http://www.pencoyd.com/clock/2008/04/19/book-the-naive-and-sentimental-lover/ A journal from John B. Roberts Sun, 28 Mar 2010 14:03:39 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 http://www.pencoyd.com/clock/2008/04/19/book-the-naive-and-sentimental-lover/comment-page-1/#comment-70366 John M Mon, 04 Aug 2008 22:06:26 +0000 http://www.pencoyd.com/clock/2008/04/19/book-the-naive-and-sentimental-lover/#comment-70366 Or possibly someone else wrote it--someone much less skilled--and LeCarre tinkered with it and sent it out under his own name. Or possibly someone else wrote it–someone much less skilled–and LeCarre tinkered with it and sent it out under his own name.

]]> http://www.pencoyd.com/clock/2008/04/19/book-the-naive-and-sentimental-lover/comment-page-1/#comment-70365 John M Mon, 04 Aug 2008 22:05:22 +0000 http://www.pencoyd.com/clock/2008/04/19/book-the-naive-and-sentimental-lover/#comment-70365 It's a badly written book--seems to me perhaps a fast reworking of something he did while an undergraduate. I'm giving it a close read right now and I can see many of the mistakes a beginning novelist would make, back in the 1950s and 60s. It looks like a fast reworking of a book written about the age of 21 or so. It's not only away from the subject of spying, but it does not use the techniques that LeCarre had already mastered at the time the book was supposedly written. The references to TS Eliot and James Joyce give it away as undergraduate posing. I think he took it out of his drawer and gave it to his publisher while he was working on the huge and great Tinker Tailor. That's my opinion. It’s a badly written book–seems to me perhaps a fast reworking of something he did while an undergraduate. I’m giving it a close read right now and I can see many of the mistakes a beginning novelist would make, back in the 1950s and 60s. It looks like a fast reworking of a book written about the age of 21 or so. It’s not only away from the subject of spying, but it does not use the techniques that LeCarre had already mastered at the time the book was supposedly written. The references to TS Eliot and James Joyce give it away as undergraduate posing. I think he took it out of his drawer and gave it to his publisher while he was working on the huge and great Tinker Tailor. That’s my opinion.

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