I recently posted about overcoming the monster as the most basic plot for story telling. I had just read John Le Carré’s The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, in which the book’s hero was also the monster. I have now finished reading the next book in the George Smiley series, The Looking Glass War.
I have also previously written about The Seven Basic Plots by Christopher Booker. It’s a great book, but he omitted the plot in which every single character is the monster. That is essentially the plot of The Looking Glass War, and I’m not quite sure how I feel about it. I suppose it’s an accurate reflection of the intelligence services in which David Cornwell served, and probably of humanity too. Yet we want to believe in heroes, don’t we? I hope I’m not giving too much away about the plot if I say that there is a sacrifice made in order to save an innocent.
Before I started reading the George Smiley series in order I had read Smiley’s people (about forty years ago) and A Legacy of Spies relatively recently. I really enjoyed A Legacy of Spies, and I can’t remember if I enjoyed Smiley’s People. I’ll be starting on Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy next. I enjoyed the TV series, so I think I’ll enjoy the book.
What comes across very strongly in John Le Carré’s work is moral ambiguity. He masterfully portrays a world where heroes and villains are virtually indistinguishable, and where the true battlefield is the human conscience.