Crossposted at Daily Kos
If you’ve ever seen the movie The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, based on John le CarrĂ©’s famous spy thriller novel, you’ll remember the movie’s central character. Played by Richard Burton, Alec Leamas is a British spy coaxed out of retirement.
If so, you’ll remember this unforgettable quote by Leamas
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What the hell do you think spies are? Moral philosophers measuring everything they do against the word of God or Karl Marx? They’re not! They’re just a bunch of seedy, squalid bastards like me: drunkards, queers, hen-pecked husbands, civil servants playing cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten little lives. Do you think they sit like monks in a cell, balancing right against wrong?
Even as his cynicism and self-loathing comes through quite clearly, notice the explicit references to political ideology by Leamas – something so evident in movies and literature during the several decades of the East-West Cold War.