Word: squalor
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...other spy novel these might be fatal lapses. But Le Carre is not any other spy novelist. Throughout, he is aware not only of the moral squalor that can attend espionage - but also of Auden's ironic observation: "We are left alone with our day, and the tune is short and/ History to the defeated/ May say Alas but cannot help or pardon...
...songs, and here they are." There's a feebly executed but well-meaning attempt to create coffee-house atmosphere--the audience trades its ticket stubs during intermission for a cup of coffee and a croissant--but the floodlit cavernous Leverett dining hall offers little in the way of bohemian squalor or continental chic...
...perhaps the book's overall blandness is not Theroux's fault--maybe the geography is to blame. After all, squalor in Mexico is pretty similar to squalor in Peru. South America lacks the historical associations of Europe and the exotic attractions of Asia. Maybe Theroux's topic is not interesting...
...zone. The Zonians, as they are called, were witnessing the end of their cherished home away from home, a small piece of America transplanted to a well-tended tropical setting beside the beloved waterway. Anti-American propaganda held that the Zonians had reveled in colonial splendor amid the surrounding squalor of Panama. In truth, their homes were modest by U.S. standards and their incomes only adequate. Said one longtime Zonian, on his way for a last rum punch at the historic Spanish colonial-style Washington Hyatt Hotel in Colon: "We saved the best things of the American way of life...
Despite the aid, refugees are discovering that assimilation is far from automatic. There are the usual problems of language and loneliness. The months and often years spent in the crowded squalor of the resettlement camps have taken their toll: malnutrition is widespread, and cases of tuberculosis are found...