During the 1960s, Forsyth worked as a journalist for the BBC. During his time reporting in Biafra, he began to work as a spy for MI6; a relationship that was to last 20 years.

Forsyth decided to write a novel using similar research techniques to those used in journalism. His first full-length novel, The Day of the Jackal, was published in 1971. It became an international bestseller and gained its author the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel. In this book, an assassin is hired to kill then-French President Charles de Gaulle. It was made into a film of the same name.