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George Smiley
George Smiley OBE is a fictional character created by John le Carré. Smiley is a career intelligence officer with " The Circus", the British overseas intelligence agency. He is a central character in the novels '' Call for the Dead'', '' A Murder of Quality'', '' Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'', '' The Honourable Schoolboy'', '' Smiley's People'' and '' Karla's Choice'', and a supporting character in '' The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'', '' The Looking Glass War'', '' The Secret Pilgrim'' and '' A Legacy of Spies''. The character has also appeared in a number of film, television, and radio adaptations of le Carré's books. Le Carré created Smiley as an intentional contrast to James Bond, a character who he believed depicted an inaccurate and damaging version of espionage. Short, overweight, balding, and bespectacled, Smiley is polite and self-effacing and frequently allows others to mistreat him, including his serially unfaithful wife; these traits mask his inner cunning, e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gary Oldman
Sir Gary Leonard Oldman (born 21 March 1958) is an English actor and filmmaker. Known for his versatility and intense acting style, he has received List of awards and nominations received by Gary Oldman, various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, three British Academy Film Awards and nominations for two Primetime Emmy Awards. Gary Oldman filmography, His films have grossed over $11 billion worldwide, making him one of the List of highest-grossing actors, highest-grossing actors of all time. He was appointed a Knights Bachelor, Knight Bachelor by Charles III, King Charles in the 2025 Birthday Honours. Oldman began acting in theatre in 1979 and made his film debut in ''Remembrance (1982 film), Remembrance'' (1982). He appeared in London's Royal Court Theatre, Royal Court and was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, with credits including ''Cabaret (musical), Cabaret'', ''Romeo and Juliet'', ''Entertaining Mr Sloane'', ''Saved (play), Saved'', ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intelligence Agency
An intelligence agency is a government agency responsible for the collection, Intelligence analysis, analysis, and exploitation of information in support of law enforcement, national security, military, public safety, and foreign policy objectives. Means of information gathering are both overt and covert and may include espionage, signals intelligence, communication interception, cryptanalysis, cooperation with other institutions, and evaluation of public sources. The assembly and propagation of this information is known as intelligence analysis or intelligence assessment. Objectives Intelligence agencies can provide the following services for their national governments. * Give early warning of impending crisis; * Serve national and international crisis management by helping to discern the intentions of current or potential opponents; * Inform national defense planning and military operations, known as military intelligence; * Protect sensitive information secrets, both ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Retroactive Continuity
Retroactive continuity, or retcon for short, is a literary device in fictional story telling whereby facts and events established through the narrative itself are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subsequently published work that recontextualizes or breaks continuity with the former. There are various motivations for applying retroactive continuity, including: * To accommodate desired aspects of sequels or derivative works which would otherwise be ruled out. * To respond to negative fan reception of previous stories. * To correct and overcome errors or problems identified in the prior work since its publication. * To change or clarify how the prior work should be interpreted. * To match reality, when assumptions or projections of the future are later proven wrong. Retcons are used by authors to increase their creative freedom, on the assumption that the changes are unimportant to the audience compared to the new story which can be told. Retcons can be die ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bookmaker
A bookmaker, bookie, or turf accountant is an organization or a person that accepts and pays out bets on sporting and other events at agreed-upon odds In probability theory, odds provide a measure of the probability of a particular outcome. Odds are commonly used in gambling and statistics. For example for an event that is 40% probable, one could say that the odds are or When gambling, o .... History The first bookmaker, Harry Ogden, stood at Newmarket in 1795, although similar activities had existed in other forms earlier in the eighteenth century. Following the Gaming Act 1845, the only gambling allowed in the United Kingdom was at race tracks. The introduction of special excursion trains meant that all classes of society could attend the new racecourses opening across the country. Runners working for bookmakers would collect bets in Clock bag, clock bags. Cash flowed to the bookmakers who employed bodyguards against protection gangs operating within the vast cro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Guardian Media Group, owned by the Scott Trust Limited. The trust was created in 1936 to "secure the financial and editorial independence of ''The Guardian'' in perpetuity and to safeguard the journalistic freedom and liberal values of ''The Guardian'' free from commercial or political interference". The trust was converted into a limited company in 2008, with a constitution written so as to maintain for ''The Guardian'' the same protections as were built into the structure of the Scott Trust by its creators. Profits are reinvested in its journalism rather than distributed to owners or shareholders. It is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. The editor-in-chief Katharine Viner succeeded Alan Rusbridger in 2015. S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tradecraft
Tradecraft, within the intelligence community, refers to the techniques, methods, and technologies used in modern espionage (spying) and generally as part of the activity of intelligence assessment. This includes general topics or techniques ( dead drops, for example), or the specific techniques of a nation or organization (the particular form of encryption (encoding) used by the National Security Agency, for example). Examples * Agent handling is the management of espionage agents, principal agents, and agent networks (called "assets") by intelligence officers, who are typically known as case officers. * Analytic tradecraft is the body of specific methods for intelligence analysis. * Black bag operations are covert or clandestine entries into structures or locations to obtain information for human intelligence operations. This may require breaking and entering, lock picking, safe cracking, key impressions, fingerprinting, photography, electronic surveillance (includin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Self-effacing
Humility is the quality of being humble. The Oxford Dictionary, in its 1998 edition, describes humility as a low self-regard and sense of unworthiness. However, humility involves having an accurate opinion of oneself and expressing oneself modestly as situations demand, with clear goal orientation, openness, broad-mindedness, and a non-imposing mentality. In a religious context, humility can mean a recognition of self about a deity (i.e. God) and subsequent submission to that deity as a religious member. Outside of a religious context, humility is defined as being "unselved"—liberated from the consciousness of self—a form of temperance that is neither having pride (or haughtiness) nor indulging in self-deprecation. Humility refers to a proper sense of self-regard. In contrast, humiliation involves the external imposition of shame on a person. Humility may be misinterpreted as the capacity to endure humiliation through self-denigration. This misconception arises from the co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Bond
The ''James Bond'' franchise focuses on James Bond (literary character), the titular character, a fictional Secret Intelligence Service, British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have written authorised Bond novels or novelisations: Kingsley Amis, Christopher Wood (writer), Christopher Wood, John Gardner (British writer), John Gardner, Raymond Benson, Sebastian Faulks, Jeffery Deaver, William Boyd (writer), William Boyd, Anthony Horowitz and Charlie Higson. The latest novel is ''On His Majesty's Secret Service'' by Charlie Higson, published in May 2023. Additionally, Charlie Higson wrote a series on Young Bond, a young James Bond, and Samantha Weinberg, Kate Westbrook wrote three novels based on the The Moneypenny Diaries, diaries of a recurring series character, Miss Moneypenny, Moneypenny. The character—also known by the code nu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Secret Pilgrim
''The Secret Pilgrim'' is a 1990 episodic novel by British writer John le Carré, set within the frame narrative of an informal dinner talk given at the spy-training school in Sarratt by George Smiley. As Smiley talks, the first-person narrator, whom readers know only as "Ned", recalls his own experiences in a long career in the service. The various episodes are triggered by comments from Smiley, which send Ned into tangential memories. The individual stories together create a portrait of Ned himself, moving from the start of his career at the beginning of the novel to his retirement in the final chapter. Plot Part one ''Smiley reflects on the end of the Cold War, and makes a rueful joke that, in one way, the world has changed, but in another, it has always been the same and the secret services are gradually waking up from their own deluded perceptions of it, and themselves.'' After a couple of years of training at the Sarratt Nursery, in the glens of Argyll and battle camps o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Looking Glass War
''The Looking Glass War'' is a 1965 spy novel by John le Carré. Written in response to the positive public reaction to his previous novel, ''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'', the book explores the unglamorous nature of espionage and the danger of nostalgia. The book tells the story of an incompetent British military intelligence agency known as ''The Department'' and its multiple botched attempts to verify a Communist defector's story of a Soviet missile buildup in East Germany. Some editions hyphenate "Looking Glass". Plot During the early 1960s, the formerly renowned British military intelligence organisation known colloquially as "The Department" is foundering. Surviving on long past memories of its aerial reconnaissance missions during the Second World War the organisation has been reduced to a skeleton crew consisting of Leclerc, a nostalgic former air commander who now languishes in bureaucracy as Director; John Avery, his 32-year-old aide who took the job after fail ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold
''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'' is a 1963 Cold War spy fiction, spy novel by the British author John le Carré. It depicts Alec Leamas, a United Kingdom, British intelligence officer, being sent to East Germany as a faux Defection, defector to sow disinformation about a powerful East German intelligence officer. It serves as a sequel to le Carré's previous novels ''Call for the Dead'' and ''A Murder of Quality'', which also featured the fictitious British intelligence organisation, "The Circus", and its agents George Smiley and Peter Guillam. ''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'' portrays Western espionage methods as morally inconsistent with Liberal democracy, Western democracy and values. The novel received critical acclaim at the time of its publication and became an international best-seller; it was selected as one of the ''Time's List of the 100 Best Novels, All-Time 100 Novels'' by ''Time (magazine), Time'' magazine. In 1965, Martin Ritt directed a The Spy Who Came ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Karla's Choice
''Karla's Choice'' is a novel by Nick Harkaway published by Viking Press on 24 October 2024. ''Karla's Choice'' is the first George Smiley continuation novel published after John le Carré's 2020 death. The novel is set in the time period between ''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'' and ''Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy''. Nick Harkaway is the pen name of Nicholas Cornwell, the son of David Cornwell who wrote the original Smiley novels under the John le Carré pen name. While the cover identifies Harkaway as the author it also describes the book as "a John le Carré novel". Development In 2023, Penguin Random House announced that their imprint, Viking Press, would be publishing a novel (at the time untitled) written by Cornwell's son and set in the world of George Smiley. Both Harkaway and le Carré were to be credited on the cover of the new work. Harkaway said in newspaper interviews that his father had wanted his legacy to be continued, and that he had undertaken the novel on that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
