I'm reading the new Elizabeth George. It's like slipping on a much loved sweater, warm and comfortable. I now think of the characters as old friends. She harkens back to Dorothy Sayers, and Lord Peter Whimsey, but Tommy Lynley is updated and modern, and his sidekick is of a different class and gender. This would not have happened in Sayers' day. Times have changed. So far there are many difficult relationships, complex and hard to label, which makes George less the romantic and more the realist. Sayers was romantic. Including Peter marrying Harriet Vane. George knows better. I find reading the book a comfort from sad news and uncertain times.
I went by myself yesterday to see Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. It was a slipping into the past when the cold war was hot and spying mysterious. Now we all seem to know how ugly and unethical and wrong what our governments do is, but then we thought there was a threat that could be eliminated or contained by mirroring the conduct of the enemy. Actually, quite a few in government still believe this.
The acting was superb, with Gary Oldman, John Hurt, Colin Firth and Ciaran Hinds leading the pack. But the younger actor Benedict Cumberbatch was great as well. And the movie does remind us that we haven't really given up our belief that the end justifies the means, and that we can destroy our own public servants for the good of god and country. So there is a sadness about the film, beyond it's gray coloration and apparent bleakness. What have we learned? It's hard to conjure up anything to answer that question.
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