Game of Thrones Clash of Thrones p53-204

I will begin this second record of my reading of the Clash of Kings, the second volume in the George Martin series of Fire and Ice books after watching the fourth episode of the TV series the Game of Thrones, season two, not from page 54 which concerns Ayra once more but with pages 138-149 on the story of Daenerys Targaryen my favourite of the female characters although Ayra Stark comes a close second.

On seeing the comet Daenerys is convinced it is a sign that her time has come following her emergence from the fire of her husband’s funeral pyre and the hatchings of the dragons from their eggs. Where would she go? Ser Jorah Mormont her adviser now appointed to head her paltry Queensguard was clear, there was only one direction to travel if she was not to be destroyed by those who never accepted her  or would now do anything to acquire the three only living dragons in the known world, albeit fledglings without their potential power.

Unlike the TV series the book is explicit on the extent to which the weak in her party commence to die, the old men, the young infants and how everyone suffered from the lack of food and water. She protected the dragons by searing the dead horseflesh and the creatures consumed several times their weight each day, growing in size and strength. The remaining follows retained their belief in her and never questioned her decisions because of what had happened

Just when everyone commenced to fear for their immediate future they came across and empty ruined city but here they found cold water, food and shelter to replenish themselves. Some were hesitant about staying long fearing the place was full of ghosts. It is at this point that the books parts company with the TV series for in the latter they send out riders in each direction to find the best way to go and one returns saying he reached a city on the shore and they had promised a welcome having heard who she is and that she was the mother of dragons. In the book representatives of the city, of the thirteen who                                                     governed this city come to Daenerys and ask to see the dragons. In the TV series she approaches the city where all the thirteen wait and demand to see the dragons and when she refuses insisting that her people must enter and be fed and given water first they make as to return and close the gates. One of their numbers dissents and uses his position to act a surety for her and thus she and her party are allowed to enter. My feel us that her story, her role in the series will take time to develop and emerge.

It is therefore to Ayra Stark that I turn next on way to the Wall in secret dressed and shorn to appear a boy (50-59). There is a good description of the state of Kingdom as they travel north and they encounter a posse of Kingsguard on a mission from the Queen to find a boy. The eldest surviving illegitimate son of the late King’s eight known illegitimate offspring brought up as the son of a blacksmith.  Ayra who is out of sight thinks they come for her.

The group of thirty orphans, villains and volunteers is led by Yoren the leader of the Crows, those with the power to recruit for the Night Watch. They manage to get the upper hand of the men and send them packing but with the threat that on return they will have the disobedient Night Watch group leader. Ayra has also shows her defiance and lack of fear at the three men who are shackled and caged.

In a second scene (100-108) the position threatened when
they narrowly miss encountering remnants of a battle without knowing which side the men are fighting, They are forced to lie low one night with fires, and short of food the water is said to have the taste of rotting bodies upstream. Ayra is confronted by wolves when she needs to relieve herself. She is miserable, dirty and misses her family and home. The third piece (156-167) brings the story up to the end of the fourth episode in the new series. The group of 30 destined for the Night Watch come across a deserted town where nearby they had hoped to find boats to cross the water. Here they shelter against the instinct of Ayra. Before the night is done they are surrounded by a troop of Tyrion‘s men acting for the said true King Joffrey they say and insisting they yield  their secure place while the rest of town is burning. 

The group resist when the battle appears lost, Yoren presses Ayra to take the other children away but while she endeavours to do this the men enchained plead with her to set them free. She provides them with an axe before getting into the tunnel of escape. However as they felt this was safe from all the death and fire above ground she hears a noise as the tunnel fills with hot smoke and dust so she bends down to the mud which she kisses and cries, trying to hold her breath. Throughout the ordeal her journey north  she has clutched the special sword, “needle” given to her by half brother Jon Snow to whom she had become the closest attached during their childhood together.

Jon as I have said elected to becme a member of the Night Watch after his uncle had taken him to the Wall before disappearing believed dead on an expeidition through the tunnel into the wilding country on the other side. Jon had wanted to leave on learning what had happened to his father and other family members but had stayed after saving the life of the leader of the Night Watch and being appointed his squire.

He is anxious about the expedition beyond the wall that will follow a day of fasting which he admits to gently Sam Samwell Tarly, also a Steward appointed such because neither the fighting skills and abilities to become Rangers, and who had disappeared over night having been sent to the Libary to find some maps for places they would be going. The young man had become so absorbed with the treasures that he had lost all sense of time and of his need of food before the journey commenced. Jon who knew of books kept by his father was not impressed failing to appreiate what books have to offer, This was not to be a small expedition but involve three hundred men, with three quarters of them Rangers.

An interesting revelation reflecting the position of those who take the vow of celibacy is that two of their young friends who were “recruited” and trained at The same time, had gone to enjoy the company of professional ladies of the night. Jon resisted sayng that he had taken the vow, of celibacy.

 A new party of recruits arrives at the Wall led by another of the Crows, with news of those outside, especially that Robb, his half brother, has been proclaimed King of the North and there is speculation about this on the eventual life which Robb will lead compared to that of Jon his older but illegitimate half brother. Robb who has declared there is no shame in being afraid of what they will confront on the expedition admits to be troubled by this news but he tells the Old Bear as Ser  Jeor  Mormont is known, the Commander of the Night Watch, I be troubled but “ keep my vows.” (69-78)

(150-155) Jon then comments on his travels with Mormont as they pass from the tunnel to the land beyond the wall and finds that the villages are deserted of the wildings, the people of these lands. Mormont insists that they continue to journey north to find a lake shown on one of the maps where they will camp and perhaps catch fish for their supper. There was a sense of an enemy being out there which Mormont promised to find, or as John thought in silence, “they find us.”

Back at the fortress home of the Starks the second bother, Bran (179-190) is effectively in charge despite his disabilities cause by Jaime Lannister at the instigation of his lover and twin sister Queen Cersei. He is required to entertain Lord Wyman Manderly the second son of the Lord of White Harbour. He had come to argue that with sufficient gold he could build a navy within a year for sufficient size to take Kings Landing and the Dragonstone. He also suggested that they use the Harbour to build a mint so that Robb would have his own coin.

There is much talk about forging alliance to build up the strength of the new Kingdom but Bran is still troubled by the memories of his fall and the nightmares which continue to beset him.

His reluctant care mother, Catelyn who husband had never spoken to him or her about his birth mother. She was proud that her first born now wore a crown, specially made as the original was lost, and he only a boy of fifteen years. Under the guidance of his mother King Robb, Robert Stark, given the name of his father best friend and former King of the Seven Kingdoms, has entrusted one of the prisoners from the House of Frey with a special mission.

We   had met Walder Frey senior  during the first season when he had allowed Robb and his men to the use the Crossing short cut and agreed to recognise  his cause on the understanding that when the fighting was done  Robb would marry one of the man‘s daughters from his eight wives.  As part of the deal Ayra had been betrothed a nine year old son of his seventh wife and where Olyvar of the Freys had bcome squire to Robb and where a grandson of the fourth wife Big Walder had become a fostered ward to Catelyn while a grand son of his third wife was also fostered and a ward of Lady Catelyn, known as Little Walder. Despite this entwined connection and agreement to support the cause of the Starks against the Lannisters, one of the sons of first the wife, had married the sister of Tywin Lannister, father of Queen Cersei, twin brother Ser Jamie and the new Kings Hand Tyrion and their son Cleos had fought and been captured by Robb along with Queen Cersei’s twin brother Ser Jaime. 

It is Cleos who is asked to volunteer to take the terms of a peace to Joffrey at Kings landing accompanied by a retinue of thrity of Robb’s best men.  First he is made a knight and then asked to vow that after delivering the message to Queen Cersei he would return remaining a prisoner. In exchange   for his two sisters and the ending of the betrothal to Joffrey Robb stated he would release two of the Queens other cousins now in his captivity. He required the remains of his father and those of the men who died with him to be returned together with his father’s sword. There would then be an exchange of prisoners except for Jaime who would be kept until all was resolved to ensure good faith. He would then be released upon the acceptance that he was reognised by them as the King of the North. They would also yield ten high born hostages who would be treated as guests and released two a year to secure the peace.

Having set this action in train Rob suggests that his mother should become his envoy gaining support from the Lords for more men and also to help him decide which of the Frey girls he should marry. Catelyn then heard news that the Lannisters were raising another army and concludes that she needed to try and gain the support of of the former Kings brothers-the Lord Renly and the Lord Stannis (79-89)

Meanwhile back at Kings Landing Tyrion is already fast at work in his appointed role of the King’s hand when he approaches the Master of the City Watch Ser Janos Slynt and explains that the head of the Night Watch expressed concern to Tyrion on his visit that he had no one to succeed him. The Hand had decided that Janos would join the Watch with view to becoming its Commander and that his family would be provided for.

Ser Janos explodes with resentment sayng that the Queen and King Joffrey would not agree. It was Janos who had put Lord Stark to the sword despite Tyrion and father wanting to use the man as a bargaining counter and it was Ser Janos who was responsible for the carrying out of the order to murder the children of the late King including the child of the whore at the brothel run by Lord Petyr Baelish, known as Littlefinger, the Master of the Coin in the house of the Lannisters and who had always coveted Catelyn Stark.

Ser Janos then finds that Tyrion is well prepared for  this reaction and has the newly appointed replacement at head of the City Watch, ready to escort Ser Janos an his trusted men to a ship waiting to take them north to the Wall. Tyrion later speculates how Queen Cersei will take the news that has taken command of the City Watch without consulting her.

He is also approached by Lord Varys, the Eunuch, some call Spider because of the web of intrigue surrounding him through his spies and information gatherers as Council member. He is inclined to appear all things to all men but he has his uses on providing some valuable information that in  addition to the now murdered baby of the former kings there is another, a son and older. Tyrion also appreciate of some of the advice and thoughts of the Spider, particular that power resides where men believes it resides no more no less. It is a shadow on a wall but Lord Varys adds that a small man can cast a very large shadow (90-100).

It was Grand Maester Pycelle of the Council who brought the news of the letters circulated by Lord Stannis denouncing the King and his mother (168-178) the queen was full of rage which amused Tyrion because what was being said was true. She fumed that she was being accused of being a whore, something which Tyrion points out was not being claimed, he does not say you were paid for bedding your brother he wickedly fanned the flames. Nor could he see any point in burning all the letters as the claims were now already generally known throughout the Seven Kingdoms.

The queen now wanted the Council to issue an edict that anyone heard repeating the claims would have his tongue removed. Tyrion successfully argues that this would only give credence to the talk and suggests a different approach with the counter accusation that the daughter of Stannis comes from a union between his wife and the court fool. Later at his residence Lord Varys explains that the real problem is that the three children of the Queen are faired headed while the known eight illegitimate children of the King were all dark haired thus giving credence to the charges against the Queen and the illegitimacy of Joffrey. Something which was still being kept from him.

Tyrion (192-204) is holding a kind of court hearing petitions delivers personally deciding who to see and who not, revealing a mixture of common sense thoughtful diplomacy and personal prejudices which could quickly appear to have been counter productive as when a visitor from the Wall is held in virtual captivity because Tyrion disliked the man on his visit without first learning why the man come all this way with a decaying hand in a jar.

He encounters the Queen who is on her way inspecting he defences at the gates and again calls on Tyrion to call on their father to bring his army to defend the city, because of the news that Lord Renly with the power of Storm End and Highgarden is approaching the city with allegedly one hundred thousand men. Tyrion is sceptical about the numbers and the immediate intentions of Renly who he believes is playing a waiting game in the hope that either Robb will defeat the South which will be handed over without shedding the blood of Renly’s men or they will be so weakened throught the protracted conflict that Renly will be able to Kings Landing with the minimum of casualties on his side. He is more concerned that he other brother Stannis would take to his ships they would be sandwiched between the sea and the advancing Renly.

He then confers with Lord Baelish and we learn something of how the man rose to power and his ongoing skill in making money for himself, making appointments which secure his position and avoiding offending anyone who might threaten his situation. To him Tyrion discloses his plan to but the neutrality of the wife of the previous Hand to the former King by betrothing his niece to her son and giving the girl to the woman in the meantime has her ward. Baelish speculates on the reaction of the Queen to this.

The action then moves to the Kingdom of Dragonstone and the influence of the woman Melisandre over the Lord Stannis who would be King not just of the South but all the Seven Kingdoms. The story is viewed through the eyes of the former smuggler Davos now given the place of Maester Cressen who had sacrificed his life in the hope of

ending that of Melisandre and her influence over Lord Stannis. It was she responsible for the burning of alleged enemies as a form of sacrifice to gain support for the cause. It was she who had arrange the theatrical seizing of a flaming sword from one of the fires by Stannis who had had been protected in advance by a padded gauntlet so as to be proclaim that he would fulfil an ancient prophecy that there would come one who would draw a sword from fire who would be the Warrior of Light, the son of fire, the Light bringer, once more to rule and bring his people to their proper place.
                    
It Davos when arranging the ships that news comes that the brother of Stannis, Renly is aso taking to the road in his own cause accompanied by his wife. (I08 -120)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

It is not clear how important and what role Theon is to play (121-137) of the House of  Greyjoy and who at the age of ten years had been surrendered by his father to Robert Baratheon and given to be a ward of Robert Stark brought up alongside his brothers. He an envoy of Robb to gave to his father a parchment seeking his assistance in the war against Joffrey and the South. He is not a nice man having seduced the captain’s daughter, a maiden, on the voyage and then abandoned her as soon as his homeland shore is sighted.

The TV series introduced one change from the book in that at the he is offered assistance by one who he assumes is a local girl and therefore open to his sexual advances only to discover this is older sister on arrival at the castle keep. In fact in the book he is greeted by another relative aware of his arrival and visit purpose as is his father. His father ridicules the dress and ornaments of his son and then burns the parchment saying he has no intention of siding with the family of those that killed his two brothers. He has plans of his own which will lead him to being king again but for the moment he refuses to disclose to his the son why he has gathered his ships in the bay.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

A Game of Thrones 2 A Clash of Kings to page 53

I should be completing my reading of Le Carré’s Russia House but the pull of the second series of Game of Thrones with the first two episodes watched before the trip to London and the third and fourth upon my return led to commencing to read the opening chapters of A Clash of Kings, the second of the George R R Martin monster volumes of his series A Song of Ice and Fire with seven volumes in all but with one in two parts and each having at least 700 pages.

It is a good test of the effectiveness of the 10 episode first series and my reading and writing of the first volume as to how much I now remember. There were three principal groups in the first series.

The Stark family are the chosen family to represent integrity, loyalty, justice and honour. The family are happy and content together living in their stronghold Winterfell in a long period of unprecedented peace which appears to have been created through the reign of the King who lives at Kings Landing in the South. He and Lord Stark were close friends who fought to achieve the stability. The King had married the daughter of an ambitious noble family, the Lannister’s, although his heart remained attached to the dead sister of Lord Stark. When the Chief Adviser cum Prime Minister to the King dies in questionable circumstances he visits Winterfell to persuade Lord Stark to return with him to become in his “Hand” and to bring with him his eldest daughter who is beautiful but still a child to become the bride of his son, Joffrey, when he reaches the age of fourteen. He also brings his youngest daughter, Ayra who is a tomboy and realising that that the situation at the Court is thwart with danger he enables his youngest daughter to become skilled in self defence.

Lord Stark has three sons. Robb the eldest son is also a boy who finds himself the head of the family when his father is executed and after the murder of the King and the coming to power of Joffrey who the daughter Sanza has willingly married and made to declare her father a traitor and witness his death. Unbeknown to her mother and the rest of the family the youngest daughter Ayra escapes by pretending to be a boy.  A feature of the first volume is that many of future central characters are all in effect children and as they were during the Middle Ages until Victorian times and prepared to fight and to marry as soon as they became adolescents and if they were high born to participate in arranged marriages which furthered the interests of Kingdoms and Noble families.

Robb supported by his mother, Catelyn, assumes not just the title of Lord Stark but is recognised by the Nobles as the King of the North of the Seven Kingdoms which comprises a land area not dissimilar to that of the British island. Robb with the help of the northern nobles has engaged the forces of the family of Joffrey’s, mother, her twin brother and her father.  He has defeated them three times and captured the twin brother. He would gladly cease fighting and return home if Joffrey and his allies would accept the division of power and exchange the two daughters for the “uncle“.

Lord Stark has two other sons. The eldest is Jon Snow the name given to an illegitimate child, accepted into the family by Catelyn and who is persuaded by the brother of Lord Stark to joining the Night Watch, an order which guards and patrols the great Wall with separates the lands controlled by Joffrey and the Starks, and others, from the wild cold far North

The seasons in these lands do no go in conventional cycles but cover prolonged periods of Summer, as now or Winter, except that at and beyond the Wall it is a permanent Winter,  dark, mysterious and threatening. The Wall is a giant construction with only one access to the world beyond through a tunnel. Jon faces a crisis of conscious when his uncle disappears after investigating developments beyond the wall and seeks to return to Winterfell on learning of the death of his father and the position of his half brothers and sisters. However he stays after saving the life of the head of the Order after a Joffrey associated plot to kill the head and take control of the Order.

There have been disturbing developments north of the wall which heralds the approach of a new and prolonged winter. There was a time of magic and devilish spirits and of dragons.

The youngest son of Lord Stark remains at the family home cared for and protected since he lost the use of his legs having been thrown from a window by Joffrey’s twin brother, Ser Jamie Lannister after accidentally witnessing an adult relationship with the twin sister, the then wife of the King. It emerged that Joffrey was not the legitimate son of the King and but the product of this relationship and was therefore not the rightful heir. Joffrey’s sister and young brother were also conceived through this incestuous relationship. It also emerged that the King had fathered a considerable number of illegitimate children. Joffrey sets out to kill these children reminding of King Herod.

Having mentioned Dragons it is perhaps an appropriate point to introduce another family who form a central role, albeit in parallel to the events involving the Starks and the Lannisters.

The also adolescent young Daenerys Targaryen is the exiled princess of the Targaryen dynasty who were associated with the use and power of Dragons. She is effectively controlled by her brother (with suggestions also of incest and physical abuse) who seeks the position lost by his ancestors and the two are advised and to some extent protected by someone who facilitates their stay in warm climes with deserts suggesting a location similar to southern Europe. Her bother arranges her marriage to the powerful Dothraki warlord Khal Drogo because he promises to use his forces to help the brother regain power.

Daenerys is at first afraid of her new husband but after learning the Dothraki language, she genuinely falls in love with him, after learning that he is a good leader and a kind man. After embracing the Dothraki culture, she becomes stronger and rebels against her brother. She later becomes pregnant with Drogo's son who is prophesied by the Dothraki to be the conqueror who will unite the world.

Her brother resenting the position she begins to hold plots against her but is killed and the former King, on learning of he prophecy also attempts to kill her. The Drogo vows that he will use his forces to conquer the Seven Kingdoms so that she will regain her rightful place and for their son. During the journey to the coast Drogo suffers an infected wound incurred during a fight with a Dothraki tribesman which forces Daenerys to seek the help of healer Mirri Maz Duur to save his life using blood magic. But Mirri tricks Daenerys by using her unborn son's life as a sacrifice to heal Drogo which leaves him a permanent catatonic state, forcing Daenerys to end her husband's life. Losing both her husband and son, Daenerys punishes Mirri by burning her into a pyre which helps hatch the three dragon eggs Daenerys carries. With her baby dragons, Daenerys and what is left of her husband's tribe must find a way to gather new allies to protect themselves and reclaim the Iron Throne.

This brings me to the Lannisters, effectively headed by Cersei Baratheon, nee Lannister, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, and was the wife of King Robert Baratheon. As stated she and her twin brother Jaime have been involved in an incestuous love affair since childhood. She had one son by Robert, who died in infancy of a strange illness. And her three surviving children are her bothers and not the former King’s’ She is calculating, ruthless, and cares only for power and the advancement of her family.

The twin brother is a member of the Kingsguard. He is nicknamed "Kingslayer" for killing the previous King, Aerys II, whom he was sworn to protect. He was allowed to keep his post in the current Kingsguard as he and his influential father helped Robert win the war, but no one feels he deserves this post which frustrates him. Away from the control of his twin sister he has shown some unexpected positive characteristics. The first is his respect for Lord Stark and a commitment to fair play. The second is his support for his brother, the height challenged Tyrion. The brother is captured by Lord Stark’s widow believing that Tyrion was complicit in the attempting killing of her youngest child and in the imprisonment and death of her husband.   Until his capture Tyrion was only interested in wenching and drinking but this near death experience as well as a visit to the Wall, changes his approach to life and he seeks the approval of his father by joining the battles against Robb Stark.

His mother died during his birth, for which his father, Tywin Lannister, blamed him as does Cersi his sister. While not physically powerful, Tyrion has a cunning mind, and often uses to his advantage the fact that others constantly underestimate him. His brother captured, his father recognises that Tyrion can play an important part in maintaining order while the war continues as the two brothers of the former King declare Joffrey a usurper and seek to gain the crown for themselves. Tyrion is appointed to be the King’s Hand in place of his father while the war continues, much to the opposition of his sister who sees her power challenged. Peter Dinklage, the only American among the leading cast won a number of awards as best supporting actor for his role in the series.

The new King, Joffrey, is unaware of his true parentage. He has shown himself to be vicious, cruel, a coward and a short tempered. He believes he could do anything he wants when the Crown Prince and on becoming King he quickly begins to act without the guidance of his mother and official advisers.  He orders the death of Lord Stark and the killing of the illegitimate children of the former King which he still believes was his father. So it is time for the second volume which begins with a prologue.

A Clash of Kings begins not with the Starks, the Lannisters or Daenerys Targaryen but with the King of the Narrow Sea Lord Stannis Barathon the older of the former Kings brothers and a rightful claimant to the throne over Joffrey. The TV series covers all the events and storylines of the book but in a different order, I will follow that of the book until the end of the fourth part although cover the story in two parts.

It is Stannis who writes to all the Lords in the land of the Seven Kingdoms to claim the Kingship over all, correctly stating that Joffrey and his brother and sisters are the children not of his older brother but of the incestuous relationship between his brother’s wife and her twin brother,

This is the land of the Dragon stone, the former homeland of Daenerys and her now dead older brother. Here Lord Stannis was cared for by Maester Cressen, his former tutor and healer and now an old man but still wise and anxious for the once boy  of the three sons who he helped raise after the early death of their father.

His place now had been taken by the woman, the red woman Lady Melisandre of Asshal, called red because of hair and her dress, a priestess, a witch, sorceress, a dealer in the black arts and who no was driving Lord Stannis to take on Joffrey alone without the help of his estranged younger brother or of Robb Stark. Cressen who dismissed the horrible visions of the Stannis young daughter Sireen, only ten years, as nightmares and saw no meaning in the appearance of a great red comet in the sky pleads with his Lord as had  to  find common cause with Stark and brother, Renly, something which is also supported by Ser Davos Seaworth, his principal adviser a man with seven sons, but their view is challenged by the Lady Melisandre and who in the matter of what their Lord  should do was supported by his wife despite his lack of regard for her since her inability to provide him with sons from their occasional couplings.  Concerned at the decision which events are being directed Cressen plots the death of Melisandre only to be thwarted by her skills as she turns the tables on his attempt to poison her with wine. He dies instantly but she drinks the rest of the wine without adverse effect.

It was Ayra’s good fortune to be discovered by the man entrusted with the task of replenishing the men sent to join the Night Watch at the Wall. He had been allowed by her father to take his pick of the cut throats and thieves held in the dungeons as well as the volunteers with authority to leave the city and journey north. He cuts the girl’s hair and warns her take care when she passes water so that no one else knows of her sex and identity. Also in the caravan is the eldest of the surviving illegitimate children of the king and therefore a rightful claimant to the throne. They have not travelled long before one of the other youths takes a fancy to the sword given her by Jon Snow. Faced with his challenge she resists his request and beats him badly in their subsequent fight. She is stopped from killing him by the leader who gives her a gently smacking out of sight of the others telling her to cry out in protest and warning her and the others what will happen if they engage in further conflict between themselves.  He warns her that half of the company would gladly give her up to the Queen and the other half would rape her first before doing so.

Back in Kings Landing a tournament was held to mark the birthday of the King, but there was to be a poor showing because of the situation. Sanza was expected to play the role of the loving betrothed although her situation had become one of constant torment as she was regularly beaten not just by Joffrey but by his younger brother and his adult companions at his command. She hoped the Queen would also attend because was able to restrain the wilder behaviour of her son. Unfortunately the Queen would not be present having arranged a Council because her father instead of coming to the city to support her was staying away.

When one of the participants worse for drink displeases Joffrey, he is nearly put to death being forced to drink until Sansa intervenes and saves her and the young knight by suggesting he is appointed the King’s fool. She is also supportive of the eight year old overweight brother when he makes a fool of himself trying to be an adult in the lists. This is cue for Tyrion to arrive and surprises Joffrey who believed him dead. Tyrion advises that he has brought his wit as a present for the King and tells Sansa that he is sorry for her loss and she in turn regrets what happened to him when taken by her mother. She has learned quickly to say the right thing although she finds it difficult to control her emotions as well as her words.

Tyrion then has to insist on being allowed into the Council when the news that he has been appoint the Hand by her father and only brought his own men,  a few hundred,  fills her with dismay and anger. She wanted an army now that Stannis and Renly as well as the Starks had risen again against her son. Tryion is able to convince of his value in acting as a brake upon the wilder actions of Joffrey that she has so far been unable to control. He demands that Sansa  remains unharmed as he works out a way to free their brother and he is impressed at almost all the ensures that have been taken to defend the city except for “quickfire” where the quantity created is  enough to burn down the city. She demands his allegiance to her and insists that he gets approval from her for everything he plans to do.

Tyrion chooses to reside in the official quarters despite knowing the fate of all those who have held the position in recent times, with the exception of his father. However he has brought with him the young woman, only eighteen years and a professional whore who has shown genuine affection and loyalty towards him. His father had insisted that she was not brought into the court so against her wish to be always with him he promise a home of her own  close to him in the city so he can visit he as often  as his duties permit. One of the members of the Council, the Eunuch Vaerys is  waiting for him at the Inn where he is staying, announcing that eh has come to see the woman for himself thus announcing that hi intelligence service remains as strong as every. Tyrion retaliates by warning that he kills any enemy and he has already shown his serious intent by demanding the heads of those killed be removed from the battlements despite Joffrey ordering that they remain until accompanied by those of Robb Stark, Lord Stannis and Lord Renly.
It was always my belief that the second youngest of the Stark sons Bran, short for Brandon is to play an important role. It is noteworthy that Martin in introducing Bran into his second book explains to the reader that one the boy was so fearless and nimble that he would climb the out walls and spent more time on the roofs of the city than he did in the other pursuits of a son of the a ruler.  He is cared for and dependent on his Maester Ser Rodrick Cassels who dismisses his concerns about the dreams and the arrival of the comet.

For explanation Bran turns to Osha a wilding woman taken prisoner and employed in the kitchen but who has a relationship with Bran as well as appearing to know of the ancient powers and ways. She warns that the Comet means blood and fire and nothing sweet and she is also altered that the howling of the dire wolves signals time of change and trouble. The dire wolves play some part in the first volume when the cubs of the mother slain are given as pet guardians to each of the children with that of Sansa killed, that of Ayra Nymeria run off but surely to have an important role in her survival, that of Brandon called Summer, that of the youngest brother called Shaggydog now aged four, that of Jon Snow with him at the Night Watch and called Ghost and that of Robb the Grey Wind.

Osha bring him a potion mixed with honey to make him sleep without the dreams of his being able to run and climb but always ending in tragedy and pain. He is still being called to go beyond the security of the Castle and its grounds. He is certain he has to answer the call or die. The books returns to the situation of Ayra while in the first episode we have also visited the Wall, Robb’s camp where he is accompanied by his mother and across the Narrow Sea to where Daenerys, her young dragons, her adviser and a few of the Dothraki still accompanying her go in search of sanctuary and revenge, across the unforgiving desert.

American Idol Finals 2012 begin and some cool jazz sounds

I commenced to write this second weekend celebration memory with some cool sounds from the Modern Jazz quarter on Deezer with All the things you are, Vendome, La Ronde where I had the original 10 inch LP with Rose of the Rio Grande and the Queen’s Fancy, Delaunay’s Dilemma, Autumn in New York, In a Sentimental Mood and The Stopper, Almost like being in Love, No Moe and Django(on original LP) One base hit and Milano(on LP) La Ronde Suit , Ralphs New Blues and All of me.

I also enjoyed the semi final of American Idol in which 25 hopefuls were cut to 13, 6 ladies and 7 men. My problem is that the ladies are collectively better than the men but because of the pubic voting which favours the men, it is likely that the winner will from them.

In the first show where the lowest public supported male and female will vie for the one place from the judges there were some outstanding performances and the group are significant better than any UK competition.

The present front runner in terms of singing voice is the Spanish American Jessica Sanchez only sixteen years from San Diego. She presently lacks the stage presence to guarantee a place in the last three.

The other twelve before the first sending home were Deandre Brackens a 17 year old from San Jose California who as a high voice in contrast to Jermaine Jones from Pine Hill New Jersey a 25 year old with an exceptionally deep baritone. Both will do well from a novelty aspect. The outstanding male is Joshua Ledet from Westlake Los Angeles with a gospel poor family background Phillip Phillips is a talented 21 year old musician from Georgia Lessburg musician who puts his own slant on whatever number he is asked to sing. He has confidence and stage presence but the voice is limited and with distinctiveness.

The potential dark horse is the Chinese Heehjun Han 22 from Flushing New York who is something of comedian but has a surprisingly seasoned swinging crooner’s tone. Colton Dixon 20 from Murfressboro Tennessee entered the competition last year and did not make it to the finals and this year came to support his sister but was persuaded to enter himself. He made it and she did not. He has the looks and a vulnerability which should attract support from the young girls and their mums. There is also a highly emotional overweight 19 year old Jeremy Rosado who was rescued by as a Judges pick last week but without public support I forecast he would struggle this week.

There are three other outstanding female singers who I expect to reach the latter stages of the competition. Although she is unlikely to win my favourite is Skylar Laine 18 years from Brandon Massachusetts who has the natural voice of a country singer with the strength of a rocker reminding of Janice Joplin, Tina Turner and Loretta Lynn rolled into one. 18 year old Hollie Cavanagh form McKinney Texas has extraordinary powerful vocals while married Ericka Van Pelt at 26 from South Kingston Rhode Island is a strong professional lounge singer as is Elise Testone 28 from Charleston South Carolina. The six foot tall with taller parents sixteen year old Shannon Magraine from Tampa Florida found the Whitney Houston number too much and disappointed so I anticipate she will struggle in the public vote. It was of no surprise that Jeremy Rosado received the lowest public vote and they also held back Joshua Ledet. However 16 year old Shannon received the Florida vote over Elise and from there it was inevitable that Rosado was the first of the Finalist sent homes. It was the best result.

The Russia House part 2

The second part of The Russia House contains passages which resonate with me strongly, more than in any novel for sometime and which also aroused several memories. My reading has been slow as a consequence, slower than my plan for the week justifies, so I have struggled to complete the reading and writing of the second part when had hoped to finish before weekend.

I do not know if Le Carré visited Russia during the Gorbachev years but the image be portrays of Russian life appears authentic, especially that of Katya. She is woman who brought the manuscript of Goethe to the Audio Fair but otherwise she remained a mystery and even in the film while she becomes the lover of Barley and continues to be an important link with the author of the manuscript, she remains secondary to these two characters although all three are in the story foreground with the machinations of the secret services of the UK, the CIA and Russia secondary.

It was when I read of Katya in the book I began to see her more than Goethe as representing mother Russia at the crossroads of a new era. Knowing the ending in the film, I suddenly realised that perhaps like Renko’s woman in Gorky Park, she could return to Russia once the transition was completed. But the difference between the two women is otherwise significant.

Katya is a woman of ideals and passions but she is also rational and practical. We learn a lot about her in what I regard as the second part of the book commencing with chapter 6 page 143 when Barley arrives in Moscow and makes contact with her.

Katya juggles three lives, those as a mother of twins, sharing her small home space with her uncle, there is her work and then the independent woman of passions and spirit but how and why she came to risk her life because of Barley and Goethe is not immediately clear,
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She wants, as Le Carré says, to keep the paper thin walls between the parts of her life separate and understandably she has reservations about Barley because he threatens the immediate life and well being of her family, and her anxiety is reinforced when he arrives, wants to meet her socially and begins to question not only about Goethe but about herself when she is just the Go Between and cannot wait for him to go. Unlike Renko’s girl she is not driven by the desire to leave Russia, but to change it and to survive.

However we also learn a great deal about her present and past life and although she does not know it, she is open to someone like Barley, or anyone who can fast track a different life to the one she leads and also for her children, although she is also not a woman who lives for her children.

She explains the several levels of deals required to obtain material to make two cowboy style shirt as presents for the birthday of the twins. She has gained two tickets for a concert from the editor at the publishing firm where she works who believed he had made a drunken pass at her which she had resented but in reality it had been nothing, but she did not tell him that because of what she could do with the tickets. Then she traded the tickets for 24 bars of foreign soap in their colour wrapping paper and these in turn she was to trade for the cloth with the manager of the clothing shop who she believed had hoped for a different kind of transaction with her. She was to make up the shirts on the new East German sewing machine which she had traded for the ancient but sought after family Singer.

We learn that apartments, she has one on the site of former Aeroport, are allocated with precise spacing according to her family size, work, political and social position and where the partition walls between flats are such that you are affected by the lives of others as how you behave also affects them..... an alarm clock, a dog wanting walkies, a child’s incessant cry, extra loud music at a party and so on.

On the whole it was space, or the lack of it which also affected me, the sharing of a bed with three adult women throughout most of my childhood until starting secondary school. We had the top floor flat in the requisitioned house as well as sharing the garden and the walls of the 1950’s first council built three story twin blocks of flats we were allocated because the owners wanted their home back was not just strongly built but were built to look private and still do.

It was my noise playing the clarinet in airing cupboard which was the nuisance or playing my records as loud as possible using a footstall as a drum to beat out the rhythm of Sing Sing Sing from the Benny Goodman twin albums I purchased soon after going to work at the age of 16.

It was only later through my work that the nature of living in Council flats and housing estates was brought home. The aunties had been so proud of the three bed and then their two bed plain four walls and low ceiling flats where I would stay hearing the shoutings of the wild young single parent next door to my bedroom and to the noise of the family above. I learned how accommodation and location reflected how others saw themselves and affected how you saw yourself, and helped define what you wanted.

Katya had only a single bed in a room where there was only space for a wardrobe. The twins had to sleep in the same bed and her uncle in a made up bed in the lounge. I know that feeling only too well and even now living among by my ten roomed three storey terrace with walk in loft I could do with more space! If I will the euro lottery I will build the space to curate my work, to live and to entertain, with space for professional contemporary creative to work and go live and perhaps if the cash is sufficient, our own restaurant bar, jazz club but there would have to be sufficient to ensure its continuation after my death as well as for the family

We also learned in those opening pages that Katya had more than one lover, first a temperamental musician who kept bees illegally on the roof thus enabling her to give a jar of honey to a neighbour who recently lost her mother and whose father had been admitted hospital with a brain tumour.

We do not know as yet, what had happened to Katya’s parents or how her uncle came to live with her although they get all well and helps with looking after the children.

Later under pressure from Barley we also learn that she was married to someone she knew from childhood in Leningrad where she had been to university and developed a flair for languages and which enabled her to speak Jane Austin English better than most English folk. She had come to Moscow with her husband after their marriage where he managed a timber firm making prefabricated houses. He was a practical man who knew how to catch fish through ice, sleep in the snow and skin a rabbit from his early childhood in Siberia. She had been attracted to such a man rather than someone of the mind. I remember from my early professional life that some of my female colleagues were also attracted in this way, to a farmer perhaps someone earthy without complexes, a military man or a surgeon.

Another aspects of life in the city then and I suspect now is that everyone was trying to make additional money if they had connections. We would call the black market or street economy. The taxi that she takes and drives quickly in torrential rain despite the young driver forgetting to attach the windscreen wipes because if you leave them on they are taken, asks if she interested in fresh fruit, coffee, vodka, offered no doubt in the expectation she had only her body to trade. Earlier she mentions having a connection with access to the farms allowed to sell some of the produce, and could supply fresh chickens and we well as fresh eggs. One can understand how quickly such a people would take to capitalism at different levels, and those with the best connections would become the oligarchs while others the establish businesses of the mafia gangster.

I was also struck by the greater link between Russian and British men than say British men with the western Continental Europe. The continental Europeans like the wine and enjoy a glass or two with meals on at the pavement cafe but as people they do not go in for the binge drinking of English and the Russians where both nations have not just a high number of alcoholics but a growing number of alcoholics who become social and family problems. In the UK while the incidence of diseases has reduced especially from smoking lung cancer that from alcohol has jumped several fold.

I can understand how Barley liked the Russians but not why over the past decade so many Russian woman would like to become British wives to get away from the drinking of Russian men!

After the meeting with Barley we learn the steps she takes to receive a phone call from Goethe and it is during this passage that Le Carré communicates the fear and suspicion and the risks she and Goethe are taking. It is also evident that they have been lovers but when, for how long and if still, she only later is to answer.

Back in his hotel room with its noising plumbing systems and convulsing ice box Barley had a different perspective fearing that he disappointed as a morally bankrupt man without convictions and that he had not shown immediate interest in her as a woman despite her beauty and intellect. She appeared to have run away from him which made her more interested to him.

He has a fantasy or two about her and is disappointed when his “editor” arrives and they have a conversation in which the assistant attempts to impart knowledge which Barley finds it difficult to comprehend tired and drunk until she rings and arranges to see him the following day and his assistant speculates whether she had written the manuscripts or was in contact with their author. It occurs that we in the west in the midst of the digital era, the phone and computer hacking, we should learn to expect surveillance as they did then in Russia and probably still do. The theme of my work as I frequently explain is that what we do and say can be viewed and heard by anyone. anywhere, anytime with the technology. But we are also in the era of the exhibitionist and the voyeur as I learned when visiting an independently run camera and video surveillance unit.

Meanwhile in the Russia House the events are monitored and distributed to those on the Bluebird circulation list which bemused and worried the Brits because Langley’s list included the Pentagon Scientific Liaison Board and the White House Academic Advisory team.

There were elaborate precautions taken over the next meeting between Barley and Katya after calling for at her home. He had taken her to a safe house which Barley pretended was the flat an artist friend who was away although the kind of artist had not been explained which made questions by Katya difficult. She resisted all his questions about Goethe or whoever had provided the manuscripts. He asked if she knew their content which she summarised as “my country’s involvement in anti human weapons of mass destruction over many years. It paints a portrait of corruption and incompetence in all fields of the defence industrial complex. Also of criminal mismanagement and ethical shortcomings. These he felt were as much her feelings as those explained to her by the author

Barley was able to establish that her contact was a scientist who believed there was little time left and therefore need for openness and honesty was great. She was unable to say how he knew so much as the information covered so many areas of interest, If we see one goal clearly we may advance one step. If we see all goals at once, we shall not advance at all.

I have been mulling over this point for sometime. I need to have an overview of my work, my life, my year, my day, the world, but if I spend too much time contemplating the enormity of the challenge I do little, whereas if I set tasks for the day, the week, the year and proceed to their accomplishment I make progress and am more content with what I do.

The Author is reported as saying there are times when actions must come first and we must consider consequence only when they occur. I agree. Too much consideration of potential outcomes may well freeze action and let others dictate events and their outcomes. However if there is opportunity it is wise to consider outcomes and therefore avoid blind alleys, pitfalls and bobby traps.

“We regard the destruction of Russia as preferable to the destruction of all mankind,” was quite a statement for anyone to make and I am not sure if anyone would believe this in reality.

We are tribal by nature and inheritance and the idea of sacrificing ourselves and all we know for the sake of others we do not know it a concept impossible for me to accept.

She went on; he says “the greatest burden is the past. We cannot execute the past. He says if we cannot execute our past, how shall we construct our future? We shall not build a new world until we have got rid of the mentalities of the old. In order to express truth we must also be the apostles of negation. He quotes Turgenev, A nihilist is a person who does not take anything for granted however much that principle is revered.”

I have read Turgenev from my 30 book series of Russian writers. I have Fathers and Sons in one volume, The Hunting Sketches and perhaps his most well known the Virgin Soil.

I have also written many times about the advertisement I placed in the New Statement about being a nihilist waiting for the bomb to drop and which led to two kinds of replies with a well known journalist for the London evening Standards suspecting that I was advertising wine and seeking a complimentary case to a beautiful young woman with who I became her lover, to a female journalist who took my play to read and never gave it back and to another young woman art student who came for a weekend to Ruskin bringing her friend who proved to be the most beautiful young woman I have ever met who came for a weekend with me to stay with a college friend at Liverpool and also to Birmingham, although we did not become lovers because of our chosen paths.

Katya said “I am not a nihilist. I am a humanist. It is given to us to play our part for the future, we must play it.” Yes I understand this but we must play the part well to the best of physical, psychological intellectual, spiritual abilities.

Barley pressed to now how long Goethe had talk like this. ““He had always been idealistic. That is his nature. He has always been extremely critical in a constructive way,” she explained. That also strikes a strong chord with me because although at times I have disturbed others it is because I have recognised better and best, hated my mediocrity in comparison, but always looked for ways to improve. Some will argue that I became addicted to experience, and yet the long hours spent alone in contemplation counter this, although I am a personality mixture of conviction, determination and completing finishing which can become an addiction.

Katya reveals that the authority has believed for a time that the possession of annihilation was so terrible they would have the effect of abolishing war. I have never thought that and if anything the weapons have had no impact on whether nations possessing such weapons wage war or not. The author has changed more in line with the USA thing that the greater the possession of weapons held the greater the capacity for peace.

She went to say that he become inspired by Perestroika and the prospect for world peace but he is not a Utopian and not passive. “He knows nothing will come of its own accord.”

This I have long understand that it does not matter what is ones talent, one potential you have to push yourself out into the world and hope to make early contact with someone, those who can help bridge the gulf from where you are to where you want to be.

He knows that our people are deluded and lack collective power (thus it is ever so). He goes onto say that the New Revolution must be imposed from above. By intellectuals, By artists By Administrators, By Scientists.” My response is hmm. The evidence from studies and my own experience is that planned change never works out as designed or hoped for unless you begin with clean slate and recruit to the organisation only those who understand what is required and are in agreement with it, otherwise it quickly becomes perverted to the prejudices and inclinations of those on whom the change is imposed. You cannot stand guard 24/7 on all those involved or employ others to do so. This is the fallacy of legislative government. Too many British politicians have thought all they had to do is pass a law, provide the funds and Hey Presto the law is put into effective practice. But I agree with the need for the leadership of the educated and creative but only if you can reach agreement. My mind immediately goes back to the first meetings of the Committee 100 when the majority of the Committee assembled and quickly was reduced to a steering working group of around 30 to 40 but even then power was taken by a couple of individuals and one in particular. The same with the Direct Action Committee.

What is worst is the uprising of the proletariat usually led by a fanatic or two and where the force of the proletariat is used to exterminate any opposition or anyone likely to oppose but who in turn also become as exploited themselves as before with the best literary example is George Orwell’s Animal Farm saying it all.

Barley is then able draw from her new information about Goethe as well as to be quoted his own words back from their meeting. “If there is to be hope we must all betray our countries”.

She explained that she had been sixteen and he 30 when they first met. She was studying French and German in her last year at school and was the star pupil. She had read Erich Fromm. I am impressed by this concept as someone who read Erich also at a young age: The Sane Society and the Art of Loving in particular.
She had also read Ortega and Kafka and seen Dr Strangelove in the era of 1968. She saw herself as a peace dreamer and a revolutionary. Her father was the Professor of Humanities at the University. Having taken down the wall around her she now talked and talked and this affected in a way he had not anticipated.

She had wanted to be with French students when they had rioted. They were proud of the American students who protested against the Vietnam War and they were regarded her comrades. Barley thought, I will never leave you.

He mother had died of TB and was already ill when she was born.

She had been taken by her father to see “A bout de Souffe” at a film club and it there he and introduced her to Goethe, real name Yakov. Her father said the man was his genius of physics and she had found him beautiful. She had fallen in love with him and after the show he had joined her with friends drinking coffee and then she had invited herself back to his apartment and they had become lovers, telling Barley the delicacy of their intimacy.

Her father had stayed up waiting and she talked to him as a stranger unable to sleep that night only to learn the following morning that Russian Tanks had gone into Prague. Yakov had got drunk and appeared to Katya to have thrown in the towel. She was ashamed and disappointed. She said she had addressed him like a Stendhal heroine saying he had taken an immoral decision and that she would never speak to him again. She had reminded him of EM Forester who they both admired( A Passage to India, A Room with a View, Howard’s End and Where Angels Fear to Tread are the most well known of his seven novels because of the films)

She had married Volodya but she had continued a relationship with Yakov, meeting in secret, occasionally, and with love changing to sex. She had ceased contact when pregnant with the twins but it was Barley and the effect on Yakov as Goethe which had brought the two together and now three people were connected in the circle. For some reason Barley asked if Yakov had children which someone stopped Katya in her flow. She revealed that he was against having children because parents make victims of their children and he did not want to add to the number of victims. Who said to someone bent on changing society? First do no wrong? A guiding rule for every social worker as well as politician.

The inquisition was coming to an end as he asked about how they kept in contact and if he was afraid of his situation. Barley had with him a series of prepared questions which he fired at her in quick succession and which should have alerted her that these were not the questions one would expect from a publisher. Her answers were all no. It was only then that she suggested he put the questions directly ad Yakov wished to meet Barley in Leningrad on the coming Friday.

He proposed three places at three times and you must keep to each. He will keep one and he asked me to say that he loves you. They then had a meal drained as two exhausted lovers.

Le Carré The Russia House !

In this break from the Leveson Inquiry there is opportunity to catch up on a number of activities and projects including the work of John Le Carré in book and film, and with of my favourite Le Carré film The Russia House because of the romantic, happy and amusing nature of the story which is devoid of grimness of much of confrontation between the intelligence services of the USA, GB and the Soviets headed by Russia. The opportunity was also taken to read the book which functions at a different level.

The film is even suitable for watching in Valentine’s week unlike the reality of the cold war even under glasnost and perestroika where double dealings, betrayals and death continued. Whether loss of lives, expenditure in time and effort was helpful to any of the sides is debatable especially to those of us on the outside gleaned from news reports, literature, film and TV.

The action commences in Moscow at an international attempt to interest the Russians in the English Language Talking Book Audio cassette Fair. The film opens when a woman arrives at the adjacent stand to that hired by Bartholomew Scott Blair, the part owner and manager of a book publishing firm of Abercrombie and Blair. She asks Niki Landau (not to be confused with Andreas Niki Lauder the Formula I racing driver) if he will take a book Barley Scott Blair as he is known who she says he has agreed to publish. Barley nick named after the basic substance of beer was not at the Fair because the aunts who partnered him in the family business, helping to keep it afloat and in the life style which he had accustomed, decided against branching out into audio tapes so he has instead gone to his bolt hole in Lisbon unknown to the intelligence man who is the voice of the book.

The book was first published in 1989 the year when it can be said the Soviet empire disintegrated in a series of independence moves as President Korbechev also attempted to move Russia into a new order. (I have Gail Sheehy’s 1991 biography). The arms race and its industry remained at the forefront of Western economies and politics, at the time that Polish but London based Niki brought the package back to London and not finding Barley had contacted several government departments until making contact with British intelligence.

In the film the role of the character Niki Lander does not impact to the same effect as in the book although even here the role is described as prologue. Niki is fed up with making depressing trips where income rarely balanced costs and he longs for a more comfortable life. Although the persistence of the woman has annoyed him and he was a little disappointed when she declined his invitation to a nice dinner he accepts her assignment because her plea reached to the nice being within his outward shell.

In his search to find Barley followed also by the UK intelligence service we also learn more in the book about Barley that he was married for instance and has two grown children with their own lives, and that he belonged to a London club in addition to his ability to play jazz clarinet and chess against all comers.

The book also explains the lengths Niki has to go to make contact with the intelligence service and the lengths they then go to quiz him about the woman and her package. He had played his part well, getting her to pretend she was passing to him the book in an anonymous plastic bag as a gift, the possession of which marked her as different from the average Muscovite who carried a string bag, in fact as he disclosed he was certain her manner, her dress suggested Stalingrad/St Petersburg as it has now returned to its original name and Russia’s second city and home of the greatest museum art gallery in the world.

The book also raises the discussion about what British intelligence should do with Niki as he had flipped through the three notebooks with over two hundred pages of text and grasped their potential significance without understanding the pages of formulae and technical notes. He was told to cancel the arranged visit to Gdansk so they could cover everything that had happened in minute detail. They wanted to know if he had been given special treatment on his way back home which might indicate that the book was a plant and they wanted to know about anyone and everyone that he might have mentioned the package and its delivery to him.

Fortunately for him he said nothing to anyone but attempted to find Barley and then persisted until making contact with the right people. At the end of the process with muttering dark threats he is presented with a cheque for £100000 financed by the Americans, told his overseas trips have ended and his movements will have to be monitored even with signing the Official Secrets Act. For some the requirements would be onerous but for Niki all his dreams had come true and he was able to open a video cassette store which did interest the police from time to time, by implication because of the material he sometimes stocked and sold, but nothing which his minders could not sort out for him. The only thing that was missing is that his path never crossed with Barley again, a precondition of the settlement but something he wished would happen in order to show his appreciation of the man until his death he believed was a professional spy, for how could you judge someone who appeared in a drunken stupor most of the time and then beat anyone and everyone at a game of chess.

The reason for this emerged during the first part of the book when it is revealed that Barley has an extraordinary precise memory of conversations was well of events. Fifty years ago as part of training I learned to make a process record in which I recorded as much of the conversations and interaction with a client I could remember and then applied my knowledge and in time experience to make an analysis of the problem, the situation, the judgement which could be made.

The intelligence service is able to trace the whereabouts of Barley from his bank statements which shows he rent of the property in Lisbon Portugal. They find him at a cafe playing Chess and he is invited to accompany the man from the Embassy where he is taken to meet a group with includes the CIA who are quite open. In the film the man from the Embassy Ned is played by James Fox and another of the group is played by Ken Russell the film Director who died last year. Martin Clunes is the technician recording the conversation in an adjacent room.

The film foreshortens through visual presentation Barley’s realization that while he has never met the Russian woman Katya played by Michelle Pfeiffer he has met someone who is likely to be the author of the manuscripts.

He explains that on his previous visit for a book Fair, the Sunday after drinking all night they had gone to Peredelkino in Jumbo’s car. to the grave of Boris Pasternak and then he had got into conversation with a man. Jumbo by the way was a Russian Gold Card man, closet Scottish Fascist and Black Belt Freemason. Peredelkino the writers dacha village.

There were some two hundred at the grave of Boris Pasternak which was steeped in flowers. A plane flew over and back no doubt taking long lens photos of those below.. Barley remembered he had quoted the lines from the Nobel Prize winning speech.


“Like a beast in the pen I’m cut off.
From my friends. Freedom, the sun
But the hunters are gaining ground
I’ve nowhere else to run”

Barley remembers that the man who spoke to them was Nezhdanov which those from the visiting Russia House were immediately able to amplify that Vitaly Nezhdanov had become a latter day hero with three one act plays opening in Moscow within the coming few weeks. Barley is pleased to have this intelligence having taken a great liking to the man with their visit to a Dacha, a big rambling house with some thirty people present; this was reduced to probably a dozen for the film. The hostess was a poet. And they spoke English which was essential given that Barley had only a handful of words which is surprising given his memory but there we are. Husband edited a science magazines and Nezhdanov was a the brother in law. That had sat together at lunch at one table drinking and talk about truth.

The closest I got to such a gathering was when at Ruskin when I was part of small group of politically orientated students who also had a sense of history and an international outlook. What happen to them I wonder? That there have not been other such occasions in the rst of my life is cause for regret.

The man was called Goethe, not his real name, but someone protected by the group, a genius, this was the man with whom conversation had taken place which Barley considered led to the manuscript being delivered to him.

Disarmament was not a political matter or military he had said but of human will. This was an important statement which resonated with me given my experience and actions. I would have added that politics ought to be about will but is has become the art of the possible with the Party framework and international capitalism. He had spoken well of Gorbachev arguing that the West had to find the other half of him while the East had to recognise the half they had.

In response to those who said the bomb had kept the peace for forty years he had asked what Peace?

They had gone in after the meal and the drinking to listen to Count Basie whose records I have on one original Long Play and a 3 disk boxed set as well individual numbers among my collection of Big Band Jazz. It was an interesting choice because the more likely artist could have been expected to have been Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman or Glen Miller if they were locked into pre World War one jazz swing, Basis was his own man and style but also main stream

Count Basie Dance Session
Straight Life, Basie Goes West Softly with Feeling, Peace Pipe, Blues Go Away, Cherry Point, Bubble, Right On, The Blues done come back and Plymouth Rock

And a 3 dick Box Set
Oh Lady be Good, Going to Chicago Blues, Live and Love Tonight, Love me or Leave Me, Rock a bye Basie, Baby dont tell on me, Taxi War Dance, Jump for me, Twelfth Street Rag, Nobody knows, Pound cake, Ho long blues, Dickie’s Dream, Lester leaps in, The apple jump, I left my baby, Volcano.

The devil and the deep blue sea, I never knew, Tickle Toe, Louisiana, Easy Does it, Let me see, Blow Top, Gone with the Wind, Super Chief, You betcha my life, Down down down, Tune Town Shuffle, I’m tired of waiting for you, Basie Boogie, Fancy meeting you, My old flame, Ton Thumb, Take me back baby, All of Me, One o’clock jump’

And the angels sing, Bolero at the Savoy You can count on me, Your and your love, What goes up must come down, Fiesta in Blue, Something new, Sub-deb Blues, Boogie woogie, Bubbles, How high the moon, Your’re not the kind, Jumpin at the woodside, Jive at five, Yesterdays, Blee Blop Blues, Straight Life, 16 men swinging, Nails, Two Franks. I have also experience the Count Basie at the former Grand Croydon Theatre, usually a cinema with several thousand seats but which hosted a number of visiting jazz band sin the later 1950’s and 1960’s.

He had gone to sleep in deck chair on the veranda with a blanket wrapped around him waking at midnight wondering where he was. It was Goethe talking to him saying that some things are necessary evils. All victims are equal none more equal than others. Both these were quotes back from what Barley had said at lunchtime. He had asked Goethe who he was with the response a moral outcast. I trade in defiled theories he added. Nice to meet a writer Barley had said asking what kind of a writer he was. There was no denial. History, lies, comedies and romances came the reply.

Asked where his idea came from he had spoken at length mentioning the obscene fantasies of politicians and generals of all nations and from liberated intellects from pressed ganged Nazi scientists, from the great Soviet people and after other thoughts adding occasionally from distinguished western intellectuals who happen to drop into my life,

He said he believed every word Barley had said at the dinner and promised that if he was not a spy he would promise something in return.

The gathering around Barley from the Circus and the CIA had then considered the material in the notebooks, its potential significance and Barley’s appreciation. It was decided that Barley should return and attempt to meet Goethe and that he should have an assistant, an Editor on the books so to speak of the Publishing firm and for this it was necessary to successfully spin a story to the Aunts. He had been taken back to England to a safe house cottage in Knightsbridge chosen because Barley had no connections in the area. with the costs borne by the Americans because they were going take control. There was three weeks of intense preparations at the end of which there was a special meal. A salmon trout on a silver dish two bottle of Sancerre and a rare single malt whiskey. I drank my first bottle of Sancerre late in life at a great meal in Le Touquet in him 1980’s with a whole crab starter and a ain course fish which I have listed somewhere having retained he bills followed by a double crème caramel and coffee. It tasted my first single malt at a club in Edinburgh one afternoon, bought by the chairman of the Dunoon CND after a meeting of the Scottish CND Committee.


Before departing the Circus people had checked his flat for his likely state of mind and discovered he had written from Stevie Smith

I am not so afraid of the dark night
As the friends I do not know.

And I learn by going where I have to go, which applies to me more often than not.

In Moscow Katya had been alerted and eagerly awaited his arrival.