During the Cold War, we lived in coded times when it wasn't easy and there were shades of grey and ambiguity.

It struck him as a bit unfair that, at the age of eight, he should have manifested the same sense of solitude that haunted him at forty-three.

Yet it's not for want of future that I'm here, he thought. It's for want of a present.

It's the oldest question of all, George. Who can spy on the spies?

It is also the pardonable vanity of lonely people everywhere to assume that they have no counterparts.

A good writer is an expert on nothing except himself. And on that subject, if he is wise, he holds his tongue.

After all, if you make your enemy look like a fool, you lose the justification for engaging him.