Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

The Spy Who Came In from the Cold by John le Carré is our June 2020 New School Classic Group Read.

This is the SPOILER THREAD

I'm not sure I'll read the other books in the series, but it really surprised me that there was not a happy ending. I was expecting one, but it makes sense that there was not. I thought it was a somewhat bleak book. I want to find the movie on TV to see how it plays out on the screen.

I read this one last August, so not quite a year ago. I enjoy these books, but don't plan on rereading with the group.

I loved this book. The first le Carre I have read. Not much of a history buff I have now found myself off on a tangent of geopolitics in the 1960s. I watched an excellent History channel documentary about the Berlin wall on YouTube last night which gives excellent insight into Germany in the early 1960s. I can now understand the sensationalism around this book and why it was such an international bestseller when released. I've recently watched The Little Drummer Girl and it would seem that this would also be a well-worth read. Great plot development; characters with depth; suspense; and succinct but descriptive writing.

Here is a link to explaining the book. It includes the plot but also the list of characters and a list of jargon used.
http://everything.explained.today/Tin...
The three books in The Karla Trilogy are Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. They don't need to be read in order although there are some small references back to the first book. Also, George Smiley plays a lesser role in the other two books. Enjoy the book as I did and John le Carré occasional witticism and writing.

I love this book! But read it three times already... So won't join in the fun this time. Hope you'll all enjoy it!

This book wasn't a good read for me. I finished it and was really taken aback by the abrupt unsatisfying ending.

I didn't read the previous books in the series, so maybe that's why it was so hard to understand. But for me it was the telling technique that put me off. It was an all knowing teller, that didn't give us any feelings at all. When Leamus was pretending to be an alcoholic it was that telling style that made it exciting at first, but towards the end it merely made me annoyed. Hope you all enjoyed this more than I did!

Elin wrote: "This book wasn't a good read for me. I finished it and was really taken aback by the abrupt unsatisfying ending.

I didn't read the previous books in the series, so maybe that's why it was so hard..."
The previous books wouldn't add to the understanding of the book. The next two books are in the Karla trilogy that finishes the storyline. The hard part about this book is that it is more character-driven rather than plot-driven, which is an interesting dichotomy in a spy novel.

Don wrote: "The hard part about this book is that it is more character driven rather than plot drivenI, which is an interesting dichotomy in a spy novel"

I'm not sure I know what character-driven means, since I would have thought it was the other way around. For me the characters where bland without their own features and we never got to know what they were thinking. So I would have thought the books focus was on the plot. In any other book I would have cried rivers if the main characters died, but this didn't thouch me in the least which is weird. In style it reminds me of hemingways hard boiled style, we only get the tip of the iceberg.

I listened to an audio production and enjoyed the narrators. I got more of the emotional (or lack there of) from their characterizations of the characters. I want to watch the movie because I often miss some details when listening to an audio, which is the downside of audio books for me.

I’ve just finished and I enjoyed the book. I like how you never really knew who’s side anyone was on.

I also like how LeCarré leaves you guessing until the end. I wasn’t surprised at the ending when you finally find out what’s going on, although I was surprised Leamas went back down.

Samantha - I’ve not seen Little Drummer Girl, but read the book recently. I thought it was fabulous. From my understanding it’s supposed to be one of his best novels.

https://www.vulture.com/2017/09/best-...

An interesting take on the order of the George Smiley books to read. I love the quest to find the books in secondhand shops and old beach houses!!

Very well written. Like how le Carre handles Leamas different personalities.

The plot was so twisted it almost gave a whiplash. (view spoiler)[So the English value single lives? No, wait. If Mundt is working for the English, they actually accept him killing their own people. (hide spoiler)]

Also the trial is very clever plotted: Liz does the opposite of what Leamas want because of lack of information. It is a common critic of communist societies that it keeps people uninformed. In this case the lack of information flow is on the English side: From Leamas to Liz and from Control to Leamas. A nice little extra curl.

Anyone seen the 1965 movie with Richard Burton as Leamas? I wonder how they could get all the plot into just 2 hours?

Here is a clip:
Initial briefing from The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmmWk...

The 60’s film plays into some of the same anti-Bond spy subversion as Harry Palmer; it has Bernard Lee as a shopkeeper for one! Burton can be slightly overlooked as one of the great film actors possibly for his front page associations (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Look Back in Anger & Night of the Iguana come to mind in this period)

The films director, Martin Ritt, has a track record of adaptations, notably;

Hud (great film)- Larry McMurtry
Hombre- Elmore Leonard
Long Hot Summer & Sound and the Fury- Faulkner

The first three are very fine Paul Newman performances in his first great period vying with Brando for angry young man roles.

I used to follow directors in a similar way to more recently tracing classics authors, and film academics make a theory out of the idea that a film director fulfills the same role as a books author in its creation. That always seemed fairly obvious and didn’t deserve the title “auteur theory” but if you want to treat movies as an art form you need to gussy it up a bit. 😜

I haven't started this yet, but my library has the first three Smiley books to listen to on their app, so I've finished the first one and enjoyed enough to continue with the next two. The Spy who came in from the Cold is book 3, but I think they could be read out of order too.

I always wanted to read more about how it was to live behind the wall. Both the typical daily life and the extreme surveillance. If there was a book like the movie Das Leben der Anderen. Not a novelization - just something similar. I found this one: Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall, and started reading today. So far (first two stories of 28) it is was I have been looking for.

I have just finished the book and I am trying figure out what I liked and didn’t like. First, about a third of the way in, I was really confused and didn’t really understand all that was going on — as if LeCarre was putting the reader on a need to know basis. That made me a bit impatient. I could see it going either way by the time of the trial. I thought the trial was well written. In the end, I didn’t like the characters much and so therefore didn’t feel let down by the ending. I was indifferent to it. I am giving this three stars, because it did get better as I got deeper into it. But in the end? Meh.

I went into a DDR frenzy. I have been reading Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall. It is very good. Some very interesting and frightening stories both about specific people and life in general. To begin with I was skeptical that the author wasn’t German (she is Australian, but lived and worked in Germany). But it turns out that was maybe even a benefit: She wants to interview former Stasi people and she simply puts a notice in a paper and all the Germans are chocked! “You did what?!”

One of the Stasi people she meets gives her a copy of The Communist Manifesto, saying that it will explain everything. ....So I started reading that as well.

And on top of that I saw the 2018 movie Balloon (Balloon is a German thriller that deals with the crossing of the inner German border of the families Strelzyk and Wetzel from the GDR to West Germany with a homemade hot-air balloon.) Trailer: https://youtu.be/ouu4OoJEWIE
Also good (not superb like The Lives of Others (2006)).

In Stasiland there is an interview with one of the main DDR propagandists. Anna Funder writes about him:

“He can switch from one view to another with frightening ease. I think it is a sign of being accustomed to such power that the truth does not matter because you cannot be contradicted.”

That sounds weirdly familiar.

J_BlueFlower wrote: "I went into a DDR frenzy. I have been reading Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall. It is very good. Some very interesting and frightening stories both about specific people..."

I posted a great YouTube History Channel link on the No Spoiler section of this book that is all about the Berlin wall. It has the hot air balloon escape featured as well.

I cannot find it.

I found this one
"History Channel - Rise and Fall of the Berlin Wall"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_tXx...

J_BlueFlower wrote: "I cannot find it.

I found this one
"History Channel - Rise and Fall of the Berlin Wall"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_tXx..."

Yes that's the one, not sure where my post went - maybe I intended to but didn't! Sorry about that.

I just finished this and wow, I was completely surprised by the various twists and turns. Very clever plotting, both by LeCarre and by Control. I read the 50th anniversary edition which has a forward by Le Carre explaining that it is a work of fiction and not based on his own experiences, despite what critics and the press assumed when it was published. As much as I liked the plot, I didn’t connect with the characters. But I wonder if I would feel differently if I read it again knowing what is going on.

I just finished this book and really enjoyed it. It was fast paced and required attention to read. Very cold clever novel. I wasn't expecting the ending,

I read the book this week and really loved it: 5 stars. I like Le Carre's writing style as well as the bleak dismal atmosphere that perfectly set the mood for a pointless series of deaths. I then watched the movie with Richard Burton. What a good, faithful rendition of the story! The atmosphere was perfect and Richard Burton was the right person for the lead. The only thing I was surprised about was the actor chosen for Smiley. I certainly did not picture him like that.

Lynn wrote: "I read the book this week and really loved it: 5 stars. I like Le Carre's writing style as well as the bleak dismal atmosphere that perfectly set the mood for a pointless series of deaths. I then w..."

I've enjoyed reading John le Carré for many years. An author I can count on to help me get over any reading slump -- or for fun vacation reads.

For those who may not have seen the news today:


Best-selling spy novelist John le Carré dies at 89
https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/13/europe...