Editing Espionage (section)

== Spy fiction ==
{{Main|Spy fiction}}

Spies have long been favorite topics for novelists and filmmakers.<ref>Brett F. Woods, ''Neutral Ground: A Political History of Espionage Fiction'' (2008) [https://www.questia.com/library/120076034/neutral-ground-a-political-history-of-espionage online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190327091232/https://www.questia.com/library/120076034/neutral-ground-a-political-history-of-espionage |date=2019-03-27 }}</ref> An early example of espionage literature is ''[[Kim (novel)|Kim]]'' by the English novelist [[Rudyard Kipling]], with a description of the training of an intelligence agent in the [[Great Game]] between the [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|UK]] and [[Russia]] in 19th century [[Central Asia]]. An even earlier work was [[James Fenimore Cooper]]'s classic novel, ''[[The Spy (Cooper novel)|The Spy]],'' written in 1821, about an American spy in New York during the [[American Revolutionary War|Revolutionary War]].

During the many 20th-century spy scandals, much information became publicly known about national spy agencies and dozens of real-life secret agents. These sensational stories piqued public interest in a profession largely off-limits to [[Human interest story|human interest news reporting]], a natural consequence of the secrecy inherent in their work. To fill in the blanks, the popular conception of the secret agent has been formed largely by 20th and 21st-century fiction and film. Attractive and sociable real-life agents such as [[Valerie Plame]] find little employment in serious fiction, however. The fictional secret agent is more often a loner, sometimes amoral—an [[existentialism|existential]] hero operating outside the everyday constraints of society. Loner spy personalities may have been a stereotype of convenience for authors who already knew how to write loner [[private investigator]] characters that sold well from the 1920s to the present.<ref>Miller, Toby, ''Spyscreen: Espionage on Film and TV from the 1930s to the 1960s'' (Oxford University Press, 2003).</ref>

[[Johnny Fedora]] achieved popularity as a fictional agent of early [[Cold War espionage]], but [[James Bond]] is the most commercially successful of the many spy characters created by intelligence insiders during that struggle. Other fictional agents include Le Carré's [[George Smiley]], and [[Harry Palmer]] as played by [[Michael Caine]].

Jumping on the spy bandwagon, other writers also started writing about spy fiction featuring female spies as protagonists, such as ''[[The Baroness (novels)|The Baroness]]'', which has more graphic action and sex, as compared to other novels featuring male protagonists.

Spy fiction has permeated the [[video game]] world as well, in games such as ''[[Perfect Dark]]'', ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|GoldenEye 007]]'', ''[[The Operative: No One Lives Forever|No One Lives Forever]]'', ''[[Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell]]'' and the [[Metal Gear|''Metal Gear'' series]].

Espionage has also made its way into comedy depictions. The 1960s TV series ''[[Get Smart (TV series)|Get Smart]]'', the 1983 Finnish film ''[[Agent 000 and the Deadly Curves]]'', and ''[[Johnny English (film series)|Johnny English]]'' film trilogy portrays an inept spy, while the 1985 movie ''[[Spies Like Us]]'' depicts a pair of none-too-bright men sent to the Soviet Union to investigate a missile.

The historical novel ''The Emperor and the Spy'' highlights the adventurous life of U.S. Colonel [[Sidney Mashbir|Sidney Forrester Mashbir]], who during the 1920s and 1930s attempted to prevent war with Japan, and when war did erupt, he became General MacArthur's top advisor in the Pacific Theater of World War Two.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theemperorandthespy.com/books/the-emperor-and-the-spy/overview/|title=The Emperor and the Spy|last=Katz|first=Stan S.|date=2019|website=TheEmperorAndTheSpy.com|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190926154509/https://theemperorandthespy.com/books/the-emperor-and-the-spy/overview/|archive-date=2019-09-26}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=The Emperor and the Spy|last=Katz|first=Stan S.|publisher=Horizon Productions|year=2019|isbn=978-0-9903349-4-1}}</ref>

Black Widow is also a fictional agent who was introduced as a [[Russia]]n spy, an antagonist of the superhero [[Iron Man]]. She later became an agent of the fictional spy agency [[S.H.I.E.L.D.]] and a member of the superhero team the [[Avengers (comics)|Avengers]].

Real espionage is actually quite boring work.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Liulevicius |first1=Vejas Gabriel |date=October 2011 |title=Espionage and Covert Operations: A Global History |chapter=1. Introducing the Secret World |chapter-url=https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/espionage-and-covert-operations-a-global-history |url-access= |trans-title= |format= |language= |location= |publisher=The Great Courses |access-date= |via= |quote=Like the old adage about war, real spionage is most often made up of vast stretches of boredom punctuated by sharp moments of fear. [...] It has been said, with some justice that good tradecraft keeps espionage, routine, and boring, which is good, because excitement actually means that something has gone terribly wrong.}}</ref>