International Journal of James Bond Studies · Vol
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James Bond Studies Evolutions of a Critical Field IAN KINANE From the twelve completed novels and two short story collections originally published by Ian Fleming between 1953 and 1966, the James Bond ranchise has seen a near exponential growth within popular consciousness in the historical signi"cance, political implications, and cultural in#uence of its central "gure. %aving spawned countless editions, adaptations, continuations, parodies, reis& sues, spin-offs, re-wor(ings, and re-releases, Fleming’s most memorable creative venture has * in the sixty our years since its inception * garnered somewhat of its own commercial mythology, and has been transformed into a virtually limit& less and sel -sustaining industry$ +ven prior to Fleming’s death in 196,, James Bond had already made the transition to both the small screen -in a sixty minute televised adaptation of Casino Royale .1953/0 and onto the radio -in a one-off adaptation of Moonraker .1955/0, before being immortalised in the guise of Sean 2onnery in the "rst of Eon 3roductions) Bond "lms * a relatively aith ul adaptation of Fleming’s 1954 novel, Dr. No$ 5he continuing commercial success of the Eon "lm series need not be elaborated on here, but in addition to the official series, two non Eon-pro& duced Bond "lms have been made: the 1968 spoof of Casino Royale as well as the 1943 Thunderball remake, Never Say Never Again$ 5o date, a urther ten authors have penned continuation Bond novels * including 9ingsley Amis, whose novel Ian Kinane is Lecturer in English Literature at the Univer- sity of Roehampton. He is the author of Theorising Literary Islands (2016) and co-editor of Landscapes of Liminality: Between Space and Place (2016). He is currently editing a collection of essays on didactics and the modern Robin- sonade for young readers and is preparing a manuscript Vol. I, Issue 1 · Spring 2017 on Ian Fleming, James Bond, and British-Jamaican cul- ISSN 2514-2178 tural identity. DOI: 10.24877/jbs.3 Distributed under CC BY 4.0 UK Colonel Sun -19640 was the "rst of Bond)s adventures to be released ollowing Fleming’s death$ Amis was ollowed by 2hristopher ;ood -who also wrote the screenplays or the "lms The Spy Who Loved Me .1988/ and Moonraker .1989/, on which his novelisations were based0< John =ardner -who wrote a staggering si!& teen urther Bond adventures, including novelisations of the "lms Licence to ill .1949/ and GoldenEye .1995/0< and >aymond Benson -who wrote a urther si! ori& ginal novels0$ As Bond moved into the twenty&"rst century, high-profile writers such as Sebastian Faul(s, Jeffrey ?eaver, ;illiam Boyd, and :nthony %orowit@ each penned a continuation novel, while 2harlie %igson and 1teve 2ole have been responsible or inspiring the next generation of Bond ans with their ABoung BondC series of novels. Beyond both literature and "lm, the "gure of James Bond has continued to prove his adaptability across various di'erent media, solidi ying Fleming’s popu& lar reputation and drawing in an inclusive an base. From the Daily Mail and Sunday "#press comic strips in the 195Ds, the Bond character has been repro& duced in a number of graphic art orms * ranging rom comic book adaptations of the "lm)s screenplays and serialised cartoons -such as Enited Artists) $a%es &ond $r.0 to graphic novel reissues of the ABoung BondC stories. :dditionally, E9 BB2 radio has produced a number of adaptations of Fleming’s novels, with all& stars casts; innumerable behind-the-scenes documentaries and making-of ea& turettes have been produced or television and ?F? home movie release; the "lm)s main title theme songs have traditionally been recorded by de rigeur mu& sical artists and released to widespread commercial acclaim; and various com& puter plat orm consoles, rom 3lay1tation to Gintendo, have also produced and developed interactive "rst& or third-person video games -either adapted rom one of the Eon "lms or rom an original story0$ Horeover, in terms of Bond)s wider cultural signi"cance, the ranchise has inspired a large number of "lm and television projects that have their roots in Fleming’s spy hero * rom television series such as The Man 'ro% (.N.C.L."., ) Spy, Re%ington Steel -GB20, Mission: )%+ possible, Get S%art -2B10, The Saint, and The Avengers -I5F0, to "lms such as the ?erek Flint series, the Jack >yan series, the ingsman series, the Taken series, the &ourne series, and the overt parody of the :ustin 3ower series. Indeed, so ar-reaching is Bond)s popular cultural appeal that a cursory search of the internet reveals the e!tent to which the Bond phenomenon is "rmly rooted in online andom. From an websites such as 5he James Bond In& ternational Fan 2lub -www$DD8$in o0 to 5he James Bond ?ossier -www$thejames& bonddossier$com0< rom HI67 5he %ome of James Bond DD8 -www$mi6-hJ$com0 2 International Journal of James Bond Studies · Vol. I, Issue 1 · Spring 2017 to 2ommanderBond$net< and rom Iamesbondli estyle.com to 5he 1py 2om& mand -www$hmssweblog.wordpress.com0, it is evident that, rather than being, in particular, a "gure that is representative of mid-twentieth century, post-Second ;orld ;ar social anxieties, James Bond has comfortably entered the twenty&"rst century and has become a vehicle through which more modern and contempor& ary cultural concerns are addressed$ 5hese concerns range rom broad social and historical issues -masculinity and gender politics, racial politics, technological modernity0 to more speci"c geopolitical issues -the pervasive in#uence of the media in To%orro, Never Dies .1998/, the oil crisis in The World is Not "nough .1999/, and the threat of government surveillance in Spectre .KD15/, or example0$ ;hat is also apparent rom Bond)s successful assimilation into the hyper com& munication age is the ardent desire of a large vocal andom to talk about James Bond, and to debate endlessly the many acets of Fleming’s literary wor(s and the "lmic universe. James Bond is not merely an object of Fleming’s time, neither a Arelic of the 2old ;arC nor a AdinosaurC -!oldenEye 19950< rather, this vocal andom, many of whom populate the aforementioned orums, suggests that James Bond is an immanent cultural orce, something live and ever-present * a power ul discursive conduit through which an understanding of late-twenti& eth century and contemporary socio-political currents may be channelled$ Huch an discussion on these orums is preoccupied with trivial debates over who the best Bond actor is or which of the "lms is considered the best, and the comment& ary that is offered of the "lms -and the Bond universe, in general0 is often lacking in structure or critical rigour$ Gevertheless, the many online plat orms that exist to serve the Bond an community suggests the need or a more considered dis& cursive approach not only to Ian Fleming’s wor(s and the Bond novels and "lms, but to the industry that has grown up around the character of James Bond * in& cluding the andom itsel $ In their introduction to the KDD5 collection, )an -le%ing and $a%es &ond* The Cultural .olitics o' //0, 2omentale et al$ defend the cultural study of Bond as little more than a Aglori"ed orm of andomC -xviii0$ ;hile it is probably true that a lot of academic interest in James Bond and Fleming, more broadly, derives rom a combination of personal appreciation and nostalgia or the series, the small but growing number of scholars who have turned their attention to the study of James Bond and the related ranchise have done so not merely because they en& Ioy writing and speaking about James Bond, but because the Bond ranchise provides a particular ramewor( through which scholars may observe and ad& dress shiLs that have occurred in British and international cultural politics rom I. Kinane · James Bond Studies: Evolutions of a Critical Field 3 the post&war period through to the millennium and the immediate post-millen& nial period$ James Bond 1tudies brings an academic rigour to the cultural dis& course surrounding James Bond, offering an array of considered approaches to a popular cultural icon whose ubiJuity within the mainstream has received relat& ively ractional critical attention$ =oing back, the "rst major critical study of James Bond was 9ingsley Amis)s The $a%es &ond Dossier, which was written in 1965 * Iust after Fleming’s death and during the height of si!ties’ ABondmaniaC$ : poet, novelist, and established liter& ary critic, Amis)s academic critiJue of Fleming and Bond steered the course of contemporary scholarship in this "eld, as Amis was one of the "rst literary writers to treat Fleming’s novels and short stories with a degree of academic seri& ousness. Amis)s book was also an early defence of genre "ction, in general, which argued that popular literature and the li(es of Fleming should be read on their own terms, and not as in erior oils to more canonical literature. Following Juickly on Amis)s heels, Emberto Eco)s oL-cited structuralist approach to Flem& ing’s narratives appeared in )l Caso &ond -The &ond A1air0, a collection of essays edited by +co and Mreste ?el Buono in 1966$ Eco)s analysis ocuses largely on certain oppositional relationships within Fleming’s stories - or example, Bond and the villain< Bond and H0 that have provided the later "lm series with its trademar( ormulaic structure -e.g. H briefs Bond on his assignment< N briefs Bond on his latest consignment of gadgetry< Bond con ronts the villain< Bond gets the girls, and so on0$ Further to Eco, 5ony Bennett and Janet ;oolacott)s &ond and &eyond* The .olitical Career o' a .opular 2ero -19480 examines the political overtones