Key dates in the life of John le Carre: - October 19, 1931: Born David Cornwell in the southern English coastal town of Poole in Dorset. - 1936: Olive Cornwell flees the family home, leaving the young le Carre to be raised by his father Ronnie, a tyrant and conman who was jailed twice for fraud. - 1948 to 1956: Studies French and German in Bern in Switzerland, where he begins his espionage career, before moving to Oxford. - 1954: Marries Alison Sharp, with whom he has three sons before their divorce in 1971. - 1958: Starts working for MI5, British Security Service, and writes "Call for the Dead", his first novel.