Frederick Forsyth 'set to reveal he was an MI6 spy'
Day of the Jackal author Frederick Forsyth is expected to reveal in his forthcoming autobiography that he was an agent of the Secret Intelligence Service, MI6
He has long been lauded for the uncanny realism of his spy thrillers, and now Frederick Forsyth is set to reveal the secret of his insider knowledge: he was himself an agent for MI6.
Fans of the 76-year-old author had suspected he may have had brushes with the Secret Intelligence Service, as MI6 is formally known, and Forsyth is expected to confirm they were right when his autobiography is published in September.
As a journalist for the BBC and Reuters, Forsyth spent time based in Communist East Germany and in Africa, where he became close to key figures including Odumegwu Ojukwu, leader of the Nigerian breakaway state of Biafra.
He has admitted in the past that he often draws on his real-life experiences for the plots and action in his books; his experience of reporting on an attempt to assassinate the French president Charles de Gaulle gave him the idea for his first novel, The Day of the Jackal.
He has also admitted having friends in MI6. In his newspaper column Forsyth has referred to “taking lunch with a senior officer of from the Secret Intelligence Service” though he did not explain how they knew each other and he has never gone as far as revealing that he was recruited by them.
Been so long since I saw them referred to as SIS that I almost thought they'd just dropped that in favour of the colloquial -- Hell, I still hear the FSB referred to in the media as the KGB for that matter.
Any writers out there relying purely on actual imagination, or is that just an urban myth ?
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