Introduction
This is part of Diamonds in the Rough, a section of the free ebook Need to Know, which can be read on this website or downloaded here.
This book is a short collection of six articles about the cinematic and literary worlds of Ian Fleming and James Bond. Both have, of course, already been covered in scores of other books, articles and documentaries, and one would be forgiven for thinking there’s no ground left to cover. But in the last few years, I’ve investigated some lesser-known, and in some cases completely unknown, facets of Ian Fleming’s world, and I hope found a few diamonds lurking in the rough. Some of the material in this book has previously been published in newspapers, magazines and online, but all of it has been revised and in some cases greatly expanded.
The opening article, Gold Dust, is about my hunt for Per Fine Ounce, the lost James Bond novel by South African thriller-writer Geoffrey Jenkins. This first appeared in issue 2 of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang magazine back in 2005, and I’ve made just a few revisions. The full draft of the book has sadly still not been found, but Jenkins’ estate published a novel with the same title by Peter Vollmer in September 2014 as a result of this story, inspired by the surviving material.
Uncut Gem builds on research I published in The Sunday Times in 2010, examining the attempts to film Ian Fleming’s non-fiction book The Diamond Smugglers. I’ve gone into a lot more detail here than in previously published versions, about the background of the book, the contents of the screenplay I unearthed, and the prolonged efforts to turn the property into a serious rival to the Bond films. John Collard’s family very kindly gave me access to a huge amount of material, including private correspondence, IDSO agents’ reports, and the complete manuscript of Collard’s book.
In Commando Bond, I look at how Ian Fleming incorporated elements of real life into his novels, and explore the numerous references and allusions to special forces. Fleming’s use of real operations had a curious cinematic echo after his death, as I explore in Black Tie Spy, an extension of an article I originally submitted to The Sunday Telegraph. The seed for my research here was planted when I was writing a novel. I’d plotted out a chapter set during the Second World War in which my protagonist, a British secret agent, is sent on a mission to an island in the Baltic. But as I came to write it, I realized I was unsure how he should reach the island. Would he have been sent by parachute? By submarine? Or some other way? I reached for one of my most thumbed books, M.R.D. Foot’s official history of the Special Operations Executive, to refresh my memory on how that organization had inserted secret agents behind enemy lines during the war. To my surprise, I found myself reading a passage I hadn’t paid sufficient notice to before, which mentioned an operation undertaken by MI6 in 1941.Those few lines took me on a fascinating journey into the origins of one of the best loved moments in modern cinema: the opening scene of Goldfinger.
For Smersh vs Smersh, I hop over to the other side of the Iron Curtain to compare the real organization of that name with the one Fleming created for his novels, tracing his research into Soviet intelligence. Who inspired Rosa Klebb and Red Grant? This is where you’ll find out.
Finally, Bourne Yesterday, first published on my website, looks at Ian Fleming’s influence on the Jason Bourne series, and the influences on his own work.
So please, grab your wetsuit and Champion harpoon gun and join me as I dive in to the world of Ian Fleming and James Bond.
Jeremy Duns
Mariehamn, December 2014
Note: this section now includes Rogue Royale and Catch-007.