A
few weeks ago our local parish library had its annual fundraising
book sale, which my wife and I like to hit. Great deals can be had.
Among my finds this year was an all-but-complete set of Ian Fleming's
James Bond
novels in excellent condition, recent Penguin paperbacks. They were
50 cents apiece. I grabbed them. I was missing two – including
this first volume in the series – but the very next day my son had
a soccer game in Alexandria so I checked at Hastings there. I paid
more for Casino
Royale
than I did for all the others put together! Compulsive completist
that I am, that evening I placed an order through Abebooks.com for
the other missing volume, and within a few days an all-but-pristine
full set perched proudly on my bookshelf. I just recently got around
to starting it.
It's
not the first time I read one of the original novels that inspired
the cultural phenomenon that is the 007
movies – or at least attempted to read one. Many years ago, when
the movie Moonraker
came out, after picking up the movie adaptation which is basically a
transcription of the script into prose, I attempted the original
novel upon which it was based. I did not get very far into it. The
James Bond
movies are notoriously different from the books, often bearing no
resemblance to the original beyond the title. This was especially
the case with the immediately post-Star
Wars
Moonraker.
And I never really felt drawn to the originals for a very long time
after that.
Then
I came upon the library book-sale find. My immediate excitement was
doubtless augmented by the synchronicity that I had just started
reading Bronze
Shaped as Clay,
which of course includes a thinly-veiled James Bond as a major
character. As indicated above, I grabbed them – along with an
interesting albeit thin hardcover, For
Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming + James Bond
by Ben MacIntyre, which I found on a different table. This latter
book is heavily illustrated, sort of a semi-coffee-table book
overview of the life of Ian Fleming heavily geared toward the
writer's most famous creation.* It's a fascinating story. My point
is, everything seemed to come together, and as soon as I cleared out
some other backlogged reading intentions I started Casino
Royale.
I'm
not going to engage in a full-blown review here. Suffice it to say
that if you have seen the 2006 film with Daniel Craig, you know the
basic story – although there are considerable changes in detail as
well as additons to the story, the central plot is there more or less
intact: Agent 007's battle over a casino card-table with Le Chiffre,
an agent of the enemy; his reluctant attraction to yet ultimate
betrayal by a beautifuly fellow agent, Vesper Lynd; even the
harrowing torture that he suffers at the hands of Le Chiffre
(although the most memorable line from that scene, Bond's defiant
“Now
the whole world's gonna know you died scratching my balls!,”
is nowhere to be found). I already suspected from the comic strip
adaptation that those beats would be there, pardon the pun. That
adaptation is very
accurate, with only minor differences necessary to condense the
story as well as tone it down a bit.
 |
| Art by John McLusky for Daily Express |
This
was quite an enjoyable read and I look forward to continuing the
series. There is something special about seeing characters such as
this in their original settings. In this case, the story is very
much informed by the still-fresh memories of World War II in the
context of deepening 1950s Cold War tensions. And here we see a much
more down-to-earth, human Bond than the virtual super-hero he became
in the movies. He's less “cool,” less sure of himself, indeed
less likable, with less of the boyish roguishness. It's one major
difference between the motion picture medium and prose that the
latter allows the reader to have considerable insight into the core
of the character – depending on the author's intent as well as
skill, of course, and Ian Fleming was a natural storyteller. That
can be good – or it can, as in this case, lay bare an uglier side
of our hero's nature. One thing that I've heard commented on through
the years is that the literary James Bond is colder, with a real
misogynistic streak to him. That is very much the case. He has
definite negative feelings toward the very idea of women engaging in
his line of work. How much of that was Fleming and reflective of the
time in which he wrote as opposed to the character he was drawing I
could not say, but I know I was a bit taken aback by the punch line,
so to speak, of Bond reflecting on his growing feelings for Vesper
near the end of the book, before the climax:
“He
found her companionship easy and unexacting. There was something
enigmatic about her which was a constant stimulus. She gave little
of her real personality away and he felt that however long they were
together there would always be a private room inside her which he
could never invade. She was thoughtful and full of consideration
without being slavish and without compromising her arrogant spirit.
And now he knew that she was profoundly, excitingly sensual, but that
the conquest of her body, because of the central privacy in her,
would each time have the sweet tang of rape”
(pp. 158-159).
Uh-huhhh....
Anyway,
despite the lack of CGI-worthy pyrotechnics and a diabolical
world-threatening super-villain – evil though he be, Le Chiffre is
in the context of the larger world very much a small fish – this is
an engaging little character drama that leaves me wanting more. And,
similar to the movie, the book's conclusion sets up what must have
been a central overarching conflict in Fleming's novels as the
ambiguous character of Vesper Lynd and her fate give Bond a driving
purpose going forward – to hunt down and destroy SMERSH.
Cheers!
– and thanks for reading!
*
* *
*
Fleming's only other creation, for a single children's book, was –
I kid you not!
– Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang.
No comments:
Post a Comment