Ian Fleming Vs John Le Carre: Event Report On The Two Giants of Spy Novels

I tend to agree with the late, great actor George C. Scott, who refused his Oscar for the film Patton, saying that art should not be compared and should not compete.

Scott said that you can not hold up two great paintings and say "And the winner is.."

Ian Fleming (seen in the above photo) is often compared to John le Carre (seen in the below photo), with le Carre being offered as the anti-Fleming when it comes to realism. Yet le Carre has often stated that his novels come more from his imagination than from his five years as a British intelligence officer.

In my view, Fleming and le Carre are two very different kinds of writer. I prefer Fleming, with From Russia With Love as my favorite novel, but I also read and enjoy le Carre's novels, especially his early novels, such as Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Both are great Cold War spy novels and they can both be read and reread and enjoyed.

Fleming and le Carre should not be pitted against each other.

And yet I was interested in reading Tom Cull's piece at the James Bond website MI6 - not to be confused with the British intelligence agency - on the Ian Fleming vs John le Carre debate.

Within the fitting grandiose setting of the Emanuel Centre in London’s Westminster, last Tuesday saw two of the most influential writers working today make the case for their respective choices for the greatest spy novelist of all time.

In one corner Anthony Horowitz, the author of the latest Bond continuation novel “Trigger Mortis”, argued for Ian Fleming.  He was pitted against David Farr, who recently adapted John Le Carre’s “The Night Manager” for our screens with global success.

Accompanying them were four esteemed actors who added colour to the debate by performing readings of each author’s novels, who included Simon Callow, Lesley Manville, Alex Macqueen and Matthew Lewis.

... The Bond films, of course, are intertwined with the book’s success and yet whenever the film franchise chooses to stick closely to the original texts, they are all the better for it. Fleming’s Bond was the first modern spy and Mr. Horowitz stressed that in those early books he was no cartoon hero and Fleming adroitly made him vulnerable.

Mr. Horowitz discussed Fleming’s wonderful use of language as only he wished he could write and asked, “did Le Carre ever write a sentence with such a smile?” The sheer number of great set pieces, book titles and iconic moments are incredible for one writer to have created in 12 books. Do we really know Le Carre’s characters in the same way?

Fleming’s Bond is in our national identity. 

...In Le Carre’s novels, he is seeking himself just as his characters seek their nemesis. Deep ideas but never high-brow. He tackles moral problems, which tests the reader and asks the sort of questions that we ask ourselves about our own identity.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/articles/event-ian-fleming-john-le-carre-debate?id=04194

And you can listen to audio of the debate via the below link:

http://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/ian-fleming-vs-john-le-carre-anthony-horowitz-and-david-farr/

Writers To Debate Whether Ian Fleming Or John Le Carre Is The Better Spy Novelist

Some years ago actor George C. Scott refused to accept an Oscar for his great portrayal of General Patton in the film Patton.

I agreed with what he said at the time, which was that art should not a competition. You simply can not hold up two great paintings and say, "And the winner is..."

So I can't say I like the idea of a debate on whether the late Ian Fleming (seen in the above photo) or John le Carre (seen in the below photo) is the better spy novelist, which, as the The Spy Command noted, will soon take place.

Intelligence Squared, which stages debates and presentations on various topics, will hold a debate this month whether Ian Fleming or John Le Carre is the better spy novelist.

Representing Fleming (1908-64) will be Anthony Horowitz, author of the James Bond continuation novel Trigger Mortis, according to the group’s website.

Advocating for LeCarre (real name David Cornwell, b. 1931) will be David Farr, who adapted LeCarre’s The Night Manager for the BBC. The debate is scheduled for Nov. 29 at Emmanuel Centre in London.

And yet...

Ian Fleming served as a British naval intelligence officer and assistant to the Royal Navy's Director of Naval Intelligence in WWII. He later wrote admittedly highly romanticized novels that featured a character by the name of Bond, James Bond. He said he wrote the books unabashedly for his own and the public's entertainment.

The novels are highly entertaining and they are far darker and more complex than the films, and some of them, like From Russia With Love, Goldfinger and On Her Majesty's Secret Service, are first-rate thrillers.

John le Carre, who, like Fleming, was a British intelligence officer, having served in both MI5 and MI6 as a young man, considers himself to be a much more serious novelist than Fleming, which means he is a much duller thriller writer.

As I wrote in my Philadelphia Inquirer review of le Carre's novel Our Kind of Traitor, le Carre wrote a talky thriller that unfolds mostly through dialogue. And he offers some very good, smart writing.

Le Carre has written, in my view, some fine spy novels, such as the "Karla" trilogy that featured a character by the name of George Smiley; Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, Smiley's People, and The Honorable Schoolboy. I can't say I care much for his later novels, which are marred, as I wrote in my Washington Times review of John le Carre: The Biography, with his shrill leftist and anti-American views.      

The two novelists are very different, and I like them both, and they should not, like Scott said, be compared or be in competition.

And yet, I'm interested in this debate, because le Carre is often presented as the "realistic" antidote to Fleming's "fantasies," and le Carre has been highly critical of Fleming in the past.

You can read about the upcoming debate via the below link:

https://hmssweblog.wordpress.com/2016/11/16/writers-to-debate-whether-fleming-lecarre-is-better/

You can also read my Philadelphia Inquirer review of le Carre's Our Kind of Traitor via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2010/10/russian-crooks-corrupt-brits-at-large.html

And you can read my Washington Times review of John le Carre: The Biography via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2015/12/my-washington-times-review-of-john-le.html

And you can read my Crime Beat column, Spy Writer Vs. Spy Writer, via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2010/08/spy-writer-vs-spy-writer-john-le-carre.html

Note: Below are photos of Sean Connery as James Bond and Alec Guinness as George Smiley: