Former Senator Bill Bradley- AAronoff
convincingly relates the fictional world of John le Carré to the real world of
politics and espionage. His analysis of le Carré's span style='font-family:"WP TypographicSymbols"'>=s
central theme--the need to balance the conflicting demands of ethics and
politics, personal integrity and public responsibility--speaks to key
challenges of civil societies and democracies. Using le Carré's span
style='font-family:"WP TypographicSymbols"'>=s novels, Aronoff poses
challenges, such as the limits to which democracies can go in using
nondemocratic means to protect democratic freedoms--for example, in the war
against terrorism--without undermining those very freedoms.@
John G. Cawelti (University of Kentucky)- AThis fascinating book is the best analysis yet
published of le Carré=s
treatment of such Cold War themes as loyalty and betrayal, the conflict between
means and ends, the ambiguous relationship between ethics and politics, and the
use of espionage as a major form of international aggression. This book clearly
indicates why le Carré should be considered a major political novelist in the
tradition of Joseph Conrad. Aronoff=s
book is one of the best, perhaps the best, study of John le Carré=s novels yet published.@
Wilson Carey McWilliams (Rutgers University)- AA great story-teller, John le Carré is also an
extraordinary observer of the moral and political crises of the time, as
perceptive as >The
Shadow= on old-time radio.
Aronoff=s analysis is
worthy of George Smiley: careful, relentless and desperately shrewd, with an
eye for subtle relationships and connections, invariably probing below the
appearances.@