Hints and tips:
...His boss John Bingham was no mean thriller writer himself....
...At one point the novel’s authors planned a children’s picture book, and it was this tone — simplistic, smiley, gently patronising — that characterised Huffman’s production....
...Gung-ho Bond and conscience-stricken Smiley alike did their bit for British espionage exceptionalism. However, a gulf divides the real-world records of both men....
...relationships with the women in his life, providing new insights into the inner workings of the man who created George Smiley....
...Given the absence of the Slough House cast of misfits, the tone feels darker than before — less David Brent, more George Smiley....
...His friends (Hurley and Elton John) checked him into rehab. But even that didn’t hit the spot....
...The talk-show host Tavis Smiley called him a consigliere, and it is certainly true that much of his work was done behind the scenes....
...To explain why, he approvingly quotes an observation that the novelist John le Carré had his fictional spy George Smiley utter at the end of the cold war: “If a democratic Russia emerges — why, then Russia...
...I also thought John Plender was absolutely right about AI and why this is the real deal, not another dotcom bubble....
...Like John le Carré’s George Smiley, Merrick’s mild exterior conceals a steely determination....
...There are strong echoes of George Smiley in Merrick’s mild and unprepossessing manner, which disguises a razor-sharp brain and considerable courage when necessary....
...“The Gediminas letter inspires me,” says the current mayor of Vilnius, Remigijus Šimašius, a tall, blond, smiley man who is relentlessly positive about his city....
...All these writers have been described, at some point, as the heir of John le Carré, aka David Cornwell, the master of cold war espionage fiction who died in 2020 at the age of 89....
...He looks like a smiley, tanned Cal Ripken, backslapping his way through the place like he’s the mayor. He eats with us, eager to confer with Gold, who supplied his employees with Ivermectin....
...Follow John Reed on Twitter: @JohnReedwrites...
...Proctor’s qualities recall those of George Smiley — like Smiley he also has to put up with his long-standing wife cheating on him....
...John, a finance worker based in Hong Kong, is not looking forward to moving to Singapore....
...This misogyny was repeated and exaggerated in popular novels written by former spies such as Ian Fleming and John le Carré....
...In John le Carré’s Karla trilogy, which George Smiley novel comes between Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Smiley’s People? Which geographical zones lie between the tropics and the polar regions?...
...John le Carré, who died on Saturday, was credited with developing the cold war-era spy thriller, quickly becoming synonymous with the genre....
...I have never thought of the spy novelists who came after John le Carré as working in his shadow....
...It’s sometimes said that David Cornwell, known to his millions of readers across the world as John le Carré, was his droll, studiously observant, dry-eyed anti-hero George Smiley: “small, podgy and at best...
...Other collaborations around the festival’s districts include 1990s rave- inspired smiley face rugs by fashion designer Henry Holland and Shoreditch carpet dealer Floor Story....
...Born in 1931 in Poole on the southern coast of England, le Carré’s real name was David John Moore Cornwell....
...Briefly we digress into a celebration of Alec Guinness’s magisterial command of George Smiley. “He didn’t look like Smiley in the books but it didn’t matter,” says Nauman reverently....
International Edition