Fascinating interview of John le Carré; Parallels of betrayal in his books and Muddenahalli group
Last updated on 18th Sept. 2020
18th Sept. 2020 Update: I had an inner urge to name-snip the names of some person(s) in this post and so have done so. This post got missed out in the name-snipping I did some months ago.
Ravi: In my twenties, I was a crazy fan of John le Carré's spy novels. George Smiley is an unforgettable character for me. So I thoroughly enjoyed the above interview of John le Carré and another writer.
John le Carré (JLC) about his childhood (his father was a notorious conman): "The truth, in my childhood, didn’t really exist. That is to say, we shared the lies. To run the household with no money required a lot of serious lying to the local garage man, the local butcher, the local everybody." And more about his childhood background.
I did not know about this background of his. No wonder he was able to create extremely duplicitous characters in his spy novels. JLC goes on to say about his boarding school days, "If my father said he was going to come and take me out, it was as likely as not that he wouldn’t show up. I would say to the other boys, I had a wonderful day out, when I had really been sitting in a field somewhere."
Hmm. What a freaky and sad childhood to have! How challenging it would have been for JLC to recognize these traits in him and then be able to speak so frankly about it now in his old age (he is 85 years old now). Fascinating!
Another sentence of JLC: "And then there was the genetic inheritance I got from my father. This was a man who, while still being pursued by the police, or bankrupt, or Christ knows what, who had done prison time, then boldly stands as a parliamentary candidate." Ha! Ha! Well, not surprisingly, democracy of India and Britain do have some things in common, like few/some con artists and criminals who are politicians aspiring to become/becoming Members of Parliament :-).
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Over email I wrote (slightly edited) to a correspondent (slightly edited):
John le Carré writes exquisite English. But the genre is spy stuff.
One of his early books (mentioned in the interview article) which is a masterpiece, and which was the one that got me hooked onto his books is, The Spy who came in from the cold. Here's its wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spy_Who_Came_in_from_the_Cold.
He is an expert on double-agents and betrayal. Given what we experienced with the Muddenahalli betrayal of our beloved Lord, I think you will appreciate the parallels of betrayal, double-cross and double-agents in Le Carré's books (typical books).
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[A later mail to same correspondent:]
His [JLC's] character-creations are awesome. For me the most enduring, endearing and sometimes sympathy-provoking character of John le Carré's spy books is George Smiley. He is the good guy, doing hard intellectual analysis and also some grunt work of spymasters but who gets tricked by the sly and more dazzling/flashy British double agents who are being controlled by their Russian minder/controller. I sometimes feel that people like you and me are like George Smileys who were first betrayed by MDH sympathizers/double-agents in Prasanthi Nilayam system and sold/chucked out in a way as losers by the MDH fellows who were on a roll for a few years (till end. 2014, I would say). Then we had to figure out the betrayal and the hijack and reverse it (like George Smiley figuring out who were the double-agents in the British spy agencies and then exposing them), which I think took the years of 2015 and 2016 to fully reverse.
Here is an interesting extract from the wiki page of the George Smiley character (he is such a famous character that he has a wiki page to himself!), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Smiley :
Le Carré introduced Smiley at about the same time as Len Deighton's unnamed anti-hero (Harry Palmer in the film versions). This was a time when critics and the public were welcoming more realistic versions of espionage fiction, in contrast to the glamorous world of Ian Fleming's James Bond.
Smiley is sometimes considered the anti-Bond in the sense that Bond is an unrealistic figure and is more a portrayal of a male fantasy than a realistic government agent. George Smiley, on the other hand, is quiet, mild-mannered and not at all athletic. He lives by his wits and, unlike Bond, is a master of quiet, disciplined intelligence work, rather than gunplay. In The Honourable Schoolboy it becomes clear that he is not as adept at bureaucratic manoeuvring as the duplicitous Sam Collins and Saul Enderby, who are able to use even a great success to force him into retirement. Also unlike Bond he is not a bed-hopper; in fact it is Smiley's wife Ann who is notorious for her affairs.
When Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was published, the reviewer of The Spectator described Smiley as a "brilliant spy and totally inadequate man." However, Smiley has his pride, and in the end, in Smiley's People, he refuses to take the beautiful Ann back, despite her pleadings.
Smiley is depicted as an exceptionally skilled spymaster, gifted with a prodigious memory and a talent for getting people to talk. His subtle interrogation methods, derived from psychology and experience, he imparts to his understudies, such as Jerry Westerby and Peter Guillam. These are depicted as far superior to the heavy-handed tactics of the Americans, who are called "the Cousins" in Circus jargon, and whose entry into a mission always ensures that things will get a lot rougher.
A student of espionage with a profound insight into human weakness and fallibility, highly sagacious and incredibly perceptive, he is very conscious of the immoral, grisly and unethical aspects of his profession. At the same time he works to inculcate loyalty and discipline into his pupils, and a sense of moral obligation to the espionage service, and to the country. Smiley has no patience with the political niceties of Whitehall and their distaste for classical espionage tactics, including bribery, blackmail, and turning enemy agents into British double agents. On the other hand, he is not one of the "hawks" who are given to the sharp, militaristic attitudes of "the Cousins" (clearly depicted during the climax of The Honourable Schoolboy).
Despite his series of retirements, Smiley's own unflinching loyalty to and support for his people inculcates loyalty in them. Thus, whether in or out of the Service he is able to maintain an extensive range of aides and support-staff, extending even to "retired" police officers, former and present Service members.
Le Carré describes him in A Murder of Quality as a somewhat short and fat man, who always wears expensive but badly fitting clothes (he "dresses like a bookie... short and stubby"). He has a habit of cleaning his glasses on the "fat end" of his necktie. Also in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, le Carré wrote that his wife describes him as "a reptile that can regulate his body temperature". Gary Oldman, in an interview with Charlie Rose promoting the film adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, said that this description is "the key" to Smiley.
In March 2010, while giving a talk on his life and works at the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, le Carré responded to a question concerning what became of Smiley by telling the audience that although he would like to think of Smiley as a Holmesian figure, never having really retired, he acknowledged that to his mind, the character would now be "very old and getting past—certainly in his nineties".
This accords with the later chronology. Le Carré envisaged Smiley now to be "keeping bees somewhere", still alive but very much retired.
In March 2017 it was announced that George Smiley would be making one last appearance in John le Carré's latest novel A Legacy of Spies.
----end wiki extracts ----
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To another correspondent, I wrote (slightly edited):The interview states JLC saying, when the offer to meet Philby was made to him:
And I refused to do so. I felt a spurt of hatred. I felt, “If he wants me he can’t have me.” I didn’t want to give him comfort.
--- end extract ---
Ravi: I think I can understand JLC's above reaction. I don't know whether you have faced betrayal. I had not faced serious betrayal till Sathya Sai bodily passed away, and two of his long-term servitors (a long-time warden of Sai university - B.N. Narasimhamurthy - and a Bombay based Trustee of the Central trust referred to as the Grand Old Man of Sai orgn.) betrayed his teachings by starting a splinter group claiming to have dream-medium (B.N. Narasimhamurthy) and then a regular medium (Madhusudan Rao Naidu) as Sathya Sai successor in a way. These were people we respected (though I would not say revered) for their decades of service and leadership in the Sathya Sai movement, and who were praised, sometimes in public, by Sathya Sai so many times. These two senior persons were among the small group of senior leaders (say 5 to 10 or so such leaders) who most of us, including people like me, looked up to, after Sathya Sai (bodily) passing away (in April 2011) to lead us.
Instead they misled many of us!!! A few of us (including me) rebelled as we saw fishy things happening, with me breaking away from the Sai university whose vice-chancellor - --Name1-snipped-- - had come under the complete sway of the former warden and seemed to have been running the university as per his instructions (viewing it as Sathya Sai instructions). But their HIJACK of the Sai university and some other parts of the Sathya Sai setup continued till almost the end of 2014!!! From end 2014 onwards the loyalists started openly fighting against the rebels, and starting pushing back against their HIJACK efforts. I think I can say that by end 2016, the HIJACK had been reversed. The rebels have their splinter group with their medium (Madhusudan Rao Naidu) who is their successor to Sathya Sai (or some view him as Sathya Sai spirit in that medium's body). The loyalists have a separate setup - the original one created and administered by Sathya Sai himself while he was in physical body. But there are many people in between with one foot in the loyalists' camp and another in the splinter group's camp.
I don't even look at some people who I used to respectfully wish earlier, as those people betrayed us behaving like secret double-agents during the crucial period of two to three years after Sathya Sai (bodily) passing away where they secretly built their setup, and shamelessly poached on the loyalist group people including wealthy donors. They came out in the open in May 2014 at which time people like me were utterly dismayed and felt heartbroken to see their betrayal and disloyalty to the teachings of Sathya Sai related to mediums.
It was indeed a very bitter experience to see such betrayal, and even today it is bitter though I have become hardened to it now. I recalled so many books that I had read of betrayal and double-agents including JLC's books. I found that I could relate to betrayal in Indian history like Siraj ud Dowlah being betrayed by Mir Jaffer who was lured/bribed by Robert Clive (British) in the vital Battle of Plassey. Like the Peshwa rulers who were betrayed by their own when they tried to fight the British at a time when large parts of India had come under a loose-knit Maratha federation rule. If I recall correctly, the Peshwa ruler who was betrayed in this manner, got into a kind of surrender-treaty with the British, and spent the rest of his life enjoying wine and women! After I personally and directly experienced this betrayal and HIJACK of Sai university by traitors to Sathya Sai teachings about mediums, and their collaborators (quislings) from around Jul 2011 to Nov 2014 (when --Name1-snipped--, the traitor vice-chancellor stepped down), I could empathise with that Peshwa ruler! Honestly! Betrayal by people who you trust and depend on and look up to, can be devastating for one's faith in humanity.
So I can fully understand JLC's hatred of Philby. JLC had served in UK's secret service - he was not just a spy fiction writer. His service people would have been killed by Philby's betrayal. Of course, JLC should have hated Philby for that. That's my view.
I don't know whether you have read, say abridged accounts of, life of Rama and Krishna, two of the biggest avatars of Hinduism. They too faced betrayal or something similar. I guess it is part and parcel of life of any big ruler/big kingmaker (Krishna was more king maker than big ruler). Krishna faced a lot of such horrific stuff. And Krishna responded to it ruthlessly.
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[A later mail response of mine]
Noted your response and thanks for the sympathy about the phase being over.
But the bitterness remains. It does not drive a dagger into our hearts now like it did when we realized their betrayal and were coming to terms with it. But it is still painful.
And yes, JLC was talking about country betrayal and lives being lost due to that. So that is far, far worse.
But in our case it is ONGOING spiritual master teaching dilution and distortion betrayal by the splinter orgn. using the name of that spiritual master (as against the medium's - Madhusudan Rao Naidu's - name) even through we reversed the HIJACK in the main/original orgn including Sai university. That essentially corrupts the legacy of the spiritual master. That bothers some of us very, very deeply.
Apostle Paul's initial evangelical efforts seems to have drawn perhaps similar concerns from key apostle-companions of Jesus like Peter.
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauline_Christianity:
Pauline Christianity is the Christianity associated with the beliefs and doctrines espoused by Paul the Apostle through his writings. Most of Christianity relies heavily on these teachings and considers them to be amplifications and explanations of the teachings of Jesus. Others perceive in Paul's writings teachings that are different from the original teachings of Jesus documented in the canonical gospels, early Acts and the rest of the New Testament, such as the Epistle of James.
---- end wiki extracts ---
And then there is the famous Shia and Sunni differences in belief and practice in Islam. The Muddenahalli based Sathya Sai splinter group has created a Sai Sunni group (loyalists like us) and a Sai Shia group (rebels who have diluted Sai teachings to cater to their needs). That separation into two separate though related belief groups is the most bothersome, worrying and bitter thing about the Muddenahalli splinter group for people like me, as it can have ramifications, mostly unpleasant I guess, for generations of Sathya Sai devotees, now and in the future.
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[I thank John le Carré, nytimes.com and wikipedia, and have presumed that they will not have any objections to me sharing the above few sentences of John le Carré/extracts from wikipedia, from their websites on this post which is freely viewable by all, and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.]
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