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" There are some subjects that can only be tackled in fiction. "
John le Carre
Only
Subjects
Tackled
Related Quotes:
" I've had nothing to do with the intelligence world since I left it, in any shade or variety. "
John le Carre
Had
Shade
Nothing
" I wrote 'The Spy Who Came in from the Cold' at the age of 30 under intense, unshared personal stress and in extreme privacy. As an intelligence officer in the guise of a junior diplomat at the British Embassy in Bonn, I was a secret to my colleagues, and much of the time to myself. "
John le Carre
Age
Myself
Intelligence
" People who've had very unhappy childhoods are pretty good at inventing themselves. If nobody invents you for yourself, nothing is left but to invent yourself for others. "
John le Carre
Good
People
You
" For better or worse, I've been involved in the description of political conflict. "
John le Carre
Political
Better
Conflict
" You should have died when I killed you. "
John le Carre
You
Should
Died
" Completing a book, it's a little like having a baby. "
John le Carre
Like
Little
Book
" I've always had difficulties with female characters. "
John le Carre
Characters
Difficulties
Had
" Americans believe that if you know something, you should do something about it. "
John le Carre
Something
Know
Should
" We have learned in recent years to translate almost all of political life in terms of conspiracy. And the spy novel, as never before, really, has come into its own. "
John le Carre
Never
Political
Conspiracy
" I began writing when I was still in the British Foreign Service, and it was then understood that even if you wrote about butterfly collecting, you used another name. "
John le Carre
Service
You
Writing
" Love is whatever you can still betray. Betrayal can only happen if you love. "
John le Carre
Love Is
Betrayal
Happen
" Well, certainly I don't think that there are very many good writers who don't live without a sense of tension. If they haven't got one immediately available to them, then they usually manage to manufacture it in their private lives. "
John le Carre
Sense
Live
Good
" The world of spying is my genre. My struggle is to demystify, to de-romanticise the spook world, but at the same time harness it as a good story. "
John le Carre
Struggle
Good
Same
" But there is a big difference in working for the West and working for a totalitarian state. "
John le Carre
Working
State
Difference
" When you are brought up as a frozen child, you go on freezing. It wasn't until I had my four sons, who have brought me immense joy, that I began to thaw. That I realised how utterly extraordinary my childhood was. "
John le Carre
Joy
Child
You
" I think, increasingly, despite what we are being told is an ever more open world of communication, there is a terrible alienation in the ordinary man between what he is being told and what he secretly believes. "
John le Carre
World
Communication
Man
" I write and walk and swim and drink. "
John le Carre
Drink
I Write
Walk
" The monsters of our childhood do not fade away, neither are they ever wholly monstrous. But neither, in my experience, do we ever reach a plane of detachment regarding our parents, however wise and old we may become. To pretend otherwise is to cheat. "
John le Carre
Experience
Childhood
Parents
" SIS, the Secret Intelligence Service, also known as MI6, also has no executive powers and operates abroad on CIA lines, but with a tiny percentage of the budget and a tiny percentage of the personnel. "
John le Carre
Intelligence
Service
Budget
" I remain terrified of the capacity of the media, the capacity of spin doctors, here and abroad, particularly the United States media, to perpetuate false lies, perpetuate lies. "
John le Carre
Lies
Media
United States
" If there is one eternal truth of politics, it is that there are always a dozen good reasons for doing nothing. "
John le Carre
Doing
Nothing
Politics
" I suffer from the same frustration that every decent American suffers from. That is, that you begin to wonder whether decent liberal instincts, decent humanitarian instincts, can actually penetrate the right-wing voice, get through the steering of American opinion by the mass media. "
John le Carre
Media
American
Frustration
" I mean, I'm in the business of storytelling, not message making. "
John le Carre
Message
Mean
Business
" Until we have a better relationship between private performance and the public truth, as was demonstrated with Watergate, we as the public are absolutely right to remain suspicious, contemptuous even, of the secrecy and the misinformation which is the digest of our news. "
John le Carre
Relationship
Truth
Performance
" The creation of George Smiley, the retired spy recalled to hunt for just such a high-ranking mole in 'Tinker, Tailor,' was extremely personal. I borrowed elements of people I admired and invested them in this mythical character. I'm such a fluent, specious person now, but I was an extremely awkward fellow in those days. "
John le Carre
Character
Person
People
" If you're growing up in a chaotic world without reason, your instinct is to become a performer and control the circumstances around you. You lead from weakness into strength; you have an undefended back. "
John le Carre
World
Control
Growing Up
" America has entered one of its periods of historic madness, but this is the worst I can remember. "
John le Carre
Madness
Worst
Remember
" A spy, like a writer, lives outside the mainstream population. He steals his experience through bribes and reconstructs it. "
John le Carre
Like
Through
Outside
" Writers are two-home men - they want a place outside and a place within. "
John le Carre
Men
Within
Want
" Thank heaven, though, one of the few mistakes I haven't made is to talk about the unwritten book. "
John le Carre
Talk
Mistakes
Book