More experiences and inspirations that shaped the background to the James Bond books

The ideas that inspired the themes and details depicted in the James Bond books occasionally become apparent after researching material such as Ian Fleming's Sunday Times articles, the books that he placed in Bond's library, or copies of interviews with Fleming. Sometimes, however, Fleming is pretty clear himself on the background to his books.

The Lilly Library of Indiana University holds all the original manuscripts of the James Bond novels, except Thunderball, The Man with the Golden Gun, and Octopussy and the Living Daylights. The manuscripts include Fleming's copious annotations, added not only during his usual period of revision in the months after completing his first drafts, but sometimes years after publication. These provide much information on Fleming's sources and inspirations.

On the manuscript for Casino Royale, Fleming wrote that some of the incidents were based in fact. These included the botched attempt on Bond's life using the trick camera, which was based on similar events committed by Russian agents in Ankara, Turkey. Fleming noted on the manuscript of Live and Let Die that the settings that featured and the details about fishing were based on his own experiences. He had also consulted the New York Police Department and the US Navy Department for information.

Fleming drew much of the background to the Dover scenes in Moonraker from personal experience too, as he had a home at nearby St Margaret's Bay. Fleming wrote on the draft of From Russia, with Love that he drew on information from the Soviet refugee and spy, Tokaev, for the Russian background, and claimed that fights between gipsy women can be arranged for a small fee.

Much of the background described in You Only Live Twice was based on personal experience, but he was also helped by Richard Hughes, the Sunday Times far eastern representative, and the editor of the annual, This is Japan. Fleming also referred to four books: Meeting with Japan and The Diving Girls' Island, both by Fosco Maraini, The Heart of Japan by Alexander Campbell, and The Horned Islands by James Kirkup.

Short of visiting the Lilly Library and examining the manuscripts, a visit to the library's website is the next best thing. If you haven't already seen its online catalogue of the Fleming collection, I urge you to do so, as it provides much insight into the background to the Bond books.

Ian Fleming's commandos and James Bond

The story of Ian Fleming's 30 Commando/Assault Unit has been a long time in the telling. There have been books from members of the elite force, such as From Arctic Snow to Dust of Normandy, by Patrick Dalzel-Job, and The Hazard Mesh, by J A C 'Tony' Hugill, but these have been personal narratives, rather than broader dispassionate histories. Recently, we have had Craig Cabell's History of the 30 Assault Unit, which, though a welcome attempt to tell the story of the unit, incorporating interviews with survivors and information from documents that had remained secret, lacked depth and was marred by excessive typographic errors. Then there was the film, Age of Heroes, starring Sean Bean. The film had its moments, but contained too many plot holes or rather great chunks of script torn from the pages of the screenplay to accommodate the shoestring budget.

So with the publication of Nicholas Rankin's, Ian Fleming's Commandos: the story of the 30 Assault Unit in WWII, the 30AU and Ian Fleming's role in it finally has a definitive account. What separates this book from those before it is the author's complete self-assurance at placing the inception and function of the unit in context. The book spends pages and pages away from the unit to explain the work of the Bletchley Park code-breakers, or German rocket technology or the events leading up and during the war in the Mediterranean and D-Day. Consequently, the importance and success of the work of 30AU – particularly with regard to Enigma and German naval intelligence – is made more significant.

The book also details aspects of the war that normally fall between the cracks of official histories. Rankin describes the petty jealousies among officers and leaders, devastating friendly-fire incidences caused by poor communication and human error, and the mental anguish and physical horrors suffered by soldiers in the face of the carnage of Dieppe and D-Day. But above all, there is the bravery, comradeship, humour and incredible heroism among the men who served in 30AU.

Ian Fleming's achievements were as an organiser, fixer, and administrator. Very early in the war, he recognised the valuable contribution that elite units could make to intelligence gathering. This was irregular warfare of which not everyone approved. But Fleming was adept at persuading people to his way of thinking, and before long his commandos were up and running. Then on, he made sure that his men had everything they needed to carry out their work, even if that meant ruffling the feathers of the top brass.

But although Fleming was respected by his men, but he was not universally liked. Tony Hugill thought him 'one of those superior professorial type RNVRs', although he modified his opinion after being name-checked in The Man With The Golden Gun.

The 30AU and the world of wartime intelligence had a lasting impact on Fleming, and their legacy is apparent in the James Bond books he wrote 10-20 years after the end of the Second World War. Of James Bond, Fleming said that he was a 'compound of secret agent and commando types'. Rankin highlights other connections. For example, M is popularly thought to have been based on Fleming's chief in the Naval Intelligence Division, Admiral John Godfrey, but he also writes in a green ink like Colonel Claude Dansey, a top SIS officer (a Major Dansey is also mentioned as Kerim Bey's predecessor in From Russia, with Love). Rankin wonders whether the name Dr No was influenced by a certain Dr Noton, who had complained about 30AU. And in Thunderball, Largo's men steal the two nuclear weapons from the RAF bomber using a two-man midget submarine employed in the war by the Italian navy (also a 30AU target) usually to plant limpet mines.

The stories that rely most heavily on the work and the targets of the 30AU are, of course, Moonraker and 'Octopussy'. The former is steeped in the events of the end of the Second World War and the start of the Cold War. For instance, and most obviously, it has as its backdrop Britain's attempt to develop an independent nuclear capability and keep up with the Americans and Soviets. Fleming refers to the race in the months before and after the war ended to capture German missile experts and technology. Drax's missile system is fuelled by hydrogen peroxide, a fuel developed by the Germans for submarines (and whose secrets were pinched by 30AU) but superseded soon after the war by nuclear power. Krebs, Drax's main henchman, served in the war as a 'Werewolf'', a member of a Nazi youth guerrilla organisation.

The short story 'Octopussy' concerns the actions of Major Dexter Smythe, an officer in the Miscellaneous Objectives Bureau, whose mission is to clear out German hide-outs. Clearly 30AU provides a model for the fictional MOB force. The gold that Smythe kills for (and the reason why Bond tracks him down) is taken from the massive hoards of gold stolen and melted down on an industrial scale by the Nazis throughout the war.

Nicholas Rankin's book contains many other links between Fleming's war and James Bond, and is an essential read for anyone interested in the origins of Bond and his adventures.

Quantum of Solace: when 007 met Somerset Maugham

Kingsley Amis described 'Quantum of Solace' (the short story published in For Your Eyes Only in 1960) as 'Maughamish'. Henry Chancellor saw similarities between 'Quantum of Solace' and Somerset Maugham's short story, 'His Excellency', which appears in Ashenden (1928). There is little doubt that Ian Fleming wrote his story in homage to Maugham, as stylistically and structurally the stories are close. More generally, Fleming's cultural environment – the two authors knew each other socially, and Fleming avidly read Maugham's work – made Fleming susceptible to pick up 'Maughamisms' (or Maugham-memes). Let's explore some of the evidence.

'His Excellency' starts, like 'Quantum of Solace', with the main protagonist, Ashenden, reflecting on his invitation to a social meeting with the ambassador of an unnamed country (rather than Fleming's governor of Bermuda) and the prospect of a dull evening. The evening livens up a little when the conversation between Ashenden and the ambassador turns to the subject of Byring, a promising diplomat who is obliged to resign in view of his impending marriage to a woman – a former dancer – ostracised by polite society due to her reputation for a voracious appetite for men and expensive things. There is more than a nod to this in 'Quantum of Solace', which, in its tale of Philip Masters, contains similar themes of a society scandal and a diplomatic career ruined by the actions of a woman from a 'working' background.

The story of Philip Masters is told to Bond by the governor. This device recalls Maugham's story, in which the ambassador goes on to recount to Ashenden the story of another tragic affair of the heart. This story has little in common with that of Masters other than general aspects of love and misery and breaking convention with society. But both the ambassador and the governor draw lessons on life from their tales. The governor devises his law of the Quantum of Solace. When all humanity between a couple has gone, the quantum of solace (the amount of comfort) is at zero and the relationship cannot survive. The ambassador concludes that a relationship based on love is worth pursuing, even if it lasts only a few years, and is preferable to a lifetime of regret within a loveless marriage.

Fleming's short story mirrors Maugham's in one other curious way. As he listens to the ambassador's tale, Ashenden wishes he had moved to a sofa, rather than stay on a hard chair. Bond, on the other hand, is uncomfortable on the sofa, and takes the opportunity of a refill of his brandy glass to move to a hard, upright, chair.

Both stories may also have expressed something of their authors' own turmoils. The law of the quantum of solace could have applied to Fleming's turbulent relationship with his wife, Ann, while Maugham's story could have been a metaphor for his homosexual relationships (forbidden in society and law).

That Ian Fleming would be so familiar with Maugham's work, and therefore think highly enough of it to want to imitate it, is unsurprising, given that the two authors were friends. In a note concerning her travels through Europe, Ann, who spent much time at Somerset Maugham's villa (Villa Mauresque) in the Antibes, south of France, recalls that, in 1954, Ian joined her at the villa and delighted in Maugham's company. Ann thought the two were much alike, not just in their enjoyment of martinis and food, but through 'a basic sadness and a desperation about life.' What is more, Ann thought they both 'regarded women with mistrust'.

Andrew Lycett writes that Fleming and Maugham often played bridge together at the Portland Club in London, and Fleming's Sunday Times colleague, John Russell, thought Fleming had a 'schoolboy idolisation' of Maugham. At one stage, Fleming even offered to run delicate errands for Maugham and become his 'homme de confiance'.

A minor postscript: it occurred to me that, given his penchant for naming his characters after his friends and relations, Ian Fleming did not name the false identity (Mr Somerset) that Bond takes for the train journey in From Russia, With Love (chapter 20) after the English County, but his friend and idol, Somerset Maugham.

References:

Amis, K, 1965 The James Bond dossier, Jonathan Cape
Amory, M (ed.), 1985 The letters of Ann Fleming, Collins Harvill
Chancellor, H, 2005 James Bond: the man and his world, John Murray
Lycett, A, 1996 Ian Fleming, Phoenix

Does Chitty Chitty Bang Bang take off?

It must have been a challenge for Frank Cottrell Boyce to write a sequel. After all, there are two Chitty Chitty Bang Bangs. There's the film incarnation, which appeared on screens in 1968 and starred in a magical musical adventure. Then there's Ian Fleming's original Chitty, which began life as a children's book in 1964. Less well known than the film version, the story takes Chitty and the Pott family on adventures in England and France, where they foil a gang of burglars and villains. Boyce's solution is to embrace both Chitties, and the result – Chitty Chitty Bang Bang flies again – is a wonderful testament to the book's cinematic and literary ancestry.

In his latest adventure, Frank Cottrell Boyce introduces us to the Tootings. Dad, an inventive engineer, loses his job, but ever the optimist, sees it as an opportunity to explore and visit new places. Excited at the prospect, Mum acquires a rusty VW camper van, much to the embarrassment of children Lucy, Jem and Little Harry. Jem soon changes his mind, though, when given the chance to restore the van with Dad.

A visit to a scrapyard brings more excitement as they encounter an old engine – once the power behind the racing car of Count Zborowski. That's when the magic begins. The Tootings quickly find out that it's the van, not them, who's driving, as it takes them from England to France, then to Egypt for reasons that slowly become clear. On the way, they encounter a glamorous nanny, and the mysterious Tiny Jack, who has his own interest in the flying van.

The story is imbued with the spirit of Ian Fleming. The author gives the Tootings the same 'never say no to adventure' philosophy shown by the original Potts, and skilfully weaves in interesting facts, just as Fleming did. The name Jem, short for Jeremy, and an allusion to the original children, Jeremy and Jemima, is a nice touch too. The illustrations, by Joe Berger, recall the art of Fleming's illustrator, John Burningham. The film is not forgotten either. There is more than a hint of the childcatcher, and fantastic toys are an important feature of the book, just as they are in the film, while descriptions of Tiny Jack's hideaway could come from the drawing board of Ken Adam. There's even a cameo role for James Bond's most famous car.

At the end of the book, the author acknowledges that there are questions concerning some of the plot details that remain unanswered. But then again, the bigger question of how a car came to fly at all is one that even Fleming never addressed. Neither book, old and new, is the worse for this – we accept the magic, which papers over all the holes. Despite the nods to the past, readers of the latest adventure don't need to be familiar with earlier incarnations to enjoy the book. It stands on its own four wheels, and serves as the perfect introduction to Chitty Chitty Bang Bang for the next generation.

Bonding with Dirk Pitt, Lucifer Box, Archie Noble and Asterix

Evidence of the significant place James Bond has in popular culture is found in a number of novels that cannot be called James Bond parodies – Bond is not the subject of the books, which instead usually feature a well-established character of their own – but contain allusions to Bond in tribute to Ian Fleming’s character and hint at the influence that Bond has in the shaping of the authors’ works.

For example, there is Clive Cussler’s Night Probe!, published in 1981. The hero of the novel is Dirk Pitt, a marine adventurer who works for the US National Underwater and Marine Agency. Pitt is dispatched to locate and retrieve the only copies from a shipwreck of an old, but potentially dangerous, treaty between Great Britain and the United States. Meanwhile, the British Government has brought the legendary spy Brian Shaw out of retirement to make sure the documents never get into American hands.

That Brian Shaw can be identified as James Bond is clear from Cussler’s descriptions. We meet Shaw at a funeral of, we learn, his old boss. ‘There were times I wanted to kill him, and there were times I could have embraced him as a father.’ A neat summary of the love-hate relationship between M and Bond. We also meet his chief’s old secretary (Moneypenny?) who lets slip that Brian Shaw is a pseudonym. Then there is reference to SMERSH, Shaw’s former enemy, and to the death of his wife, and Shaw’s home in the West Indies. At the end of the novel, Dirk Pitt thinks he’s discovered Shaw’s true identity. ‘James Bond would be proud of you’, he says. Shaw replies that Bond only exists in fiction. ‘Does he?’, Pitt asks. Cussler’s ‘Bond’ is largely the Bond of the books, but the cinematic Bond creeps in. ‘The same old flatterer’, the elderly secretary says when Bond tells her how sensual she looks. We can hear Lois Maxwell’s Moneypenny utter that line.

Dirk Pitt is something of a Bondian character himself, and Clive Cussler has acknowledged the influence of Bond in Pitt’s make-up: ‘I began researching and analysing all the series heroes, beginning with Edgar Allan Poe's Inspector Dumas. Next came Conan Doyle and Sherlock Holmes, and all the other fiction detectives and spies: Bulldog Drummond, Sam Spade, Phillip Marlow, Mike Hammer, Matt Helm, and James Bond. I studied them all.’

Black Butterfly, by Mark Gatiss and published in 2008, is the third novel to feature the bisexual secret agent, Lucifer Box. In the novel, he investigates the unexpected deaths of members of the establishment, which, he discovers is caused by a poison deriving from the black butterfly.

Bond references come thick and fast. On the cover of the hardback edition, the lettering of the title and author’s name is stencilled, and very much like the tea-chest font used in the Richard Chopping covers of Ian Fleming’s later novels. The cover art shows, in the manner of the cover for The Spy Who Loved Me, a commando knife piercing a playing card and the wood beneath. The artwork is a fine tribute to Richard Chopping. There is even a fly, Richard Chopping’s trade mark. Incidentally, the paperback cover nicely mimics the Pan covers of the 1960s.

The allusions to Bond continue inside. The action is set in 1953 (the year that the first Bond novel, Casino Royale, was published), and moves from England to Istanbul, then Kingston, Jamaica. The prologue, describing a dream of Lucifer Box, is a good Fleming pastiche, featuring expensive branded products (a Siebe Gorman wetsuit), the taking of Benzedrine tablets, and appearance of a Blofeld-like villain, Gottfried Clawhammer. Further into the novel, we meet Whitley Bey (a nod to Kerim Bey of From Russia, With Love) and Dr Cassivellaunus Fetch, the Man with the Celluloid Hand. There is even a reference to Jamaica’s Undertaker’s Wind, something that Fleming often mentioned in his books.

There are fewer Bond references in The Reavers, by Octopussy screenwriter, George MacDonald Fraser, but those that are present reveal the work of a Fleming aficionado. The novel, published in 2007, is a comic historical adventure set in the world of the Border reivers or raiders on the Anglo-Scottish border in the 16th-century. As usual with his novels, Fraser intersperses the narrative with factual snippets, among them the fact that ‘the original “M”’, Sir Francis Walsingham was Elizabeth I’s espionage chief. The hero of the novel is the spy, Archie Noble. He moves with ‘cat-like agility’ (a reference, perhaps, to how Harry Saltzman thought Sean Connery moved), is head of Station B for Border, ‘licensed to slay’, and a ‘double-nought operative’.

Finally, Asterix and the Black Gold (published in English in 1982), is a comic book adventure by Albert Uderzo, and features the indomitable Gaul on a mission to secure a supply of ‘black gold’ or rock oil, which is an essential ingredient in the druid Getafix’s magic potion. A wandering druid, who is really a Roman spy, joins an unsuspecting Asterix, and tries to sabotage the mission. The druid is Uderzo’s tribute to the early Bond films. The character’s name is Dubbelosix, and looks like Sean Connery. He drives a chariot, which, like Bond’s 1964 Aston Martin, hides many gadgets (for example retractable scythes on the wheels).

It is no surprise that Uderzo incorporates the cinematic Bond in his work. The comic strip medium is, of course, cinematic, but Uderzo is also a film buff who often references aspects of French and American cinema in the Asterix books. For example, Laurel and Hardy are portrayed as Roman soldiers in Obelix and Co, and Kirk Douglas, in Spartacus mode, has a role in Asterix and Obelix All at Sea.

All these works are testament to the continuing influence of both the literary and cinematic James Bond in popular culture, and it is a rare spy or adventure novel that features a spy that does not make a reference to Bond. Ian Fleming said that he wanted to write the spy novel to end all spy novels. The genre didn’t end, but the landscape of the spy novel was undoubtedly altered, with Fleming creating an archetype to which other novelists inevitably turn.