Revelator

I thought Kingsley Amis liked Spillane's work.

 

That's quite possible--Amis was more broad-minded in dealing with genre fiction than most other members of the literary establishment. My own feeling is that Spillane was seen as rather down-market and seedy on both sides of the pond. An example is from Simon Raven, who often reviewed and championed Fleming's work but knocked Spillane by saying that Mike Hammer was an unlikable fanatic. I'll be posting Raven's Bond reviews soon.

Thanks for posting the article by Max Allan Collins--where did you find it? I'm familiar with his work on Dick Tracy (a comic Fleming referenced several times in the Bond novels and short stories) and Collins was also a friend and literary executor of Mickey Spillane, which explains why he's eager to say Fleming was influenced by the latter.

However, Collins's grasp of Fleming's influences is not accurate. The idea that Fleming owed nothing to Ambler is baloney--From Russia With Love is deeply in the Ambler mode (and even contains a shout-out to him). Nor does Casino Royale "frankly imitate Spillane"--as Jeremy Duns has shown, Dennis Wheatley was a far more likely influence, along with the British tough-guy thriller-writers like Peter Cheyney. Fleming actually disliked Spillane, as Lycett's biography demonstrates, and that dislike seems to have been widespread throughout the British literary establishment.

Determining who truly influenced Fleming is difficult, because he wasn't the sort of writer who produces only one type of book. Yes, Doctor No is obviously influenced by Sax Rohmer--but not the Amblerian FRWL. And the bleak Wheatley-influenced Casino Royale is very different from the adventure-story mood of Live and Let Die or the self-parodic Goldfinger. What makes Fleming interesting is that he could switch gears so noticeably.

Collins is belittling when he says Fleming "had an outrageous Ripping Yarns view of modern espionage." He seems to be confusing the books with the films, as if they were the same. And as we are increasingly learning, much of the background and many of the incidents in the Bond novels were derived from Fleming's own experiences in intelligence or actual incidents from the Cold War.

Hi, Revelator.  I posted them in the International Events section under "United States of America."  It's about the fourth topic down inside the forum. 

 

In addition to the matters discussed there, I got back for Cork's lecture on "Thunderball."  He spoke for about 50 minutes without notes and was a knowledgable and entertaining lecturer.  Nothing terribly new for those of us versed in this topic, but certainly time well spent.  He's obviously no fan of Kevin McClory.  The introductory weekend events are past, but the exhibition continues.

Thank you Major--your write-up makes me doubly regret missing the event. If I remember correctly, several years ago John Cork write a masterly article tracing the evolution of Thunderball from script to novel to film. He went through every draft of every screenplay, tracked the contributions of McClory and Whittingham, and came to conclusion that the project didn't really succeed on an artistic level until Fleming wove the elements into his novel. The article demonstrated better critical judgement than anything in the Battle for Bond and I hope it resurfaces online.

As for McClory, I'm not a fan either. He reminds me of one of those characters in Dickens who spend their lives in court and have almost nothing to show for it. If he were anything resembling an artist, he would have gone on to make films out from his own ideas and characters, rather than wasting his and other people's time in grasping for another man's creation. And what came of all his effort? A remake of Thunderball whose best parts came from other people than himself. McClory got all that was owed to him when Broccoli and Saltzman let him have producer's credit and proceeds from Thunderball. After that, nothing but greed was at work.

Fascinating find, Major! It does indeed look like Baum was Fleming's original name for Le Chiffre. No surprise that he would have changed it, since it not only sounds close to "Baum" but also sounds too bland (whereas Bond was intentionally meant to sound dull). Le Chiffre is vastly more evocative and memorable, and exemplifies Fleming's mastery in naming.

Incidentally, where are your other posts about the Casino Royale 60th Anniversary Exhibition? I seem to have missed them.

Fleming's own testimony, taken from his letter to the Guardian, is revealing:
 

...to create an illusion of depth I had to fit Bond out with some theatrical props, and while I kept his wardrobe as discreet as his personality, I did equip him with a distinctive gun and, though they are a security hazard, with distinctive cigarettes. This latter touch of display unfortunately went to my head. I proceeded to invent a cocktail for Bond (which I sampled several months later and found unpalatable)...

So the Vesper indeed was "a stunt" to show Bond's daring, and to accentuate his character. And Fleming concocted the whole recipe without even trying it. The fact that this drink is still being tasted and debated decades later is tribute to the authoritative and worldly tone of Fleming's prose, which made him look like an expert even when he was off-mark.