Bernard Samson
Encyclopedia
Bernard Samson is a fictional character
created by Len Deighton
. Samson is a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer
working for the Secret Intelligence Service
(SIS) – usually referred to as "the Department" in the novels. He is a central character in three trilogies written by Deighton, set in the years 1983–1988, with a large gap between 1984 and 1987. The first trilogy comprises the books Berlin Game
, Mexico Set
and London Match
, the second comprises Spy Hook
, Spy Line
and Spy Sinker
, and the third and final trilogy comprises Faith
, Hope
and Charity
. The plot of the entire trilogy of trilogies revolves around Samson's wife Fiona, also an intelligence officer, and which side she is really working for, after she has defected to the East Germans in the first trilogy, leaving a distraught Bernard with their two children. Her defection also cause some of his superiors to question his loyalty.
Samson undergoes sacrifice in his duties and is often ignored by his superiors, being passed over for promotion or sent to Berlin during Christmas
. This is especially true in the first trilogy. Like Deighton's earlier unnamed spy character ("Harry Palmer
" in the film adaptations), Samson is cynical and has a disrespect for his superiors and any ambitious colleagues.
Bernard's description appears in Berlin Game:
Bernard Samson is also the name of a Swiss Franciscan
seller of indulgence
s, who was denounced by Zwingli in 1516.
and who became head of the Berlin Field Unit after the war. Brian Samson plays a small role in Deighton's 1987 prequel novel Winter. Bernard grew up in post-war Berlin before the wall was built and received a typical German education rather than a privileged English one and never went to university. Despite his ability to speak German fluently, he is seen as an Englishmen by Germans, and as a German by the British, leaving him unsure about which country he really belongs to. Bernard worked for his father from a young age with his best friend Werner Volkmann. They served as couriers making payments to agents and performing espionage related 'odd-jobs'. This enabled Bernard to make friendships and connections that would serve him well in his future work.
Bernard's old friend Werner was sacked by the dept. after a cable he was delivering turned up in the hands of the KGB. At the start of the novels, Bernard's wife Fiona, who went to Oxford with Dicky and got her job through Bernard, is working on the top floor and is a rising star in the department. Much of what happened to Bernard was done in order to keep him in the dark about his wife's real mission and he is led to believe that she is a KGB agent who used him, betrayed all his missions in exchange for keeping him safe and then defected to the East. This has left him embittered towards the department and very cynical.
Bernard is very stubborn and believes he knows better than his superiors who are all just desk men. He trusts no one except for his old friend Werner. His secretive and suspicious ways often keep Bernard alive but they just as often get him into trouble and cause harm to many of those around him.
. Samson is biased, especially towards his superiors, and is prone to regarding himself too highly. The true nature of his character can be gleaned from reading between the lines, or alternatively from the sixth novel, Spy Sinker, which recounts the events of the previous books from a third-person perspective, and casts doubt upon Bernard's reliability as a narrator, especially in his assessment of his colleagues' capabilities and motives.
Critic Wesley Britton has seen the Bernard Samson books as an echo of the Biblical story of Samson
: like Samson, Bernard has his own Delilah
, when his wife turns out to be an apparent traitor.
and Fiona Samson by Mel Martin
in a 1988 Granada Television
adaptation of the first trilogy, entitled Game, Set and Match, transmitted as twelve 60 minute episodes. Filmed on location in Berlin and Mexico, the project included a large international cast with 3,000 extras and a budget of $8 million. It is considered the most ambitious espionage miniseries ever filmed. While critically acclaimed, the ratings for the series were poor.
In February 2008, director Quentin Tarantino
expressed interest in developing the Game, Set and Match trilogy as a three-hour film. He is quoted as saying, "I would see if I could boil it down to the fat of the characters, and ignore all this Maquis double agent stuff.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
created by Len Deighton
Len Deighton
Leonard Cyril Deighton is a British military historian, cookery writer, and novelist. He is perhaps most famous for his spy novel The IPCRESS File, which was made into a film starring Michael Caine....
. Samson is a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer
Intelligence officer
An intelligence officer is a person employed by an organization to collect, compile and/or analyze information which is of use to that organization...
working for the Secret Intelligence Service
Secret Intelligence Service
The Secret Intelligence Service is responsible for supplying the British Government with foreign intelligence. Alongside the internal Security Service , the Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence Intelligence , it operates under the formal direction of the Joint Intelligence...
(SIS) – usually referred to as "the Department" in the novels. He is a central character in three trilogies written by Deighton, set in the years 1983–1988, with a large gap between 1984 and 1987. The first trilogy comprises the books Berlin Game
Berlin Game
Berlin Game is a 1983 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the first novel in the first of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service...
, Mexico Set
Mexico Set
Mexico Set is a 1984 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the second novel in the first of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Mexico Set is part of the Game, Set and Match trilogy, being...
and London Match
London Match
London Match is a 1985 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the concluding novel in the first of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . London Match is part of the Game, Set and Match trilogy,...
, the second comprises Spy Hook
Spy Hook
Spy Hook is a 1988 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the first novel in the second of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Spy Hook is part of the Hook, Line and Sinker trilogy, being...
, Spy Line
Spy Line
Spy Line is a 1989 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the second novel in the second of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Spy Line is part of the Hook, Line and Sinker trilogy, being...
and Spy Sinker
Spy Sinker
Spy Sinker is a 1990 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the final novel in the second of three trilogies about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Spy Sinker is part of the Hook, Line and Sinker trilogy, being...
, and the third and final trilogy comprises Faith
Faith (novel)
Faith is a 1994 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the first novel in the final trilogy of three about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Faith is part of the Faith, Hope and Charity trilogy, being followed by...
, Hope
Hope (novel)
Hope is a 1995 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the second novel in the final trilogy of three about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Hope is part of the Faith, Hope and Charity trilogy, being preceded by...
and Charity
Charity (novel)
Charity is a 1996 spy novel by Len Deighton. It is the final novel in the final trilogy of three about Bernard Samson, a middle-aged and somewhat jaded intelligence officer working for the British Secret Intelligence Service . Charity is part of the Faith, Hope and Charity trilogy, being preceded...
. The plot of the entire trilogy of trilogies revolves around Samson's wife Fiona, also an intelligence officer, and which side she is really working for, after she has defected to the East Germans in the first trilogy, leaving a distraught Bernard with their two children. Her defection also cause some of his superiors to question his loyalty.
Samson undergoes sacrifice in his duties and is often ignored by his superiors, being passed over for promotion or sent to Berlin during Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
. This is especially true in the first trilogy. Like Deighton's earlier unnamed spy character ("Harry Palmer
Harry Palmer
Harry Palmer is the name of the protagonist of a number of films based on the main character from the spy novels written by Len Deighton. Michael Caine played Harry Palmer in the films based on three of the first four of the published novels featuring this character, and also later in two films not...
" in the film adaptations), Samson is cynical and has a disrespect for his superiors and any ambitious colleagues.
Bernard's description appears in Berlin Game:
Bernard Samson is also the name of a Swiss Franciscan
Franciscan
Most Franciscans are members of Roman Catholic religious orders founded by Saint Francis of Assisi. Besides Roman Catholic communities, there are also Old Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, ecumenical and Non-denominational Franciscan communities....
seller of indulgence
Indulgence
In Catholic theology, an indulgence is the full or partial remission of temporal punishment due for sins which have already been forgiven. The indulgence is granted by the Catholic Church after the sinner has confessed and received absolution...
s, who was denounced by Zwingli in 1516.
Early life
Bernard Samson is the son of Brian Samson, a British SIS operative who worked undercover in Germany during World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and who became head of the Berlin Field Unit after the war. Brian Samson plays a small role in Deighton's 1987 prequel novel Winter. Bernard grew up in post-war Berlin before the wall was built and received a typical German education rather than a privileged English one and never went to university. Despite his ability to speak German fluently, he is seen as an Englishmen by Germans, and as a German by the British, leaving him unsure about which country he really belongs to. Bernard worked for his father from a young age with his best friend Werner Volkmann. They served as couriers making payments to agents and performing espionage related 'odd-jobs'. This enabled Bernard to make friendships and connections that would serve him well in his future work.
Career in London
Bernard quit being a Berlin field agent after a mission in which a friend was killed and he was lucky to escape to the West alive. Bernard is troubled by all the violence he both has suffered and inflicted and has recurring nightmares and drinks very heavily. Bernard hoped to get the German Desk but was passed over for Dicky Cruyer, an Oxford man with no field experience. Bernard now runs errands for Dicky whom he considers incompetent and dangerous. Bernard is continually being tipped to take over the Berlin Field Unit if Frank Harrington ever retires.Bernard's old friend Werner was sacked by the dept. after a cable he was delivering turned up in the hands of the KGB. At the start of the novels, Bernard's wife Fiona, who went to Oxford with Dicky and got her job through Bernard, is working on the top floor and is a rising star in the department. Much of what happened to Bernard was done in order to keep him in the dark about his wife's real mission and he is led to believe that she is a KGB agent who used him, betrayed all his missions in exchange for keeping him safe and then defected to the East. This has left him embittered towards the department and very cynical.
Bernard is very stubborn and believes he knows better than his superiors who are all just desk men. He trusts no one except for his old friend Werner. His secretive and suspicious ways often keep Bernard alive but they just as often get him into trouble and cause harm to many of those around him.
Analysis
Len Deighton has stated that Bernard's testimony in the books is not reliableUnreliable narrator
An unreliable narrator is a narrator, whether in literature, film, or theatre, whose credibility has been seriously compromised. The term was coined in 1961 by Wayne C. Booth in The Rhetoric of Fiction. This narrative mode is one that can be developed by an author for a number of reasons, usually...
. Samson is biased, especially towards his superiors, and is prone to regarding himself too highly. The true nature of his character can be gleaned from reading between the lines, or alternatively from the sixth novel, Spy Sinker, which recounts the events of the previous books from a third-person perspective, and casts doubt upon Bernard's reliability as a narrator, especially in his assessment of his colleagues' capabilities and motives.
Critic Wesley Britton has seen the Bernard Samson books as an echo of the Biblical story of Samson
Samson
Samson, Shimshon ; Shamshoun or Sampson is the third to last of the Judges of the ancient Israelites mentioned in the Tanakh ....
: like Samson, Bernard has his own Delilah
Delilah
Delilah appears only in the Hebrew bible Book of Judges 16, where she is the "woman in the valley of Sorek" whom Samson loved, and who was his downfall...
, when his wife turns out to be an apparent traitor.
In other media
Bernard Samson was played by Ian HolmIan Holm
Sir Ian Holm, CBE is an English actor known for his stage work and for many film roles. He received the 1967 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor for his performance as Lenny in The Homecoming and the 1998 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor for his performance in the title role of King Lear...
and Fiona Samson by Mel Martin
Mel Martin
Mel Martin is an English actor. She has appeared in such British television programmes and films as The Pallisers, Love for Lydia, Bergerac, Cover Her Face, Lovejoy, Inspector Morse, Cadfael, When the Boat Comes In, Midsomer Murders and "A Touch of Frost".She starred as Fiona Samson, the double...
in a 1988 Granada Television
Granada Television
Granada Television is the ITV contractor for North West England. Based in Manchester since its inception, it is the only surviving original ITA franchisee from 1954 and is ITV's most successful....
adaptation of the first trilogy, entitled Game, Set and Match, transmitted as twelve 60 minute episodes. Filmed on location in Berlin and Mexico, the project included a large international cast with 3,000 extras and a budget of $8 million. It is considered the most ambitious espionage miniseries ever filmed. While critically acclaimed, the ratings for the series were poor.
In February 2008, director Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...
expressed interest in developing the Game, Set and Match trilogy as a three-hour film. He is quoted as saying, "I would see if I could boil it down to the fat of the characters, and ignore all this Maquis double agent stuff.