The Spy Who Came in from the Cold Literary Elements

Spy novel

The action of the novel takes place approximately 15 years after the end of the Second World War. The action takes place both in England, in London more exactly and in Berlin.

The events are narrated from an objective third person point of view.

Violent, detached

The protagonist of the story is the British spy Alec Leamas and the antagonist is Mundt.

The major conflict is an ideological one and is represented by the battle between the Communist ideal and the Democratic one.

The story reaches its climax when Alex realizes who he is supposed to frame and have killed.

When Control asks Alec if he is not burnt out foreshadows the toll the mission will take on Alec’s mind and how he will end up becoming exhausted at the end of his mission.

When Control promises Alec that the mission will be a short one and that he will be able to return home shortly is an understatement. Alec is made to understand that he is supposed to infiltrate even deeper into the enemies side when he finds that he is a wanted man in England and thus that he is unable to return home.

One of the things alluded by Peters is that one of Alec’s spies could have never known all the information he gave to the British on his own. Through this, Peters implies that the Communist state was the one behind the information the spy gave back to the British Empire.

An important instance of imagery appears in the 13th chapter when Alec remembers the time when he was the mutilated bodies of the refugees trying to escape from a city which was bombed by the Germans. The image is important because it shows that, during war, the people who suffered the most were more than often the innocent civilians who were not involved in war. The image is also important for Alec because it convinces him once more that he is fighting for the good side.

An idea that is paradoxical is how the British Secret Service was behind the deaths of its own men in Germany. When Alec realizes that Mundt was indeed a British spy, he also realized that the man who betrayed the British spies working in Germany was one of their own.

In the 12th chapter, Alec begins to think that maybe he was betrayed by Control and he starts to be afraid. To make himself move forward, he thinks about a book he read about a revolutionary who knew he was about to be tortured. Despite this, he remained brave even though he was scared of what will happen to him. Through this example, the narrator draws a parallel between Alec and the unnamed revolutionary while also making the reader understand that being a spy does not mean that he is not afraid: it simply means that the person in question learned how to control his or her emotions as to give the impression of bravery.

A phrase commonly used in the novel is "staying out in the cold" and it is used to make reference to the job a spy must do. The term thus conveys the idea of detachment and emotional indifference they spies had to had to do their job.

In the fourth chapter "The brown eyes rested on her."