For the forty-odd years of its existence, Checkpoint Charlie (above) was the visible symbol of the conflict between Communism and the “Free World.” In a matter of minutes, one could go between the prosperous world of West Berlin to the seemingly eternal grayness of East Berlin. For miles in each direction from the Checkpoint, the Berlin Wall snaked its way across the landscape, along with its accompaniment of barbed wire, guard towers, bunkers, and attack dogs attached to long lines.

No writer was more able to convey that schizoid world of illusion, deception, and betrayal more than David John Moore Cornwell, better known as John Le Carré (b. 1931). A former agent for MI6, Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, Le Carré wrote a series of novels which described in great detail the elegant and deathly dance of the intelligence services of the Great Powers as they strove to gain an advantage in their struggle to the death. Perhaps the best-known of the novels written during this time are:

• The Spy Who Came In from the Cold (1963)
• Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974)
• Smiley’s People (1979)

The latter two were adapted by the BBC into miniseries which starred Sir Alec Guinness in perhaps his greatest acting role, as George Smiley, master spy. (I plan on writing another posting within a day or two about these two series.)

After the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, I wondered whether Le Carré would lose his edge. Far from it, he continued to write great novels about the new struggles that took no time at all in replacing the Cold War. Among his best Post-Communism works are:

• The Night Manager (1993)
• Our Game (1995)
• The Tailor of Panama (1996)
• The Constant Gardener (2001)

Instead of fading into relevance, Le Carré just kept getting better and better. Although he hasn’t succeeded in creating a great poster boy like George Smiley for the Post Cold War period, he has seen the alternating decay and accretion of power as its polarity continues to change.

When I first read The Spy Who Came In from the Cold as a junior at Dartmouth College who was taking a break from his schoolwork, I felt I was indulging a guilty pleasure. Now, as I re-read the same work many years later, I see that Le Carré is on to something. In the Manichean world of Spy vs. Spy, there is something basic. Le Carré is merely the most recent in a line of great British writers who wrote about spycraft, from Eric Ambler to Graham Greene. I don’t know what there is about the British character that is so congenial to the subject: What I do know is that no American has been able to come close.

So if you want to pick up one of Le Carré’s novels, you don’t have to feel guilty. Just concentrate on the pleasure, which I can promise you will be considerable.

I know this has got to be Photoshopped, but I couldn’t help falling for this picture of a climber attacked by seagulls. Shades of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds! It looks as if the gull at the upper right is about to show his contempt by dropping a clump of grass on our climber.

Odd photos like this one are one of the glories of the Internet. They’ve gotten so good as to destroy the whole notion of photo evidence as having any validity. On the other hand, it is a legitimate art form!

I saw these on the web yesterday and decided to pass them on to you. They are the Dalai Lama’s eighteen rules for living, and I can assure you that I have broken every one of them. I hope that I can improve.

1. Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
2. When you lose, don’t lose the lesson.
3. Follow the three R’s: Respect for self, respect for others, and responsibility for all your actions.
4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
6. Don’t let a little dispute injure a great friendship.
7. When you realize you’ve made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
8. Spend some time alone every day.
9. Open your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.
10. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
11. Live a good, honourable life. Then when you get older and think back, you’ll be able to enjoy it a second time.
12. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
13. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don’t bring up the past.
14. Share your knowledge. It’s a way to achieve immortality.
15. Be gentle with the earth.
16. Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before.
17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which love for each other exceeds your need for each other.
18. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

Now that you’ve read this, I must admit that I just checked Snopes.Com and discovered that these eighteen rules are just another Internet hoax, albeit a benign one. If I were really a stickler for accuracy, I would at this point start all over again; but—you know what?—I like these eighteen rules anyhow and I’ll post them. Just say that they come from the Jim Lama.

From a fascinating website called EnglishRussia.Com comes this photograph of an abandoned passenger railroad station in Abkhazia, formerly part of the Soviet Union. Since the breakup, no passenger trains have arrived, and the platform has become overgrown. You may recall that a year or two, Russian invaded Georgia supposedly at the request of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, both dissident parts of Georgia whose future status remains uncertain. In any case, the train station will very likely not re-open.