Book Review: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Nov. 5th, 2024 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerMy Smiley readthrough has at last brought me to Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, which was in fact one of the roots of this readthrough, as I read this book in high school and did not get it even slightly. I could see that it was good! But as to what actually happened at any point in the narrative? Who knows.
I thought rereading it as an adult would help clarify, as would reading the other Smiley books first. But while the first definitely helped, the second helped less than you would think. In fact, it made some things even more inexplicable, like Smiley’s marriage to Ann, who is constantly, publicly cheating on him. The earlier books do give more context for this, but the context only makes it weirder, as in every single book Ann appears to have just left Smiley, usually in the company of a much younger and hotter man, in an extremely public fashion that everyone knows about. Smiley keeps going back to her.
This may be a metaphor for the Circus, since every book also involves the newly-retired and/or fired Smiley coming back for One More Mission.
When Smiley hears that Karla calls Anna “the last illusion of the illusionless man,” he wonders if Karla truly thinks that love is an illusion, but let’s face it, Karla doesn’t need to think that all love is an illusion to believe that what’s going on with Ann and Smiley is mostly smoke and mirrors. As is, of course, the Circus.
Things I Remembered from My First Read of Tinker, Tailor
1. The entire subplot where Jim Prideaux is hiding out as a teacher at a school and living in a trailer on the grounds and one of the students becomes weirdly obsessed with him because he is a lonely new boy and needs to latch onto someone. Presumably this stuck with me because I was close to Bill Roach’s age at the time.
2. That bit where we meet the two Soviet experts in the Circus, and the book refers to one of them as the other’s “boyfriend.” I still don’t know if this is just the Circus being snide about how they always seem to move as a unit, or if they are in fact involved in some way. Possibly both.
3. Ricky Tarr, for some reason, not his name but his whole deal where he was in love with the Soviet spy Irina, except over time my memory metamorphosed their story so it ended with Irina joining Ricky in the UK. This happens only in Ricky’s fertile imagination. She is definitely shot dead in the USSR.
Things I Did Not Remember from My First Read of Tinker, Tailor
1. The whole mole plot. I was vaguely aware it existed but did not recall even slightly who was involved or how Smiley investigated or who ended up being the mole.
2. In fact, I forgot the entire existence of Bill Haydon (and all the other suspects, but in the end Bill Haydon is the most important one). His friendship-cum-love-affair with Jim Prideaux, and the fact that he betrayed him in the service of his double-cross operation. The tragedy of it all! But no. This all went right over my head. I believe that if you’d asked me “who snapped Bill Haydon’s neck at the end?” I would, after much puzzlement, have suggested Ricky Tarr, on account of how Haydon was responsible for Irina’s death, indirectly.
3. Karla! Karla made no impression at all! This is the first book of the Karla trilogy, about Smiley’s famed rivalry with his opposite number in Soviet intelligence Karla, and he made zero impression on me. None. Zilch. Admittedly he speaks not a word when Smiley meets him, but still. Truly surprised to read the book and discover he really is in here after all.
Le Carre suffering scale: perhaps three-quarters of a The Spy Who Came in from the Cold? Not quite as bleak, but ouch.
I thought rereading it as an adult would help clarify, as would reading the other Smiley books first. But while the first definitely helped, the second helped less than you would think. In fact, it made some things even more inexplicable, like Smiley’s marriage to Ann, who is constantly, publicly cheating on him. The earlier books do give more context for this, but the context only makes it weirder, as in every single book Ann appears to have just left Smiley, usually in the company of a much younger and hotter man, in an extremely public fashion that everyone knows about. Smiley keeps going back to her.
This may be a metaphor for the Circus, since every book also involves the newly-retired and/or fired Smiley coming back for One More Mission.
When Smiley hears that Karla calls Anna “the last illusion of the illusionless man,” he wonders if Karla truly thinks that love is an illusion, but let’s face it, Karla doesn’t need to think that all love is an illusion to believe that what’s going on with Ann and Smiley is mostly smoke and mirrors. As is, of course, the Circus.
Things I Remembered from My First Read of Tinker, Tailor
1. The entire subplot where Jim Prideaux is hiding out as a teacher at a school and living in a trailer on the grounds and one of the students becomes weirdly obsessed with him because he is a lonely new boy and needs to latch onto someone. Presumably this stuck with me because I was close to Bill Roach’s age at the time.
2. That bit where we meet the two Soviet experts in the Circus, and the book refers to one of them as the other’s “boyfriend.” I still don’t know if this is just the Circus being snide about how they always seem to move as a unit, or if they are in fact involved in some way. Possibly both.
3. Ricky Tarr, for some reason, not his name but his whole deal where he was in love with the Soviet spy Irina, except over time my memory metamorphosed their story so it ended with Irina joining Ricky in the UK. This happens only in Ricky’s fertile imagination. She is definitely shot dead in the USSR.
Things I Did Not Remember from My First Read of Tinker, Tailor
1. The whole mole plot. I was vaguely aware it existed but did not recall even slightly who was involved or how Smiley investigated or who ended up being the mole.
2. In fact, I forgot the entire existence of Bill Haydon (and all the other suspects, but in the end Bill Haydon is the most important one). His friendship-cum-love-affair with Jim Prideaux, and the fact that he betrayed him in the service of his double-cross operation. The tragedy of it all! But no. This all went right over my head. I believe that if you’d asked me “who snapped Bill Haydon’s neck at the end?” I would, after much puzzlement, have suggested Ricky Tarr, on account of how Haydon was responsible for Irina’s death, indirectly.
3. Karla! Karla made no impression at all! This is the first book of the Karla trilogy, about Smiley’s famed rivalry with his opposite number in Soviet intelligence Karla, and he made zero impression on me. None. Zilch. Admittedly he speaks not a word when Smiley meets him, but still. Truly surprised to read the book and discover he really is in here after all.
Le Carre suffering scale: perhaps three-quarters of a The Spy Who Came in from the Cold? Not quite as bleak, but ouch.
no subject
Date: 2024-11-05 04:01 pm (UTC)Sorry Karla. Your shadow is thin, as they say in Japan.
no subject
Date: 2024-11-05 09:59 pm (UTC)Karla's shadow is apparently massive for everyone except my tiny high school self. Tinker Tailor and the next two Smiley books are in fact called the Karla trilogy because he looms so large in people's minds! Me, though, Karla Schmarla, I had no time to remember him in the face of important questions like "So the teacher is just living in a trailer on school grounds? Is that normal in England?"
no subject
Date: 2024-11-05 10:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-11-06 10:58 am (UTC)It's amazing what comes into focus as an adult. WHAT gay love affair? I see.
no subject
Date: 2024-11-06 01:06 pm (UTC)It's interesting that he potentially projected this quality onto Ann rather than protag Smiley. Although a lot of his characters sleep around a lot; Smiley is really an exception in being so devoted to Ann.
WHAT gay love affair? WHO is this Karla? I was genuinely puzzled when I first heard that Tinker Tailor is the first book in the Karla trilogy because I didn't remember any Karla at all, but he was there! Just sitting there, not saying anything! Stealing Smiley's lighter!