But so many men learnt strength during the war, learnt terrible things, and put aside their knowledge with a shudder when it ended. - John le Carré

He would set up as a mild eccentric, discursive, withdrawn, but possessing one or two lovable habits such as muttering to himself as he bumbled along pavements. Out of date, perhaps, but who wasn't these days? Out of date, but loyal to his own time. At a certain moment, after all, every man chooses: will he go forward, will he go back? There was nothing dishonourable in not being blown about by every little modern wind. Better to have worth, to entrench, to be an oak of one's own generation.

Then the people in this prison are intellectuals? The woman smiled. Yes, she said, they are reactionaries who call themselves progressive: they defend the individual against the state. Do you know what Khrushchev said about the counter-revolution in Hungary? Liz shook her head. She must show interest, she must make the woman talk. He said it would never have happened if a couple of writers had been shot in time.

Can't you see it's the same? The same guns, the same children dying in the streets? Only the dream has changed, the blood is the same colour. Is that what you want?