And in Cornwell's adult life - from recruitment by both MI5 and MI6, through marriage and family life, to his emergence as the master of the spy novel - Sisman explores the idea of espionage and its significance in human terms the extent to which betrayal is acceptable in exchange for love and the endless need for forgiveness, especially from oneself. In Cornwell's lonely childhood Adam Sisman uncovers the origins of the themes of love and abandonment which have dominated le Carré's fiction: the departure of his mother when he was five, followed by 'sixteen hugless years' in the dubious care of his father, a man of energy and charm, a serial seducer and conman who hid the Bentleys in the trees when the bailiffs came calling - a 'totally incomprehensible father' who could 'put a hand on your shoulder and the other in your pocket, both gestures equally sincere'. He has consistently quarried his life for his writing, and his novels seem to offer tantalizing glimpses of their author - but in the narrative of his life fact and fiction have become intertwined, and little is really known of one of the world's most successful writers. 'Now that he is dead,' Sisman writes, 'we can know him better.Over half a century since The Spy Who came in from the Cold made John le Carré a worldwide, bestselling sensation, David Cornwell, the man behind the pseudonym, remains an enigma. The Secret Life of John le Carre reveals a hitherto-hidden perspective on the life and work of the spy-turned-author and a fascinating meditation on the complex relationship between biographer and subject. Following his death in 2020, what had been withheld can now be revealed.

While he could control what Sisman wrote about him in his lifetime, he accepted that the truth would eventually become known. In trying to manage his biography, the novelist engaged in a succession of skirmishes with his biographer. Small wonder that betrayal became a running theme in his work. These clandestine operations brought an element of danger to his life, but they also meant deceiving those closest to him. To these relationships he brought much of the tradecraft that he had learned as a spy - cover stories, cut-outs and dead letter boxes. Apparently content in his marriage, the novelist conducted a string of love affairs over five decades. Nowhere was this more so than in his private life. Adam Sisman's definitive biography, published in 2015, provided a revealing portrait of this fascinating man yet some aspects of his subject remained hidden. Secrecy came naturally to John le Carre, and there were some secrets that he fought fiercely to keep.

John le Carré by Adam Sisman