Top 86 Quotes by John le Carre

About John le Carre

These are some quotes by English author John le Carre Writer, who was born on October 19, 1931.

A spy, like a writer, lives outside the mainstream population. He steals his experience through bribes and reconstructs it.

A spy, like a writer, lives outside the mainstream population. He steals his experience through bribes and reconstructs it.

John le Carre

People who've had very unhappy childhoods are pretty good at inventing themselves. If nobody invents you for yourself, nothing is left but to invent yourself for others.

People who've had very unhappy childhoods are pretty good at inventing themselves. If nobody invents you for yourself, nothing is left but to invent yourself for others.

John le Carre

When I was 16 or 17, anyone could have had me if they sang the right song and recruited me in the right way. Which is why I've always had a sneaking understanding for people who took the wrong route. That doesn't mean to say I took it or even contemplated it myself.

John le Carre

I grew up in a completely bookless household. It was my father's boast that he had never read a book from end to end.

I grew up in a completely bookless household. It was my father's boast that he had never read a book from end to end.

John le Carre

Totalitarian states killed with impunity and no one was held accountable. That didn't happen in the West.

Totalitarian states killed with impunity and no one was held accountable. That didn't happen in the West.

John le Carre

But I think the real tension lies in the relationship between what you might call the pursuer and his quarry, whether it's the writer or the spy.

But I think the real tension lies in the relationship between what you might call the pursuer and his quarry, whether it's the writer or the spy.

John le Carre

I don't think that there are very many good writers who don't live without a sense of tension. If they haven't got one immediately available to them, then they usually manage to manufacture it in their private lives.

John le Carre

But there is a big difference in working for the West and working for a totalitarian state.

But there is a big difference in working for the West and working for a totalitarian state.

John le Carre

Novelists are not equipped to make a movie, in my opinion. They make their own movie when they write: they're casting, they're dressing the scene, they're working out where the energy of the scene is coming from and they're also relying tremendously on the creative imagination of the reader.

John le Carre

History keeps her secrets longer than most of us. But she has one secret that I will reveal to you tonight in the greatest confidence. Sometimes there are no winners at all. And sometimes nobody needs to lose.

John le Carre

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