![]() ![]() Likewise, with Irina, I don’t know what she wants from life, or why she does what she does. She revels in his celebrity and the influence that lends her, but that can’t be enough. Olga, Pasternak’s mistress, has a harrowing story of arrest and persecution to tell, yet I’m not persuaded that his magnetism has earned her loyalty, come what may. No doubt, Prescott intends no disrespect yet doesn’t this portrayal match how their male bosses likely think of them? Instead, when they socialize, as they do often, they gossip about who’s wearing what, who’s sleeping with whom, and office politics. But these women, who wish they earned respect for their minds, could at least have an opinion about the world around them or a book or an idea. The typists are warned not to discuss the documents they type. And even with a relatively small part to play, they undermine a crucial theme: sexual and intellectual freedom. But they add little to the story, and they’re largely featureless and indistinguishable. I sympathize with The Typists, whose inside view provides an intriguing perspective on the nation’s spy organization. Only one of this quartet comes through as a full-fledged character, though details of time, place, and profession at times carry the narrative. ![]() ![]() Whether or not you’ve heard of Boris Pasternak or the history surrounding the publication of his most famous work, the narrative offers few surprises, and what it builds to peters out rather than reach a crescendo.įour narrators tell the story: Pasternak’s mistress Sally Irina, the neophyte typist/operative and The Typists, an unnamed, collective voice. Yet The Secrets We Kept is the sort of novel whose pages turn readily, but which feels lightweight. Feltrinelli pulled out a cigarette, and someone in his orbit reached to light it.Īs the passage suggests, Prescott knows how to set a scene, has a keen eye, and an able pen. The trick to pinpointing the man with the biggest bank account in the room is not to look to the man in the nicest tux, but to the man not trying to impress. The majority of the party guests were in black tie, but Feltrinelli wore white trousers and a navy blue sweater, the corner of his striped shirt beneath untucked. Sure enough, she’s sent to Milan to suss out Feltrinelli, an Italian publisher believed to have dealings with Pasternak:įeltrinelli’s nickname was the Jaguar, and indeed, he moved with the confidence and elegance of a jungle cat. Sally never feels as though she’s living fully unless she has an assignment, and she’s been waiting to make her mark in the Company, as insiders call the CIA. Sally, though a gifted operative, has been shunted aside-note the recurring feminism-until now, which hurts. Irina’s trainer is Sally Forrester, a holdover from the CIA’s wartime predecessor, the OSS. Gradually, Irina understands that she’s being groomed for a mission involving Pasternak’s novel, which the CIA would like to see distributed. But the bosses have plans for Irina, who’s given lessons on how to make a dead drop and other tricks of tradecraft. The other typists, underemployed graduates of Radcliffe, Smith, and Vassar, wonder why. Meanwhile, Irina, a young American woman of Russian parentage, is hired for the CIA typing pool, a coveted job, though she has middling secretarial skills. (Why they don’t grill the author instead is never satisfactorily explained.) Olga claims not to know, but of course they don’t believe her and, once she miscarries, ship her to the gulag. ![]() Having heard that Pasternak is writing a novel critical of the Soviet past, the secret police demand to know what’s in it. Unattributed press photo of Boris Pasternak, 1959, the year after he won the Nobel Prize (courtesy, via Wikimedia Commons public domain in the United States) ![]()
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