6 replies to this topic

[Blofeld's Cat]

In an old thread, which I can't find now, Blue Eyes made comment of this book and that it may be an interesting read.

Well, I finally managed to find a hardcover copy on display in a major bookshop here in Jakarta. It's over 1100 pages and costs around US$50!

Unfortunately, there are only two pages of letters related to Bond and they are only generalised observations being made.

Hardly worth buying, if you ask me, but you would have to be an absolutely dedicated "completist" to want to add this book to your library of Bond books.

[Blue Eyes]

I've wanted to get my hands on thsi book, but haven't been able to afford it.

I did flick through parts of it. I just found it interesting the way that Amis really put John Gardner down. I remember one quote I read where he said something like "the man just can't write". Bitchy!!

[mccartney007]

Blue Eyes (02 Jan, 2002 09:50 a.m.):
I've wanted to get my hands on thsi book, but haven't been able to afford it.

I did flick through parts of it. I just found it interesting the way that Amis really put John Gardner down. I remember one quote I read where he said something like "the man just can't write". Bitchy!!

Kingsley Amis was known as a person who spoke his mind. He was also know as a very mean drunk, but according to a friend of mine who met him he was actually very pleasant.

[Blofeld's Cat]

White Persian (15 Feb, 2002 10:12 p.m.):
I've been trying to find a clipping from a British newspaper that I could've sworn I saved where Amis comments on Timothy Dalton's take on Bond.

If you can remember which paper it was out of White Persian, you may be lucky enough to find it on their web site archive(if they have one).

[Blofeld's Cat]

Blue Eyes (02 Jan, 2002 09:50 a.m.):
I've wanted to get my hands on thsi book, but haven't been able to afford it.

I did flick through parts of it. I just found it interesting the way that Amis really put John Gardner down. I remember one quote I read where he said something like "the man just can't write". Bitchy!!

As a result of RossMan's thread we can get the story from the other side to tidy up things here.

This, straight from John Gardner himself:

Peter's editing technique was not always interpreted correctly. I was amazed to read recently, in Kingsley Amis's letters, that Kingsley was convinced I was absolutely no good at producing a thriller of drama and tension. In fact he had commented to Philip Larkin that Peter Janson-Smith had thrown the manuscript of Licence Renewed back at me because it was so bad. This, of course, never happened except in the sense that I would take every manuscript back to do the necessary work to make a better book and comply with those changes I had accepted from the editor.

  Amis was in fact quite amusing. I met him at a lunch party Len Deighton gave at the Savoy for Eric Ambler's birthday. Out of devilment I said to him, "Kingsley, you're quite right: the Bond books are terrible hokum. No good at all. Dreadful," - he had reviewed Licence Renewed for, I think, The Times Literary Supplement, and it was a review in which he set about me with a cat o' nine tails, the Rack and the Chinese Water Torture. Kingsley looked at me in bewilderment, spluttering, "Oh no. my dear chap, no! No!"

[mccartney007]

Blofeld's Cat (02 Jan, 2002 05:22 a.m.):Hardly worth buying, if you ask me, but you would have to be an absolutely dedicated "completist" to want to add this book to your library of Bond books.

Guess I'm a completetist then... I believe I found my copy for $40, though.

[White Persian]

I've been trying to find a clipping from a British newspaper that I could've sworn I saved where Amis comments on Timothy Dalton's take on Bond.
I expected that he'd approve of Dalton's back to Fleming approach but he disliked Dalton's performance and seemed very much to favour the Connery version (I don't think he'd seen Moore), saying Bond should be the alpha male and not hanging around in the shadows.
[This is from memory, so sorry if I'm misrepresenting the man]
Does anyone know of the article I'm talking about?