Among the many treasures to be found at the ‘Write Cut Rewrite’ exhibition at Oxford’s Weston Library, are the original manuscripts and working copies of John le Carré’s espionage masterpiece ‘Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’, complete with crossings-out and amendments.
It all goes to show how hard le Carré worked in writing an opening scene with which he was satisfied; it took him four months.
A handwritten version dated 27 September 1971, opens with a description of two spies — Jim and Tarr — watching each other. He not only began typing it up on the same day, but also started to cut and paste and even staple sections of the typescript onto the handwritten pages.
Later the opening was changed to “I still see him there,” but it was then trimmed of “there”, and survived five rewrites before le Carré changed it to “It was early December when Tarr called, afternoon, about three,” and then “No one paid much attention when Jim arrived,” when “Jim” edged out an earlier “he”.
After four months of tinkering, tailoring the text, and soldiering on, the author spied an opportunity: He ditched the first carefully crafted sentence altogether and settled on this as an opener: “The truth is, if old Major Dover hadn’t dropped dead at Taunton races, Jim would never have come to Thursgood’s at all.”
A fascinating insight into the methods of a best-selling and respected author.
Write Cut Rewrite is on at the Weston Library, Oxford, until January 5, 2025.
Admission is free.
Next: We’ll be doing the Monster Mash.
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