#w

I made a series of wrong decisions about moderately recent books, and I've sold the rights to studios for ridiculous amounts of money and the films have never been made. That's the saddest thing of all, because they're locked up and no one else can make them. ↗

— John le Carre

#because #been #books #decisions #else

I was quite able at the insignificant work I did in MI6, but absolutely dysfunctional in my domestic life. I had no experience of fatherhood. I had no example of marital bliss or the family unit. ↗

— John le Carre

#absolutely #bliss #did #domestic #domestic life

I've always had difficulties with female characters. ↗

— John le Carre

#characters #difficulties #female #female characters #had

If I had to put a name to it, I would wish that all my books were entertainments. I think the first thing you've got to do is grab the reader by the ear, and make him sit down and listen. Make him laugh, make him feel. We all want to be entertained at a very high level. ↗

— John le Carre

#down #ear #entertained #entertainments #feel

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

#casting #coming #creative #dressing #energy

Remember Graham Green's dictum that childhood is the bank balance of the writer? I think that all writers feel alienated. Most of us go back to an alienated childhood in some way or another. I know that I do. ↗

— John le Carre

#another #back #balance #bank #childhood

We have learned in recent years to translate almost all of political life in terms of conspiracy. And the spy novel, as never before, really, has come into its own. ↗

— John le Carre

#before #come #conspiracy #into #learned

Neither can the wave that has passed by be recalled, nor the hour which has passed return again. ↗

— Ovid

#hour #neither #nor #passed #recalled

Like hatred, jealousy is forbidden by the laws of life because it is essentially destructive. ↗

— Alexis Carrel

#because #destructive #essentially #forbidden #hatred

In man, the things which are not measurable are more important than those which are measurable. ↗

— Alexis Carrel

#man #measurable #more #than #things