable or likable
Jewish character, I’d appreciate your calling it to my attention.
Yankev
You gotta understand, Le Carre thinks the wrong side won the Cold War Even in his earliest books there was the strain of moral equivalence between the West and the USSR.
There is one Jewish character that Le Carre invented that he seemed to like. That was Dieter in the first Smiley book, I can’t remember the name now. He murders three people and comes near to killing a fourth. He is an East German spy who had worked for Smiley during the War, but went East because he preferred the Communists and hated the Americans.
Le Carre belongs, I think, to the conservative trend in Britain that envies America for its power and resents Britain’s decline from Empire, and romanticizes the Arabs. Le Carre also romanticizes the Communists as revolutionaries I think. He is pretty copacetic with spying in their favor, as the sympathetic character of Bill in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy illustrates.