Behind the books - blog series on the 25th anniversary editions (3)

This is the third blog post continuing my efforts to mine some of the nuggets of insight and intelligence provided by Len Deighton in his forewords to the rare Silver Jubilee editions of his first 19 major works of fiction, from 1987. Len rarely writes about his own work, so these new forewords provided one of the few opportunities for readers to hear the writer talk about how he approached each of his book and  find out some revealing tales. You can find the other blog posts so far in this series here and here.

7. Declarations of War (1971)

This is the only collection of shorter stories written by Deighton, and provides something different from his earlier spy novels. Written soon after Bomber, it too takes a wartime theme but this time from across the ages, from the Roman era right up to the present day. But, as Deighton states in the foreword, he does not refer to this as a collection of short stories:

"As I told my publisher, Declarations of War is not a book of short stories. Books of short stories contain old bits of writing culled from ancient magazines or newspapers, and assembled together with little more than their author in common.

Declarations of War (with the exception of one story that had been published elsewhere) was written in one go, from start to finish. I had always tried to write so that each chapter of any book could stand alone. I'd always believed a book should be a collection of 'short stories', written and arranged in such a way that that reader who reads it right the way through is left with a complete impression of the author's initial idea. It's not easy to do, of course, and I wouldn't claim that I have ever succeeded. But in Declarations of War I took the opportunity to try this in another more extreme way."

This connection in the narratives does come across in the collection. All the stories share the theme of heroism,and the stress and impact of war on humans; his characters respond in a number of different and unexpected ways to the challenge of warfare. As Deighton points out in the foreword, his heroes in the stories - a jaded firing squad commander, the out-moded general, the nervous young flyer among others - are not heroes in the conventional sense. The characters and stories arose through Deighton's extensive military history research and contact with experts and old soldiers alike; but, his reputation for thorough research let him down in one story:

"Only with the story 'It Must Have Been Two Other Fellows' did I go badly wrong. I believe it's the worst mistake in research I've made so far (and if you know a worse one be so kind as not to write and tell me). Choosing carefully the sort of armoured vehicle that a man could become obsessed with took time, and provided me with an excuse to talk to many ex-tankers. The Sherman Firefly fitted the bill beautifully. I was equally careful about the Italian background with its specific slang and jargon. But too late I discovered that the Sherman Firefly was developed for the Normandy campaign. They were never used in Italy. Ah, well."

Some critics have said that Deighton's penchant for research and detail - particularly in military materiel - sometimes got in the way of plot in some of his books; but I think each of these stories is pretty well balanced and benefits from the unifying military theme. One story - 'First Base' - is set in Vietnam and was, by all accounts, a candidate for developing into a fuller novel. A Deighton novel set in Vietnam opens up all kinds of possibilities, but in the end all we have is a glimpse of what might have been, with this story of a soldier and his injured comrade coming upon an abandoned airfield deep in the jungle.

8. Close-Up (1972)

This foray into the corrupt, cut-throat and competitive world of Hollywood film-making is perhaps - until Violent Ward - Deighton's most conventional thriller, and his first departure from the military/espionage milieu. It tells the story of english actor Marshall Stone who, advancing in years, sees the parts dry up but is desperate to remain at the top; meanwhile, dark secrets are revealed as his ex-wife’s husband starts researching a no-holds barred biography.  It's a clever exposition of the 'star machine' of Hollywood at its most venal and ruinous.

The narrative is a thriller recounting the money men, the back-stabbing, the hassles and inherent falseness of the movie-making world which, as Deighton recounts in the foreword, led to his giving up on cinema production after his experiences on Oh! What a Lovely War in the 'sixties. The experience, however, stimulated his creative thinking:

"It was a fascinating period of my life and although writers are the lowest form of animal life in the film industry, I wasn't a writer: I was a producer. My role of producer opened the door to everything that happened. You can't lock the producer out, he runs the show and signs all the cheques. (I learned more about the film industry by signing the cheques than from any other source)."

Deighton informs the reader that the story developed during a trip to California, having checked into the Beverley Hills Hotel and joining a party in Malibu, still jet lagged. He spent much of his time talking to movie executives and financiers to get the detail which would create a vivid picture of the film industry and the craft of movie making. But he didn't want to write about the side of film-making he'd experienced himself; he felt that his development of the narrative, bringing together a series of characters as are found on any movie, wouldn't be suited to the first-person narrative of his earlier novels:

"It had to be a story about an actor. I knew many actors ('Oh! What a Lovely War' was a line-up of the great names of English cineman), I'd seen them at their best, and at their oh so horrible worst. For the purposes of this book I'd read all the standard works on acting and even been to the Royal Academy, and other acting schools, in my anxiety about getting the actor right. I'd become as interested in actors and acting as I was in the film business; I certainly wasn't going to write a book about a producer.

It was only when I got to the end of drafting the story that the solution appeared. I'd have the first-person narrative and third-person too, in alternative chapters that are finally seen to be resolving and endless.

Oh, I know what you're going to say. It's a book about a writer writing a film script. You're right of course but perhaps every writer should be allowed one book about a writer, as a dog is allowed one bit. And at least this one's not hiding away in the country."

9. Spy Story (1974)

After a number of years writing military and conventional thriller fiction - and mixed results from a sojourn into the movie business - Spy Story marked Deighton's return to the espionage arena into which he's burst successfully in the sixties. In the period since The Ipcress File, not only had Deighton's life and writing style developed - the Cold War had moved on too, become decidedly frostier as the doctrine of mutually assured destruction required the western Allies and Soviets to develop ever more sophisticated military strategies. It was clear, Deighton writes in the foreword, that he couldn't just replicate the approach of the first five ('Harry Palmer') spy novels:

"By the time I started writing I had worked out some things that I particularly wanted to do. First and foremost I wanted an associate for the hero. But I didn't want a Watson [note - Deighton was a significant scholar of Conan Doyle]. I wanted an abrasive superior who could give as much as he took. Colonel Schlegel was a creation that came to me from my time with the fighter pilots of the USAF and feel enough affection for him to want to bring him back some day.

The war game theme was one that I'd been toying with for a long time. I'd always been interested in war games. Even as far back as the fifties I remember watching a most interesting naval battle. It was organised by  a war games club. The opposing battle fleets were superb models sailing across the floor of a large meeting hall in a London suburb. The fleet commanders and their respective staffs were locked away elsewhere and only visitors and referees saw the battle in its entirety. It was this game above everything else that prompted me to write Spy Story."

A letter from a war game enthusiast who had programmed the attack sequence from Bomber on to a computer and played it out according to different scenarios prompted Deighton to take this initial setting and develop a conventional espionage story, in which his character Patrick Armstrong  joins the fictional Studies Centre in London and uncovers a plot to derail disarmament talks between East and West Germany. This novel was, he recounts, one of the easiest and best writing experiences of his life so far; the return to the espionage arena clearly benefitted his creative thinking, though this didn't extend as far as the title:

"I hadn't written a spy story for years, now I had written one again, so why not call it Spy Story, and everyone will know what they are getting. But it wasn't so easy. After years without arguments about titles (even The Ipcress File was accepted without question) I suddenly found that someone in a publisher's sales department had other ideas. Didn't I think 'Red Admiral' was better? No. That would sell more copies. I didn't care. Spy Story it remained. The title seemed to do no harm."

Spy Story. Does exactly what is says on the tin!

The Londonist on Deighton

I've been remiss on not posting about a series of weekly blogs by the great little website The Londonist, which is a quirky but very popular site about London in all its varied glory.

The people behind the blog describe themselves thus:

"Londonist is a website about London and everything that happens in it. That means news, reviews and events; the history and future of London. We celebrate the quirks, eccentricities, hidden and surprising bits that make up the alternative side of the city.

Upbeat and eclectic, Londonist is created by an incredibly talented and diverse team of contributors who share a passion for the city with our readers. We're a bunch of London obsessives who live the city and share our best discoveries".

Over the last eight weeks, Kevin Mills has been summarising chapters from Len Deighton's classic from the 'sixties, Len Deighton's London Dossier, which painted one of the most accurate pictures of London in all its swinging glory, a city which, sadly, is now much of a memory but which comes alive again through Deighton's writing and that of his London pals at the time, each of whom writes about a different aspect of London: food, travel, photography, children's London, slang and shopping and many other topics.

Kevin uses each of the chapters from the book to juxtapose Deighton's London with the modern version - it's an interesting little series which sums up the website's approach to this great city of ours. Last week's blog looks at chapter 8 of the book - children. The chapter in the original books was written by Drusilla Beyfus, and records a different London when kids could play on the streets happily and be satisfied with an ice cream at the end of a visit to the capital's museums. Here's a sample from the Deighton book:

"Whatever a child's hobby or interest, the chances are that London has a densely variegated supply of items which bring a sense of treasure tracked down. This is as true of stamps and butterflies as of conjuring tricks, false noses, fireworks, camping equipment, Batman gear, model soldiers, trains, cars and boats. British soft toys for babies and nursery use are imaginatively designed and made in long-lasting luxurious materials. Bicycles, scooters, tricycles and dolls' prams are usually good value. A recent improvement has been in the range and quality of cheap playthings. Hamley's of Regent Street and Selfridge's of Oxford Street have a good stock of cheap toys that work. The games counters include the best from abroad and it is possible to see the world's latest diversions and distractions that come packed flat in a box."

Not a PlayStation in sight!

A link at the bottom of the page lets you explore the first seven chapters. This week's blog post (pictured) - chapter nine - looks at London through the eyes of the photographer. In the original book, this chapter was written by Adrian Flowers.

This could run and run. There are thirty-three chapters in the original book. Worth checking out.

Bomber to finally make it to celluloid?

After missing out on the 'Lost' Man Booker Prize for 1970 with his novel Bomber, might there be some compensation in the world of films?

An interesting article in today's Daily Telegraph online edition suggests so.

Banker and businessman Bob Wigley is looking to bring Bomber to the cinemas, which is great news. It's a stunning novel - one of the most accurate and even-handed depictions of the confusion and bravery of war - and would make an epic film. In the early nineties, there were plans to bring it to the cinemas but the production was switched by Michael Caton-Jones to Memphis Belle, primarily - if I recall correctly - on account that there were more skyworthy US Flying Fortresses at the time for filming than Lancasters, which feature in Deighton's novel.

The article quote Mr Wigley: “My job is to help raise the money. All €15m (£13m) of it. It may not be obvious why a banker is involved in films but it’s amazing how many commercial ideas you have.”

Wigley is chairman of both the directories business Yell and the property group Sovereign Reversions, as well as head of the Conservatives’ Green Investment Bank Commission. The film is close to his heart. His father was a RAF navigator on a Lancaster bomber during the war. The cast for Bomber is apparently being assembled now.

I've written an email to Mr Wigley to see if I can get more information about his plans for the film. Sounds intriguing. Keep an eye on this blog for more news?

Keith Richards. Guitar god, spy fiction fan, wannabe librarian

Funny little item in the weekend's Sunday Times. Advance serialisation of the new autobiography of Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards indicates that the guitar hero is a closet librarian and book collector, as well versed with the Dewey Decimal system as he is with barre chords and the Locrian mode.

This story suggests he has considered professional Librarian training to manage his thousands of books - not surprisingly, many of them on the history of rock and the blues. He's also perhaps a Len Deighton fan, the text revealing he has a habit of "lending out copies of the latest Bernard Cornwell or Len Deighton novels to friends without much hope of getting them back."

The story's covered in the Daily Mail today too. One interesting postscript in the comments section from Terry in Brighton: "I'm glad that someone still likes Len Deighton. For all you kids out there try his first four 'Harry Palmer' books and understand what hip, rock 'n roll writing really means."

Easter weekend's always a slow news day!

Town: a day in the life of Len Deighton (3)

Part three of the reproduction in full of a fascinating article looking at Len Deighton's life in sixties' London by way of a detailed diarised account of a single day spent with him. You can find part one and part two elsewhere in recent blog posts.

---

4.30

We are back at LD's flat, having called into the Imperial War Museum on route to make a sketch of a photograph of a type of XXI u-boat. He goes into the workroom and sorts through a pile of newly arrived magazines. There is What's On, Soldier, RAF Review, Admiralty News Summary, British Model Soldiers Society Bulletin and China Reconstructs. 'I should take the Daily Worker, really,' he says.

'Why?' I ask.

'Because if you write spy books you are writing about politics - you've got to spend a little time reading everyone's point of view. If I write dialogue spoken by a Communist it must be real, accurate and convincing, not a crude parody of mustachioed villainy. We are all far beyond that now. I hope we are anyway.'

4.45

LD has explained how the next section of the book he is writing depends upon a certain amount of ww2 research. 'This character is a very old man, a Nazi general...'

'You always seem to have Nazi generals in your books,' I say.

LD grins. 'That's a bit unfair. But I do use the characters as symbols, I know. But once I have chosen them I try to make them as realistic as possible. I don't make them speak or act as symbols but the initial choice is symbolic.

Anyway, I have this old guy who is a Nazi general. I'll need some research.'

We go into the next room. Dominating it is a big brass double bed. Under the bed there are box after box of newspaper clippings filed under names like 'Travel', 'Transport' and 'Crime'. A lot of the cuttings consist only of photographs. 'A lot of my reference is just visual,' he says.

I admire the brass bed. 'My uncle Wal has a junk shop at Clapham Junction,' he says. 'He gets us things.'

The far end of the bedroom is a mass of bookshelves and potted plants. 'Wonderful plants,' I say.

'My wife drew them for The Sunday Times colour supplement, but don't tell The Observer.'

'No,' I say.

'We finally got so used to having them here - my wife works very slowly - that we paid for them and kept them.' He dives head first into this great long-barrow of printed paper and for two hours he quietly makes notes in tiny, neurotic handwriting. He shows me the notes he has prepared for a book on military history. 'Seven years' work there,' he says, 'perhaps half a million words.'

It's not clear which this work is referring to, but it could well be the early parts of Blitzkrieg, his history of the German military victories of 1939-41.

7.30

From the kitchen there is the steady tinkle of work as Mrs Deighton, who has supplied large cups of strong coffee all day, prepares the evening meal. I ask how much cooking LD does. 'It varies,' he says. 'We don't have any system.' I can quite believe it.

8.0

Guests begin to arrive. 'There will be quite a crowd,' LD says. I can quite believe that, too, for he has asked to super almost everyone we have met all day. In the living-room there is a big coal fire and the guests help themselves to a drink. LD acts rather like one of the guests; he makes no attempt to take anyone's coat or pour them a drink, but it all seems to work out very well since the visitors know where everything is.

8.15

The guests are still arriving, but LD is sitting in the workroom behind his electric typewriter. One of the guests - an advertising man - puts his head round the door. 'Are you working or watching No Hiding Place!' he asks. The TV set has been operating since Tonight came on the air.

LD says, 'Both, and what's more I'm recording a string quartet at the same time.' I look toward the tape-recorder and find he is doing exactly that.

8.45

We are sitting round two ramshackle card-tables being served with a clear beef soup, roast beef broccoli, a vast cheese board, fresh peach and brandy soufflé with brandy and cigars to finish.

11.30

The conversation is about narcotic-taking. LD says it is like pulling the bedclothes over your head and refusing to get up.

'Don't you ever pull the bedclothes over your head and refuse to get up?' someone asks him.

'Nearly all the time,' he says with a giggle.

The conversation is about advertising, food, travel and art, in which most of the fourteen people there are well versed. There is surprisingly little talk of houses or motor cars. As most of the guests have to go to work by next morning, they have all left by 2.10 am. LD goes back into the workroom and shifts a very fat tortoiseshell cat out of his chair in order to sit down at the typewriter. He flips the switch on the tape-recorder and the sound of a Brahms string quartet floats gently across the room. LD reads through the stuff he has written that day. He takes a pair of wallpaper scissors and snips it to pieces then begins to build it together again with Copydex.

'Great stuff, Copydex,' he says.

'Yes,' I say. Outside the milk lorries roar past, chinking a clattering over the uneven roadway.

3.0

He phones Aircall (his car phone service) and asks if there are any messages. The operate says there is a man who wants to sell him some information about confidence tricks, and will be in Central London tomorrow. He'll phone in at midday. LD says okay and hangs up. 'For some reason the people who want to sell you stories never have much to say - it's the ones who are prepared to tell you for nothing that really make you hair curl. I'm doing a screenplay about confidence men you see. Weird mob.'

This is a reference to his development of the story of Only When I Larf, which he developed simultaneously as a film script which he subsequently produced as a film - one of only two he ever produced (the other was Oh! What a Lovely War) before throwing in the towel on the producing game.

3.15

LD wanders into the hall and picks up a yoghurt from the floor. He opens the cap and eats it with a tiny spoon. 'I think I'll have to go to bed now,' he says. 'Have you got all the copy you need?'

'Yes, thanks,' I say.

A fascinating article which paints a terrifically vivid picture of life in London in the sixties which acted as the seedbed for many of Deighton's early novels and greatest characters.

Where do you put the carbon paper?

Interesting little story in The Daily Telegraph this week which shows up quite how much the Internet revolution of the last decade is changing the world of espionage ... and consequently the environment for spy fiction.

MI:5 is reportedly making some significant staff changes to get rid of a number of more 'senior' staff who, the paper reports, are finding it tough to get to grips with the Interweb and, consequently, are less able to act as effective modern spying operatives. Reference is made to a "James Bond generation" of spies who cannot cope with the speedy advance of online communications. Hopefully, the HR bods in the service will check that in their efforts to get aligned with modern employment trends and make every spook web-savvy, they don't lose the collective knowledge and experience these agents will undoubtedly have.

While accepting that MI:5 and MI:6 no doubt must remain effective and adapt to all the advantages modern technology offer, one can't help wandering that the spy game 2.0 lacks a little of the 'art' and guile of the classic espionage world of Deighton, Le Carré, Ambler, Fleming et al, with its 'data centres', hidden cameras, short wave radios, secret drops, trefs and one-time pads. Real scope for cracking action, intrigue and suspense, in a time when secrets were secret ... at least, most of the time. The modern spy, with his iPhone and encrypted wireless, is faced with a world of information where little, it seems, is now "top secret".

But, of course, the great spy characters reflect the age in which they operate, and the best authors will reflect this and create stories that weave this information-rich world seamlessly into a breathless narrative.

I can't help thinking what 'Harry Palmer' or Bernard Samson would make of this modern incarnation of the spy business .... and laughing.

Bomber misses its target

News comes in today that Bomber by Len Deighton did not make the short-list for the  Lost Booker Prize, which is to be awarded for the best book of 1970, covering the year when the famous prize was not awarded.

Bomber's inclusion was somewhat of a surprise. Military fiction has never been that well regarded in literary circles, even though Bomber is much more than simply that. The Guardian has a report on the final short-list, which includes Muriel Spark and Mary Renault.

[Stop press] In a piece in today's Observer (online at the Guardian website), one of the judges Rachel Cooke describes the process of whittling down the long list to a short list, and her feelings towards the disparate novels she read.

On Bomber, she writes:

"I have just read 21 novels, all of which were published in 1970, and while a few could be described as polite, none was actively dull. Two – Bomber by Len Deighton and I'm the King of the Castle by Susan Hill – were so exciting, I read them at one sitting."

Boozy lunches and canapés

Had a very interesting evening tonight courtesy of Penguin Books' crime and thriller department. Thanks for the evening go to the author Mike Ripley, editor of the Shots Mag website, who got me the invite. Clearly, the 'blogosphere' is now a target audience.

In between glasses of white wine, the effervescent Ripley told me of his lunch with Len Deighton today in London, during which he got some books signed, caught up on news with Len and spent ages sharing stories about second world war military intelligence.

Sounds like a fun lunch!

Upcoming Canadian radio documentary on Deighton

I've spent the day with Philip Coulter, radio producer on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation programme Ideas. He is interviewing Len Deighton next week for a documentary on his work; less autobiographical, more about looking at how his fiction reflects the changing public perceptions of espionage and paranoia, and also the themes of betrayal, trust and loyalty.

We went on a walk around London visiting some of the locations in the Game, Set and Match series of novels, and I talked about their significance, how they contributed to the plot and character development and - to add some colour - read some key passages from the books in these locations. Fun to do; Coulter's a real fan of Deighton's writing and this trilogy in particular, and rates him a far better writer than Le Carré, for example.

Should be an interesting radio documentary when it's all finished - I'll post up details about when it's going to be broadcast. Hopefully, it'll be on the web too so we can listen along with the Canucks.

Town: a day in the life of Len Deighton (2)

Below is the second post looking at the article 'A day in the life of Len Deighton' from the August 1963 of Town magazine, then one of London's premier glossy men's magazines.

Town: a day in the life of Len Deighton (1)

Despite the growth of the Internet as people's main source of news and information, the magazine market still seems to be hanging in there. Back in the 'sixties, magazines were in a boom period, with increasing numbers of titles published aimed at ever more specific sections of the population.

One such high-profile, but short-lived magazine from the sixties squarely aimed at the growing middle class male readership was Town. Originally titled Man About Town, the magazine provided the launch pad for the Haymarket Group. A spin-off consumer magazine from the trade title, Tailor and Cutter, the intention was to turn this quarterly into a glossy monthly for men. Men's fashion was at the margin of acceptability and men's magazines relied almost entirely upon their willingness to peddle soft porn. Town never made much money, but in the 1960's it was very high profile and one of the magazines to be seen in for writers, actors and other celebrities.

I've recently purchased a copy from August 1963. In among the profiles of actress Susan Hampshire and a fascinating article on the diamond fields of South Africa is a feature called A day in the life of Len Deighton.

Written just over a year after he achieved reknown with the publication of The Ipcress File, this self-penned article provides an interesting insight into Deighton's lifestyle, his promotion to the upper leagues of London society and his idiosyncratic approach to writing and research in the days before the electric typewriter and word processer/PC. The photos - by Adrian Flowers - also show Deighton in the kitchen, where time spent was as valuable as at the typewriter. Over the next few blog posts I'll reproduce much of the article to give readers a feel for a London lifestyle that's well and truly (and regrettably) passed and, where it's helpful, provide a little commentary.
________

[Note: Although subtitled 'by Len Deighton', this chronological piece is written in the third person; the journalist is not identified by a byline. I suspect it might be that the photographer Adrian Flowers is also the interviewer, but it's not clear.]

AM

9.55

In an ugly little neo-Georgian flat near the Elephant and Castle the phone is ringing imperiously, but all is quiet for it has a whole packet of rayon blended household cotton wool screwed under its baseplate.

10.12

In response to continuous bell ringing, the door is opened by [sic] round-faced man in a moth-eaten dressing-gown. If he were in a slightly better condition Len Deighton could be called pudgy. As it is, he is undoubtedly fat. He shows me into the front room. It is dark in spite of the whitewashed walls, on one side of the room is a large black welsh dresser crowded with chipped antique porcelain. There is a severely wounded chesterfield, a stuffed warthog, a tea trolley laden with tubes of paint, brushes and jugs of dirty water and a Thonet rocking-chair in which three overfed cats jockey for position.

The reference to painting indicates Deighton's background as first and foremost at that time a designer and illustrator, who still did commissioned work for a while even after his first book came out.

10.18

I have heard the roar of the electric coffee grinder and the scream of a whistling-kettle and now the heavy aroma of rich coffee percolates through the flat. From the bathroom there is a steady thunder of the shower.

10.30

Len Deighton has emerged with two bowls of coffee. He has cut his chin shaving and there are specks of blood on the collar of the blue shirt with epaullettes and flap pockets. He sits down heavily and stirs his coffee in a distracted sort of way.

Drinking coffee from bowls is a French habit, one which I suspect Deighton will have picked up from time spent in France on holiday and studying French cuisine.

10.40

LD has finished his coffee. He phones his secretary who works in a different part of London. 'I also have an office in Russell Square', he says, 'but I've never sat down in it.'

'Why?' I ask.

'Because there are no chairs there,' he says, and gives a nervous giggle. He speaks to his secretary and dictates three letters over the phone. One is a complaint to BEA, who feel that they are not responsible for an hotel bill when they left LD stranded in Vienna with no planes flying. One is to The Times Literary Supplement, which has just published an article about The Ipcress File and the last one is to his literary agent about two new clauses in a contract for Finnish translation.

What is evident here is how much attention and cachet Deighton has achieved in just under two years as a writer: the multiple offices, the numerous foreign editions, the secretarial service, a high profile article in a major monthly magazine. While not an overnight success, it points to the way Deighton's prose style, his apparently anti-establishment approach to what was then a literary genre of gentlemen spies and Oxbridge-educated mandarins had grabbed the public's attention.

10.55

He runs fingers through his moth-eaten hair-cut and walks across the room. 'Like those?' he asks. He is pointing to two icons that hang above the fireplace. 

'Yes,' I say doubtfully.

'Made 'em out of balsa wood and paste' - as though he expected to surprise me.

11.10

The phone rings (LD has switched the extension bell on). It is the Observer. LD has a horror of answering telephones so his beautiful wife generally cases each caller. LD takes the phone. The Observer wants to know whether he can locate an anarchist for a lecture at a provincial university. He suggests a couple of cafés they can try. Capping the phone, he says to me 'Not so many anarchists about lately.' I nod. 'Used to be a lot about at one time,' he says. 'Really?' I say. LD replaces the receiver and walks across the room. He picks up a small prickly ball and throws it to me.

'Sniff that,' he says. I look at it. It is an orange stuck with so many cloves that you can't see the peel. I sniff it. 'Great, eh?' LD says. 'Yes,' I say.

11.30

LD goes into the kitchen. In front of him is a rough pencil draft of his cooking-strip for the Observer. 

'This is boeuf bourguignon,' he says. He is cutting up meat and carrots and hurling them into a frying-pan where butter is dissolving. 'Leg of beef is best,' says LD. 'It needs long cooking but the flavour is there.' He takes the pencilled draft and crosses the word 'brown' through. He writes 'sear' in its place. 'Sear cubes of 2lb leg of Beef,' the recipe now says.

'Did you work your way through all the recipes in the Action Cook-book [sic]?' I asked him.

'Have you read the Action Cook-book?' he said in a faintly surprised way.

'Cape's sent me a review copy,' I said.

'You'd better not use it,' LD said, 'the recipes in the review copies have got deliberate mistakes.' LD laughed a great deal as he said this, and the end of his tie went into the saucepan. The kitchen is about the size of a gigantic telephone box. Across one wall is a row of tarnished copper pans and under it a shelf where balls of string, pistachios, coffee, brandy, tinfoil and a dented red tin that says 'A Coronation souvenir June 1953' a picture of Balmoral Castle on it. By now there are four gravy spots down the front of his shirt. I point this out to him. He fingers the material proudly and says, 'Netherlands Air Force: 8s 6d.'

'Yes,' I say.

More of this fascinating article in future blog posts.

A Spy Story mystery....solved?

The American edition of Spy Story which I've just purchased, says this on the dust jacket cover:

"He is back after five years' long absence, the insubordinate, decent, bespectacled English spy who fought, fumbled, outwitted and survived his outrageous way through the best-selling Horse Under Water, Funeral in Berlin and the rest of those marvelous, [sic] celebrated Len Deighton spy thrillers. One again, he finds himself a reluctant habitué of that nightmare world of espionage where a triple cross is as commonplace and regular as the daily paper at the breakfast table. Nothing's changed!"

On a first reading  - and this was the case with me first-off - it's easy to think that this is the same no-nonsense, anti-authority tough-guy spy who took on the Gehlen network and Colonel Stok in the 'sixties thrillers which initially brought Deighton to the public's attention.

There are textual clues that he's the same man: he works for W.O.O.C.(P)., the same department as 'Palmer'. He narrates the story. He's something of a ladies' man. Early on he meets Dawlish, the boss from the earlier stories; Dawlish tells him, "New name, new job, the past gone forever...But you can't wipe the slate clean. You can't forget half your life." The character is described as in his late thirties, which fits with what we know of the unnamed spy. So, all pretty clear cut.

However, despite what publishers Harcourt Brace Jovanovich chose to put on their dustcover, something had changed.  The character of Patrick Armstrong in the book was not the same unnamed spy who had appeared in Deighton's first spy novels. In the introduction to the Jubilee edition, Len Deighton confirms that, despite much speculation at the time, it is not the same unnamed spy:

"Patrick Armstrong is not the man from The Ipcress File, although he's obviously a close relative."

Edward Milward-Oliver, Deighton's sometime biographer, in his book The Len Deighton Companion, also writes:

Armstrong, Patrick. Work name of the narrator of Spy Story, who if not our overweight friend from The Ipcress File, is certainly a close relative.

So, why is the reader teased in the text to a different conclusion? And why do the US publishers present quite the opposite? Even in their efforts to address ambiguity, Deighton and Milward-Oliver leave open the hint that it might be the original hero. What does "close relative" mean? Is that literal or figurative, i.e. he's derived from the same character? What is a 'work name'? Deep cover, perhaps, for his role?

A number of answers suggest themselves.

First, ambiguity helped the characterisation. In having the hero as the narrator, we understand his character from what he says and does and how others interact. Without a third person narrator giving context, there is ambiguity; the reader is asked to question whether the character is all he seems to be, and if everything he reveals about himself is true.

This was true with Deighton's character Bernard Samson, who is revealed in Spy Sinker - narrated in the third person, not by Samson - to be not as clued-up and as expert a judge of character as he himself thought. So, in having the 'Patrick Armstrong' character draw some dotted lines back to the first hero, without explicitly demonstrating he is that character, Deighton is able to draw on the best dramatic aspects of the former character but adapt it for a new story and a new milieu.

Second, marketing purposes. The 'Harry Palmer' character was a huge hit, both in the book and film markets. He broke Deighton in the US market and would have been regarded as a banker. By playing on the character's ambiguity in the text, the publishers could be assured that - directed that way - readers would assume it was the same successful character, and give sales a boost. After all, would the market that lapped up the first five books be up for the introduction of a new character?

Third, simple screw-up. I've no information about the contract for the US rights for the book or the marketing plan, but certainly there's nothing in the UK marketing which plays up the 'is he, isn't he?' aspect of the main character as blatantly as the US version. The dust-jacked of the UK first edition says nothing other than presenting review quotes from earlier books. It might well be that on reading the book, the marketing people at HBJ thought, 'hey, let's give the public more of the same,' and ran with it.

Of course, thirty five years or more after the event nothing's absolutely certain; but, we should probably take the author at his word and conclude that it's not .... exactly the same character. But plenty of journalists, reviewers and bloggers have been taken in nonetheless.

So, mystery solved? I'd be interested what readers of this blog think.

More great British thrillers get a new lease of life

Mike Ripley, thriller writer and editor of the excellent Shots online magazine about British thriller, crime and espionage writing, has sent out news of more developments by new imprint Ostara Publishing, which is specialising in putting back out on the market long-forgotten British thrillers with the aim of attracting a new generation of readers.

Ostara is issuing four more titles in their print-on-demand Top Notch Thrillers series. Ripley set up this new company to, he says, "revive Great British thrillers which do not deserve to be forgotten”. The new titles, originally published in Britain between 1962 and 1970, were selected by Ripley, who is the series editor for this new imprint.

The Tale of the Lazy Dog by Alan Williams is a heist thriller set in the Laos-Cambodia-Vietnam triangle in 1969 as a mis-matched gang of rogues and pirates attempt to steal $1.5 billion in used US Treasury notes. Time Is An Ambush is a delicate, atmospheric study of suspicion and guilt set in Franco’s Spain, by Francis Clifford, one of the most-admired stylists of the post-war generation of British thriller-writers. A Flock Of Ships, Brian Callison’s bestselling wartime thriller of a small Allied convoy lured to its doom in the South Atlantic, was famous for its breathless, machine-gun prose and was described by Alistair Maclean as “the best war story I have ever read”. The Ninth Directive was the second assignment for super-spy Quiller (whose fans included Kingsley Amis and John Dickson Carr), created by Adam Hall (Elleston Trevor) and is a taught, tense thriller of political assassination which pre-dated Day of the Jackal by five years.

Of these new reissues, Mike Ripley says: ‘Our new titles are absolutely in line with the Top Notch ethos of showing the range and variety of thrillers from what was something of a Golden Age for British thriller writing. They range in approach from slow-burning suspense to relentless wartime action and feature obsessive, super tough, super cool spies and some tremendous villains. Above all, they are characterised by the quality of their writing, albeit in very different styles.

‘When first published, these titles were all best-sellers and their authors are among the most respected names in thriller fiction. Many readers will welcome these novels back almost as old friends and hopefully a new generation of readers will discover them for the first time.’

As a critic and editor of the Shots website Ripley has shown that he has an eye for understanding what readers are interested in and the potential for injecting new vigour into the British thriller genre by drawing on the lessons of the past. These new books sound pretty cool, and I'm sure readers of this blog would want to check them out.

Matt Lynn selects his choice of great British thrillers

Up on the excellent The Browser website, in its Five Books selection - which invites authors to select the best reading in their field of interest - thriller and military action novelist and ghost-writer Matt Lynn selects his choice of the five best thrillers.

His choices would correspond to many a top five list from readers with a keen interest in British spy and political thrillers. He cites Eric Ambler, Frederick Forsyth and Hammond Innes in his top five books.

Also there is Len Deighton's Berlin Game, which Lynn says is the best Cold War thriller he's read. He also makes an interesting observation about the espionage thriller as the extension of the 'politics' of the office:

"All spy fiction is really an extended metaphor for the office. No character captures that better than Bernard Samson, a middle-ranking intelligence executive, who can’t trust anyone."

I haven't come across The Browser before but it's an excellent news aggregation website packed full of the best writing from around the world selected by its editorial team. Well worth a look.

81 candles on the cake...

Today, 18 February, is the birthday of Len Deighton, inspiration for the Deighton Dossier blog on all things spy fiction.

I'm sure the many readers of his fiction around the world wish him 'Many Happy Returns'.

In his 1989 book The ABC of French Food Deighton has this to say on the subject of how a gourmet should celebrate a birthday:

"Pate a choux is hot-water pastry that is piped into shape while still warm, like icing on to a cake. Best known as the éclair or the profiterole, or cheese-filled appetizers. Such pastry filled puffballs are stuck together with caramel and assembled to become a tall pyramid (the croquembouche) or the St Honoré that was at one time the Frenchman's traditional birthday cake. Now my local patissiere tells me birthdays are celebrated with 'American style' layer cakes."

What's the betting Mrs Deighton's whipping up a St Honoré today?