ASHENDEN

[LARSSON at vax1.mankato.msus.edu]

Ron Churgin recommends:
"Don't forget ASHENDEN by Somerset Maugham.  I just re-read it and it stands
up as a neat glimpse into the world of the gentleman spy of WWI.  A quirky
and evocative spy book, not exactly a novel but a group of connected short
stories."


At the risk of spinning out on another tangent (but then Pynchon does invite
that sort of thing, as we've so often noted), the Ashenden stories were
filmed as THE SECRET AGENT by Alfred Hitchcock (starring a young John 
Gielgud--yes, he was young once!).  This leads to a certain possibility of
confusion, since Hitchcock also made a film based on Joseph Conrad's THE 
SECRET AGENT, but titled SABOTAGE (not to be confused with SABOTEUR, one of
his American films).  Are you confused enough now?

There is sort of a point to these ramblings, since Slothrop's predicament of
being unwittingly caught in a plot of which he has little knowledge (at first)
is a typical Hitchcock motif, polished to its most exact form in NORTH BY
NORTHWEST (which is also alluded to indirectly in GR).


Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)