David Cornwell

Writer's Almanac:
It's the birthday of the spy novelist David Cornwell who writes under the name John le Carré (books by this author), born in Poole, England (1931). In his novels such as The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1963) and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974), he's known for writing realistically about spies who aren't sexy or daring, like James Bond, but tired, lonely men, who barely trusted their own government more than they trusted their enemies.

His father was a con man who made money from fraudulent real estate deals and then racked up millions of dollars in gambling debts. Cornwell's mother abandoned the family when he was five years old. His father was in and out of prison for various fraud charges, so he was raised mostly by his father's various girlfriends. He never forgave the man. He said, "I think that my great villains have always had something of my father in them."