The Secret Pilgrim [Paperback]

"The Secret Pilgrim," British spymaster John LeCarre's thirteenth book, was published in 1990, a year after the Berlin Wall was torn down, and the 30-year long Cold War was declared at an end. It was his first published post Cold War novel. LeCarre, who penned the Cold War masterpieces The Spy Who Came in from the Cold; and the Karla trilogy,Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy,The Honourable Schoolboy, and Smiley's People, uses this book, several short stories cobbled together, that begin as the looming Berlin Wall has been up only two years, as a magisterial summing-up of the war that was.

The author sets much of it, as is his long-standing custom, in his German-speaking comfort zone, particularly Berlin, "the spy's eternal city," he calls it. The book is narrated by "Ned," a shrewd and loyal long-term employee of LeCarre's fictional intelligence service, modeled on the real one. Here, as elsewhere, LeCarre calls this service the circus, from its London location. Ned is currently teaching new recruits at Sarratt, its spy school, and contemplating retirement. He's thinking about the secret pilgrimage of his life, spent in the service, wondering, as is typical of the author, what it has gained him, or the world. He invites the "eminence grise" of the circus, George Smiley, to speak to the recruits.

The book is episodic; that may annoy some people. But it has LeCarre's usual writerly virtues, unbeaten spycraft, strong descriptive and narrative writing, complex, if brief, plotlets. Resonant characters and dialogue, a sturdy moral context. It is written in flashback, so the action may be a bit bloodless for some. But it gives an informative summation of the Smiley-Karla years. "Before the fall, " as the circus calls it, when Bill Haydon, its secret counterspy, mole in the terminology LeCarre created, is still burrowing from within. And "after the fall," picking up the pieces. And it offers new views of the circus's great knights: Smiley and his unfaithful wife Ann, Haydon, Peter Guillam, Tobe Esterhase. To Le Carre fans, it's all catnip. We even get an unexpected bonus: Ned is apparently the desk jockey who ran Barley Blair, star of The Russia House: think Sean Connery. Ned reminisces about Blair, "We were trying to do a deal on him, but Barley wouldn't go along with us. He'd done his own deal already. He wanted his girl, not us."

Several of the component short stories are particularly memorable. An early one about Ben Arno Cavendish, Ned's oldest friend, who joins the circus with him and thereafter makes a little mistake with terrible consequences. A later one about the Lithuanian Captain Brandt and his beautiful girlfriend Bella -- also Ned's. A tale about Colonel Jerzy, high-ranking Pole, who finds his own way to Ned. And Hansen, the big, fair Scandinavian, active in Indochina during the Vietnam war: Ned says Hansen, deep in the Cambodian jungle, is his own Kurz, communicating from his own heart of darkness. Finally, there's Frewin, lonely Foreign Office cipher clerk, with all security clearances; seduced into Russia's service by the language lessons of Boris and Olga on early morning radio. This is the war that was, indeed.

I was given this book as a birthday present, otherwise I probably never would have read it, since I am not a fan of spy fiction (other than the kind that appears in the factual espionage genre). I am very glad, however, that I did read it.

"The Secret Pilgrim" represents the best of both worlds, since it is actually a dozen short stories tied together within the framework of a novel. The latter depicts George Smiley, the Old Cold Warrior, acting as guest lecturer to a group of young "Circus" recruits, who are learning their tradecraft from one of his old pupils, Ned (who is himself about to retire). Each of Smiley's topics during the lecture and the conversation afterwards triggers Ned's memories and, therefore, his reminiscences about old cases.

The short stories serve as an excellent introduction to the author's earlier works, since Ned, in his adventures, has dealt with the likes of Bill Haydon, Toby Esterhaze, and Percy Alleline, as well as George Smiley--all of whom make cameo appearances. The tales are entertaining, witty, and wholly absorbing, as one gradually learns that the narrator is the pilgrim of the title on a quest to discover why he ever entered the secret world in the first place. Once he had imagined himself as a dragon slayer, who would leave the world in a "safer place." Now, however, that rampant Communism has been replaced by rampant Capitalism, the narrator, in the last chapter, wonders whether the right people have won, noting that "the evil was not in the system, but in the man."

"The Secret Pilgrim" is set in a very different world from the original Smiley books. George Smiley is now presiding over the "Fishing Rights Committee," a joint effort between the intelligence services of London and Moscow.

How Kim Philby would have approved!.

This book comprises what, at first sight, seem to be a set of short stories. In fact, the stories are linked, in part by a narrative structure and in part by the presence of George Smiley, brought out of retirement to make an after-dinner speech to a bunch of new spooks.
Much of Circus history is revisited, including the mole-hunting era of Tinker, Tailor etc. New angles and insights are revealed and old motivations seen in new lights.
It goes without saying that the writing style is fluid, intelligent and engaging. [If anything, too engaging-it is all too easy to read just one more story....]
Enthusiasts for the earlier history of Smiley and his associates will delight in this book. I'm not entirely sure that newcomers will find it quite such an accessible read: some background has to be assumed to avoid repetition.
Highly recommended.
Bill