What have I been reading recently, you didn’t ask?

What have I been reading recently, you didn’t ask?

On a bit of a whim I decided to try some John le Carré. I’d never read any of him before, I had seen the Gary Oldman film of Tinker Tailor and enjoyed it. I’d also seen a film about le Carré called The Pigeon Tunnel and found that quite intriguing.

Deciding where to start was tricky, in the end I opted for the audiobook of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold read by Simon Russell Beale. It’s brilliant! Great twists and turns, you have to pay attention very closely and I had to scroll back and re-listen quite a few times. A fascinating examination of what it’s like to be a spy and why somebody would want to do such a dangerous/confusing/dirty job.

I carried straight on to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and had a similarly excellent time with it. I love the way the action is seen from the perspective of several different characters and how le Carré examines the inner life of his protagonists. In some ways it helped having watched the film, I could picture the characters as played by the brilliant cast, but it could also confuse things as the film, understandably, changed a few details to fit the story into film length. Having finished the book I watched the 1979 BBC TV adaptation with Alec Guinness which is also brilliant and more faithful to the book, then re-watched the 2011 film. I think I’ve more or less understood the story now!

I was tempted to skip a book and go to Smiley’s People as there’s a BBC Alec Guinness adaptation of that, but in the end I decided I wanted to be a bit more completist and do the next novel in the series and so I’ve now moved on to The Honourable Schoolboy. To be honest I have hit a bit of a wall with it, probably because I’ve gone a bit le Carré heavy in a relatively short time. Will leave it a while and try again.