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Portrait image of John Le Carré Photo: Kirsty Wigglesworth / AP/TT (2008)

Sample of authors

Le Carré, John

Born David John Moore Cornwell in Poole, county of Dorset, England, John le Carré grew up in a troubled home. While his father served a prison sentence for fraud, his mother left the family when David was five years old. He did not see her again until he was 21. He grew up at boarding schools and in his father’s home, before he got the opportunity to enter higher education at age 16. He studied la...

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Literary figures

Hildegarde Withers

Gender: Female

A tall, angular and determined elderly school mistress – in later books retired school mistress – in New York who solves cases in a suite of cosy detective stories by Stuart Palmer. She often cooperates with Inspector Oscar Piper and lawyer John J. Malone, created by Craig Rice. Hildegarde Withers always wears original hats and has an umbrella with her, collects tropical fish and is a strong opp...

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