Customer Reviews

The Russia House

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Firstly, one does not pick up a John Le Carre book to be dazzled with the flash-bang imagery of modern spy thrillers. John Le Carre writes 'spy literature', a look at the inner workings and emotions felt by his well fleshed-out characters in the espionage trade. Like meeting a life-long friend for the first time, you come to know his characters, and if patient enough, actually care about them. His prose often borders on poetry.

I offer this warning of style for the sake of saving time for those looking for a quick pulse-quickening read. On to my opinion of "The Russia House". Barley Blair, the inner hypocrite comes clean. The book is an in depth tale of how a lackluster publisher with a penchant for self-destruction and jazz finds himself deeply embroiled in the hopeful defection of a Russian scientist, Goethe. Blair bumps into Goethe at a chance gathering during the hopeful glimmer of glasnost. Goethe overhears Blair's recited philosophical rhetoric for a hopeful future between the West and Communist Russia. The conspiracy begins.

Le Carre steers us through how a communique meant for Blair is intercepted, where essentially we begin our journey. We are led through London, Moscow, an island off the coast of New England, and Leningrad in the attempt to confirm Blair in his new job of spy and get the elusive scientist to switch sides. However, Blair wasn't expecting to fall in love with Goethe's emmisary, and a whole new tasteful spin is added to the spy novel. Le Carre's characters here are equally intimate and distant, illuminating yet shrouded in secrecy...so very human. So, not to spoil the intricacies for the eager reader, I shall conclude explaining the plot here.

Through all of this, Le Carre gives us a glimpse of life for both the Westerners and Easterners in Communist Russia. The lingering shadows of Stalin and Breshnev are never dismissed lightly, but rather the hope that was glasnost shines on through the murky depths of intrigue.

Fans of the George Smiley books may find themselves disappointed with reading "The Russia House", but I think fans of Le Carre as the storyteller and writer will be very satisifed.

Although some elements of this book may not seem overly realistic to the more discerning specialists of espionage, the general story line is believable. Being a native of Moscow, I enjoyed the masterful, if oversimplified, descriptions of things Russian. Le Carre diction is particularly pleasing -- his mastery of the English language is superb. The text flows easily; it is hard to put the book down. I highly recommend the book to anybody who wants to get a sence of intelligence operations, the difference between US and British apporach to espionage and what Russia was like in the 1990s. Additionally, readers will enjoy Le Carre's masterful command of English -- "an example to us all," as one of his heroes points out. I love this book!

John Le Carre has the gift of storytelling. To me, he is the best espionage writer alive today. Most of the espionage writers put all the emphasis on the events whereas the main theme of Le Carre's books has always been characters. Le Carre does not write breakneck thrillers. He writes characters, lively and human. And that's why when you read a Le Carre book, a year down the road, you can't recall the story but you can easily recall the characters of the story. He is the creator of many memorable characters and Barley Blair is one of them.

Barley is not a hero, not even a patriot. He is a careless publisher, a jazz player and a chess fan. He is not a spy. He is pushed into the espionage game because of his drunken exchange of thoughts with a Russian scientist, another of Le Carre's memorable characters. Barley has reluctantly agreed to play the part of a courier and agent-runner by British spymasters and on his arrival in Moscow, he falls in love with a girl, who very much like Barley himself, is pushed into the spy game.

Barley soon reaches a point where he has to decide whom to betray. The girl he loves or his country. To me, that is the climax of the novel, the classical dilemma.

And dilemma it is. Here is Barley Blair, the main character, forming one part of the triangle, who is not a spy, doesn't even want to be one. The second part of triangle is Goethe, the Russian scientist, who wants to tell something to the world but not through the spies. And the third part is Katya, loved by both Goethe and Barley, who doesn't even know what is she doing and where does she fit in the whole scheme of things. And in the background are the spymasters of UK and USA who think they have all the strings in their hands but have totally ignored the fact that human nature is an essential part of all the espionage equations.

You've got to read the novel to know the whole thing. And if you are into serious fiction, you must read "The Russia House".

Like most of the best-selling works that came before this one from the unchallenged master of the intelligent spy thriller John LeCarre, this is a treatise on the hidden and conflicted corners of the human heart. It is said that "The Russia House" represented a formidable new challenge for the author, so quickly and unexpectedly deprived of the forty year-old cold war he had built his career so deftly and memorably describing. Yet the author mines new tunnels of cunning, deceit, and betrayal, and at the same time weaves a quite memorable love story in the spaces squeezed between the two sides.

Barley Blair, the failing boozehound scion of a collapsing British publishing house with a love for everything Russian, happens by drunken though eloquent happenstance to inspire a famous Soviet scientist into attempting to sneak his manuscript detailing the real sorry state of Russian ICBM capabilities into the hands of the West in order to foster a recognition of the folly of the arms race and to end what he calls "the great lie". The scientist attempts to contact Blair, but through a series of mishaps rivaling the deeds of the keystone cops winds up landing the manuscript in the hands of the British Secret Service. So they soon want Barley to intercede with the Russian contact point to find out who the author of the manuscript is and thus determine its authenticity. So Barley pursues the beautiful but conflicted contact, an idealistic angel of mercy who soon sparks Barley's love interest and paternal concern. The game is afoot.

With his usual style, suspenseful prose, and intellectual gamesmanship, LeCarre stirs the reader's interest and dismay as we see the deadly games set into motion with deadly earnest by the Brits, the Americans, and the Russians, none of whom give a rattler's damn about Barley, the contact, or the scientist. This is a stunning, suspenseful, and somewhat rueful tale of what unfolds when we discover that there is a real possibility that the so-called Soviet ICBM threat is a sham, that the missiles cannot escape their silos, that their ability to achieve trajectory or destroy targets with any accuracy is vastly over-rated. And as one can expect from the shadowy and complex geopolitical world of espionage and power that LeCarre writes so brilliantly and unforgettably about, there are no simple answers or easy foregone conclusions. This is a wonderful read and a marvelous book, and has the ring of more real-life veracity and worldly wisdom than one can easily find on the non-fiction side of the bookstore aisle. Enjoy!

`Spying is waiting'. So believable. Unlike the breakneck speed of events of popular espionage fiction, John Le Carre takes us into the REAL world of spying where you do your bit and wait for the reactions. Things don't happen at the speed at which we wish them to.

His characters don't speak from high moral grounds, so typical to Tom Clancy's characters. Nor they are reluctant heroes of Robert Ludlum. They are real people, afraid, greedy, selfish, people who you can relate with, people who don't have the power to eliminate the evils of the world single-handedly. These are the people who know that the evils are here to stay, and in some sense they are also part of it. Elimination of evil will mean self-destruction. They just play the part in the manner they are told to and wait to get out of the evil-machine of espionage. `Spying IS waiting'

At his best John le Carre transcends the genre. His Quest for Karla trilogy (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy, and Smiley's People) and A Perfect Spy are marvellous novels, with deftly drawn complex characters, and a fine sense of the reasons for betrayal.

This, though, is disappointing. It is le Carre's first post glasnost fiction, and in feeling for new subject matter his novels have seemed a little weaker, until finding new form with his most recent novel, Single and Single.

The novel focuses on Barley Blair, a drunken book publisher from a small publishing house in London. Having applied for a place in the secret service some years before, Blair becomes a reluctant spy as a book with observations on Soviet military capability is handed over for Blair at an audio book convention. The novel is narrated by a wily lawyer advising the British secret service.

There are some weak points in the novel. For this reader le Carre has never convinced when drawing female characters (even the estimable Lady Ann Smiley remains a cipher from le Carre's first novel to Smiley's People). Nor is le Carre convincing when writing about love, and here one of the pivotal characters is Katya, a Muscovite with children. She is better drawn than many of le Carre's female characters (perhaps the first person male narrative strangely helps in this regard), but she remains something of a blank canvas. Her relationship with Blair is never convincing, and sadly this taints the inevitability of the final chapters.

There are the usual le Carre virtues. He has a mastery of novel openings (Witness the first chapters of Tinker Tailor and Single and Single for example) and this is no exception. In attendance at an audio book fair in MOscow a Polish emigre is approached and handed the crucial papers for Blair. How this is done, and how he deals with it, are handled wonderfully. Each detail making the situation credible. Le Carre's own style is again wonderful. His prose has a fluidity that is very readable.

Le Carre also has astute observations on the relationship between the superpowers at the time of Gorbachev's restructuring, and - from the backdrop of the Smiley novels - the relationship between the United States and United Kingdom secret services.

It is ironic that in a novel billed as a love story the most convincing relationships are those between institutions.

If you enjoy the novel try to get hold off the BBC audio dramatisation starring Tom Baker as Barley Blair. The other le Carre novels mentioned in this review are more rewarding than the Russia House, but it is still an enjoyable, albeit disappointing, read.

The Russia House is my favorite Le Carre, although I'm just getting started on his books. I enjoyed it immensely. The characters were extraordinarly well developed, even for Le Carre who is quite good at that. I enjoyed the plot, the dialouge, the characters. The idea of human love being greater than political reprecussions was a great one. Barley Blair is an imperfect publisher, a saxophonist and a drinker. He is likable and he is in love with Katya, a Russian woman. He meets her as he is drawn into Cold War espionage by chance- the world of the "grey men". I liked Ned, the human intelligence agent runner, who got along well with people but not as much with science and such. Walter, an almost girlish, strange and awkward spy was my favorite because of his fraility, his seeming too fragile for the world of espionage, and how he turned out to be right in his theories. The Russia House deals with the moral as well as the political, and deals with it very well.

`Spying is waiting'. So believable. Unlike the breakneck speed of events of popular espionage fiction, John Le Carre takes us into the REAL world of spying where you do your bit and wait for the reactions. Things don't happen at the speed at which we wish them to.

His characters don't speak from high moral grounds, so typical to Tom Clancy's characters. Nor they are reluctant heroes of Robert Ludlum. They are real people, afraid, greedy, selfish, people who you can relate with, people who don't have the power to eliminate the evils of the world single-handedly. These are the people who know that the evils are here to stay, and in some sense they are also part of it. Elimination of evil will mean self-destruction. They just play the part in the manner they are told to and wait to get out of the evil-machine of espionage. `Spying IS waiting' ***Precaution: Stay away from the movie if you haven't read the novel.

John le Carre writes spy stories which are ideal for a lazy summers day when you are outside with that long chilled drink.
Although having retired from the Foreign Service many years ago his research into the machinations of both British and the Russian intelligence have been remarked to be highly accurate.
This story of a reluctant spy in the middle of a love triangle is a marked departure of his Smiley novels.
The characters are well depicted and the storyline crisp. Although I had originally read this book a while ago, when I picked it up again I could not put it down till I had finished it.

The book is very Russian, the best book about Russia by a non-Russian I have read. This is because it is concerned much with literature, publishing books and ethical dilemmas so dear to the Russians.

I argue that *The Russia House* is neither the *spy thriller*, nor the *love triangle* story. Yes, there are elements of both, but these are decoys, literary devices the skilled literati John Le Carré uses to confuse us while he is paying his tribute to the memory of the other literati - Boris Pasternak.

The hidden hero of the book is Boris Pasternak. The character Goethe in the book is an embodiment of this remarkable Russian writer and poet.
The clues are everywhere - Barley Blair meets Goethe at the party in the soviet writers' village (*Peredelkino*) where Pasternak used to live, they have a conversation by the Pasternak's grave, which is now a place of pilgrimage, etcetera.

The Goethe's rebellion is against the *System* (first against the Soviet regime, but later against the western Capitalist order of things as well), which is designed *to trample the artist in man*. Goethe refuses to be bought up by *the West*, which is in a way similar to Pasternak's refusal to accept the Nobel Prize for literature (for his novel *Doctor Zhivago*). But like Pasternak, Goethe wanted his manuscript to be smuggled abroad and published.
The curious fact is that the manuscript of *Doctor Zhivago* was smuggled from Soviet Union by Pasternak's friend Isaiah Berlin. According to Steven Dorril's *MI6*, Berlin used to be a British intelligence officer (probably before becoming a prominent Oxford academic). I highly recommend this excellent book.