I won’t put this exactly right, but as far as I can remember Grace put it something like this: British spy stories, from Le Carré to Another Country to The Prisoner, is mostly about how being gay and aristocratic turns England’s sons against her.
Based on this prose, it seems there's a class that's "gentlemanly soft," which is valid in British spy fiction, and "pansy types," which aren't. The More You Know!
This makes me think of every time Peter Guillam is referred to as "Smiley's cupbearer", or the description of him from "The Honourable Schoolboy": "Guillam is tall and tough and graceful, and probationers awaiting first posting tend to look up to him as some sort of Greek god."
Based on this prose, it seems there's a class that's "gentlemanly soft," which is valid in British spy fiction, and "pansy types," which aren't. The More You Know!
This makes me think of every time Peter Guillam is referred to as "Smiley's cupbearer", or the description of him from "The Honourable Schoolboy": "Guillam is tall and tough and graceful, and probationers awaiting first posting tend to look up to him as some sort of Greek god."
A gentleman named D'Arcy is automatically homosexual, any further description is just gilding the lily.