The Circus

Spy or espionage thrillers, if well-written, make for great and absorbing reading. I've long been a fan of the works of John le Carré, probably the finest exponent, and Eric Ambler, who was an inspiration to both le Carré and Ian Fleming. Most recently I've been reading Len Deighton's novels. (Somehow they passed me by when originally published in the 1960s and 1970s.)  What I love about Deighton and  le Carré in particular is the quality of their writing, proving that genres are no barrier to literary greatness.

The protagonist of Deighton's first four novels (The IPCRESS File, Horse Under Water, Funeral In Berlin, Billion Dollar Brain) was never once given a name. Now that's an interesting gambit for a spy thriller. He worked for WOOC(P) - an acronym that even Deighton can't pin down accurately - presumably some secret department of the War Office, based in non-descript offices in Charlotte Street just north of Oxford Street. Deighton himself was a graphic artist turned newspaper columnist and author. He was never a spy but he researched meticulously as any investigative journalist would and wrote quite brilliantly.

John le Carré on the other hand (real name David Cornwell) worked for both MI5 and MI6 until the early 1960s when he, along with several other operatives, had to be retired from active service because their cover was blown by a defecting Briton. Le Carré (he adopted the pen name because the Foreign Office would not allow its employees to publish under their real identities) based his version of the Secret Intelligence Service in headquarters on Shaftesbury Avenue at Cambridge Circus - see the map below - and he always referred to the organisation as 'The Circus'; not only a good codename but one layered with ironic overtones. Interestingly, Stella Rimington, director-general of MI5 in the 1990s, has published a raft of spy novels in her own name since her retirement; presumably the nom-de-plume requirement doesn't apply to those no longer actively spooking.

I-Spy Map of London centred on 'The Circus'

Probably the most famous of le Carré's novels were those featuring intelligence officer George Smiley (Call For The Dead, A Murder of Quality, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy, Smiley's People), especially as Smiley also transferred successfully to the big and small screens in adaptations starring a roll-call of great actors from Rupert Davies and James Mason via Alec Guinness to Denholm Elliot and Gary Oldman. Le Carré's series of novels about 'The Circus' are intelligent, intense and involving creations, written with the wit and authenticity that suggest fiction is but a thin veneer over lived experience.

Smiley the Ring Master

As with any real-life circus, there is anticipation, excitement, tension, trickery, bravura, skill and suspense to be found within the pages of any of the name-checked novels. If you've never read one, roll up, roll up. I think a splendid time is guaranteed for all. I do sometimes wonder if the subject matter appeals more to boys and men than girls and women, though I see no good reason why it should.

Here to conclude, my latest poem, extracted from the imaginarium using that most dastardly of tortures, the deadline. It appears there is no place for weakness, self or sentiment in the world of spooks. I give you... 

Sanitization (Nancy, 1963)

They say when the west is benighted, 

the east is delighted, certainly the case 

that evening when confusion reigned

in the house of the flattered bee,

a honey-trap sprung. 

There is no glamour in sleeping 

with a pistol under the pillow,

waking in adrenalin sweat with each

unfathomable creaking, the pissing

in fear over unfamiliar u-bends,

life as a cryptic, lonesome cipher.

They also say fear not the soles 

led by a duty to cosmology,

it's the heavier tread of hobnailed ideology

that kills the will to go on dissembling.

That, and what's worse, the paranoia,

led to a terse exchange in Lorraine.

Not even the ubiquitous doves

circled the square on the morning

of  twitching curtains in faceless bays

tracking invisible tails and foggy trails  

as one hot Englishwoman to be traded

in discreet fashion walked slowly

towards the car and a future unnumbed,

the edge of silence portentous

before two bullets ripped her heart

from front and back,

spinning her like a hapless top.

She bled out shot by both sides

beneath the sign of the double cross,

a merciless date with destiny

while from a watching casement 

the ringmaster sighed,

whip cracked, duty done, 

always beyond reach of reproach.

Thanks for reading. Never let the left hand know what the right is doing! S ;-)

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