Spies

by

Michael Frayn

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Spies makes teaching easy.
Stephen’s childhood best friend who is responsible for declaring the “six simple words” (“My mother is a German spy”) that begin their mission of spying on Keith’s mother. The novel clearly illustrates Keith’s higher social status: he goes to the local preparatory school, has a separate playroom that stores all his toys, and rides a bike to school, in comparison to Stephen, who goes to public school, shares his room with his brother, and rides the bus to school. Although Stephen envies and respects his best friend, Keith is actually not everything Stephen makes him out to be. Keith can be controlling—he is always the leader for every project and adventure that the two undertake, and he insists that everything must go his way. From his family, especially his father, Keith inherits an air of haughtiness and a tendency to be manipulative and violent. As such, Keith does not get along with the other children in the Close, and Stephen is his sole friend.

Keith Hayward Quotes in Spies

The Spies quotes below are all either spoken by Keith Hayward or refer to Keith Hayward. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Class Difference and Social Status Theme Icon
).
Chapter 2 Quotes

Cycling's plainly the right way to go to school; the bus that Stephen catches each day at the cracked concrete bus stop on the main road is plainly the wrong way. Green's the right color for a bicycle, just as it’s the wrong one for a belt or a bus.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 18
Explanation and Analysis:

Gratitude not only to Keith's mother but to Keith himself, to all the others after him whose adjutant and audience I was, and to everyone else who wrote and performed the drama of life in which I had a small, often frightening, but always absorbing part: Thank you for having me. Thank you, thank you.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 31-32
Explanation and Analysis:

I think now that most probably Keith’s words came out of nowhere, that they were spontaneously created in the moment they were uttered. That they were a blind leap of pure fantasy. Or of pure intuition. Or, like so many things, of both.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 36
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

I feel more strongly than ever the honor of my association with Keith. His family have taken on the heroic proportions of characters in a legend—noble father and traitorous mother playing out the never-ending conflict between good and evil, between light and dark.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Father / Mr. Ted Hayward , Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 57
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 4 Quotes

“Anyway,” I say, “my father’s a German spy, too.”…
“Well, he is," I say. “He has secret meetings with people who come to the house. They talk in a foreign language together. It's German. I've heard them.”

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Stephen’s Father / Mr. Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 73
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

Even before this there were a lot of things piling up that I couldn’t tell Keith about. Barbara Berrill’s visit. Her stupid stories about his mother and his aunt. Now I’ve been burdened with another secret that I have to keep from him. But how can we possibly proceed if I don't tell him this one?

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward, Auntie Dee / Mrs. Tracey
Page Number: 126
Explanation and Analysis:

Not that I ever believed those stories for a moment. Or could have said anything about them to Keith even if I had. It would be telling tales. You can't tell tales.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 134
Explanation and Analysis:

We’ve come on a journey from the highest to the lowest—from the silver-framed heroes on the altars in the Haywards' house through the descending social gradations of the Close, from the Berrills and Geests to us, from us to the Pinchers, on down through the squalor of the Cottages and their wretched occupants, and then, reached even lower, to an old derelict taking refuge under a sheet of corrugated iron.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Uncle Peter / the Man
Page Number: 144
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

So far as I can piece it together, as the heir to Stephen’s thoughts, he neither thought she was nor didn’t think she was. Without Keith there to tell him what to think he’d stopped thinking about it all. Most of the time you don't go around thinking that things are so or not so, any more than you go around understanding or not understanding them. You take them for granted.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 153
Explanation and Analysis:
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Keith Hayward Quotes in Spies

The Spies quotes below are all either spoken by Keith Hayward or refer to Keith Hayward. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Class Difference and Social Status Theme Icon
).
Chapter 2 Quotes

Cycling's plainly the right way to go to school; the bus that Stephen catches each day at the cracked concrete bus stop on the main road is plainly the wrong way. Green's the right color for a bicycle, just as it’s the wrong one for a belt or a bus.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 18
Explanation and Analysis:

Gratitude not only to Keith's mother but to Keith himself, to all the others after him whose adjutant and audience I was, and to everyone else who wrote and performed the drama of life in which I had a small, often frightening, but always absorbing part: Thank you for having me. Thank you, thank you.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 31-32
Explanation and Analysis:

I think now that most probably Keith’s words came out of nowhere, that they were spontaneously created in the moment they were uttered. That they were a blind leap of pure fantasy. Or of pure intuition. Or, like so many things, of both.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 36
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

I feel more strongly than ever the honor of my association with Keith. His family have taken on the heroic proportions of characters in a legend—noble father and traitorous mother playing out the never-ending conflict between good and evil, between light and dark.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Father / Mr. Ted Hayward , Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 57
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 4 Quotes

“Anyway,” I say, “my father’s a German spy, too.”…
“Well, he is," I say. “He has secret meetings with people who come to the house. They talk in a foreign language together. It's German. I've heard them.”

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Stephen’s Father / Mr. Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 73
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

Even before this there were a lot of things piling up that I couldn’t tell Keith about. Barbara Berrill’s visit. Her stupid stories about his mother and his aunt. Now I’ve been burdened with another secret that I have to keep from him. But how can we possibly proceed if I don't tell him this one?

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward, Auntie Dee / Mrs. Tracey
Page Number: 126
Explanation and Analysis:

Not that I ever believed those stories for a moment. Or could have said anything about them to Keith even if I had. It would be telling tales. You can't tell tales.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward
Page Number: 134
Explanation and Analysis:

We’ve come on a journey from the highest to the lowest—from the silver-framed heroes on the altars in the Haywards' house through the descending social gradations of the Close, from the Berrills and Geests to us, from us to the Pinchers, on down through the squalor of the Cottages and their wretched occupants, and then, reached even lower, to an old derelict taking refuge under a sheet of corrugated iron.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Uncle Peter / the Man
Page Number: 144
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

So far as I can piece it together, as the heir to Stephen’s thoughts, he neither thought she was nor didn’t think she was. Without Keith there to tell him what to think he’d stopped thinking about it all. Most of the time you don't go around thinking that things are so or not so, any more than you go around understanding or not understanding them. You take them for granted.

Related Characters: Stephen Wheatley (speaker), Keith Hayward, Keith’s Mother / Mrs. “Bobs” Hayward
Page Number: 153
Explanation and Analysis: