British author David Cornwell, who operated under the pen name John le Carré, is universally considered a master of espionage fiction. His work explored the moral complexity and human toll of geopolitical gamesmanship and, in so doing, redefined the spy genre.

We chart le Carré’s legacy and portrayal of the Cold War – an era of shadowy duplicity and deception that inspired Cutler and Gross’s Duālis collection.

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Le Carré served as an officer in MI5 and MI6 during the height of the Cold War, having been recruited while an undergraduate at Oxford university. It was during his intelligence career, as the Berlin wall was going up in 1961, that he wrote his debut novel, Call For The Dead. Le Carré left the field after his third book, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, became an international bestseller. The author’s insider knowledge lent his work an unparalleled authenticity; in the 2023 Apple TV+ documentary The Pigeon Tunnel, he stated, “I cannot define for you where reality goes through the secret door to fiction.”

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Cornwell’s fifth novel, drew inspiration from the betrayal of Kim Philby, one of Britain’s most notorious double agents. Philby was simultaneously a high-ranking member of British intelligence and arguably the most important Soviet spy of the Cold War. He was a key player in the infamous ‘Ring of Five’ – former Cambridge University students who shared information to the Soviets from the 1930s to 1950s. After nearly three decades of passing British secrets to the KGB, he dramatically defected to the Soviet Union. His betrayal, which was finally exposed in 1963, marked a turning point in Cold War espionage; it caused a profound crisis within British Intelligence, shaking trust and unleashing deep paranoia about Soviet infiltration.

“You could be the perfect spy. All you need is a cause.”

John le Carré, A Perfect Spy, 1986

Published in 1974, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent embedded at the heart of the British secret service, called ‘The Circus’. The central plot revolves around intelligence officer George Smiley (played by Gary Oldman in the 2011 film adaptation), who is brought back from retirement to root out the mole. Written with debonair charm and an upper-class background, the traitorous double agent Bill Haydon bears transparent similarities to Philby.

The author’s connections to the British defector extended beyond the book. In a 2010 interview with Channel 4, le Carré claimed his cover as an MI6 agent working in Germany in the late 1950s was blown by Philby. However, the validity of this has been questioned.  

“Characters don't work until they’ve got a bit of you in them. Until then, they’re paper men.”

John le Carré, The Pigeon Tunnel documentary, 2023

Unlike Ian Fleming’s slick, smooth-talking James Bond, le Carré’s spies are weary civil servants entangled in bureaucratic betrayals. Le Carré’s novels challenge the romanticism of espionage, revealing it instead as a profession filled with moral ambiguity and shattered ideals. This is epitomised in The Perfect Spy, where the protagonist Alec Leamas bitterly states, “What do you think spies are: priests, saints, and martyrs? They’re a squalid procession of vain fools, traitors too, yes; pansies, sadists, and drunkards, people who play cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten lives. Do you think they sit like monks in London balancing the rights and wrongs?” Far from glorifying the heroism of espionage, Cornwell is depicting a spy disillusioned and deeply affected by the brutal realities of the Cold War.

In an era when political manipulations dominate headlines, le Carré’s work remains profoundly relevant. And at the time of writing, MI5 files documenting Kim Philby’s confession have been newly declassified by the National Archives in London, revealing the calculated deceit of the ultimate double agent.

“This is a war," Lemas replied. "It's graphic and unpleasant because it's fought on a tiny scale, at close range.”

John le Carré, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, 1963

The author’s 25 novels transformed the espionage genre, steering it away from the spectacle of action and focusing instead on the shadowy corners of personal and national integrity. Le Carré passed away in 2020 at the age of 89, but his legacy endures; as BBC correspondent Gordon Corera wrote at the time of the author’s death, “Le Carré's career was shaped by his time in the secret world and, in turn, his own fiction shaped the way much of the world saw British intelligence.” The author’s influence was further emphasised when the head of MI6 published a tweet paying tribute to his “evocative and brilliant novels”.

John le Carré’s son, novelist Nick Harkaway, has taken up the mantle, continuing the Smiley saga with a new novel Karla’s Choice, released in October 2024.

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