John Le Carre Sayings and Quotes

Below you will find our collection of inspirational, wise, and humorous old John Le Carre quotes, John Le Carre sayings, and John Le Carre proverbs, collected over the years from a variety of sources.'

Betrayal can only happen if you love. John Le Carre
Survival ... is an infinite capacity for suspicion. John Le Carre
Coming home from very lonely places, all of us go a little mad: whether from great personal success, or just an all-night drive, we are the sole survivors of a world no one else has ever seen. John Le Carre
Betrayal can only happen if you love. John Le Carre
Once you've lived the inside-out world of espionage, you never shed it. It's a mentality, a double standard of existence. John Le Carre
The longing we have to communicate cleanly and directly with people is always obstructed by qualifications and often with concern about how our messages will be received. John Le Carre
The Cold War was over long before it was officially declared dead. John Le Carre
It was man who ended the Cold War in case you didn't notice. It wasn't weaponry, or technology, or armies or campaigns. It was just man. Not even Western man either, as it happened, but our sworn enemy in the East, who went into the streets, faced the bullets and the batons and said: we've had enough. It was their emperor, not ours, who had the nerve to mount the rostrum and declare he had no clothes. And the ideologies trailed after these impossible events like condemned prisoners, as ideologies do when they've had their day. John Le Carre
During the Cold War, we lived in coded times when it wasn't easy and there were shades of grey and ambiguity. John Le Carre
Tyranny is like the electric wiring in an old house. A tyrant dies, the new tyrant takes possession, and all he has to do is drop the switch. John Le Carre
Sometimes we have to do a thing in order to find out the reason for it. Sometimes our actions are questions, not answers. John Le Carre
By repetition, each lie becomes an irreversible fact upon which other lies are constructed. John Le Carre
The fact that you can only do a little is no excuse for doing nothing. John Le Carre
There is a terrible alienation in the ordinary man between what he is being told and what he secretly believes. John Le Carre
A desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world. John Le Carre
My definition of a decent society is one that first of all takes care of its losers, and protects its weak. John Le Carre
Give a man a car of his own and he leaves humility and common sense behind him in the garage. John Le Carre
The only reward for love is the experience of loving. John Le Carre
The monsters of our childhood do not fade away, neither are they ever wholly monstrous. John Le Carre
They did this to me but I have remained who I am. I am tempered. I am able. Inside myself there's an untouched man. If they came back now, and did everything to me again, they would never reach the untouched man. I've passed the exam I've been shirking all my life. I'm a graduate of pain. John Le Carre
Ideologies have no heart of their own. They're the whores and angels of our striving selves. John Le Carre
Home's where you go when you run out of homes. John le Carré
Home's where you go when you run out of homes. John le Carré
A committee is an animal with four back legs. John Le Carre
Do you know what love is?... It is whatever you can still betray. John Le Carre
When a problem threatens to engulf you, there's nothing like irrelevant detail to keep your head above water. John Le Carre
A desk is a dangerous place from which to watch the world. John Le Carre