Does any one here think Amis wrote TMWTGG ?
perdogg
Posts: 432MI6 Agent
When I first read The Man with The Golden Gun in the summer of 1989, I thought it seemed somewhat different stylistically from his other novels. However, this awareness sensitivity could have been because I knew the novel was published after Fleming had died. Then when I discovered Kingsley Amis Col Sun in 2006 I read about the almost near controversy.
One of the things I have noticed about Fleming is that Fleming borrowed a lot from Fleming. He was a good story teller, however I was amussed to discovered that Tracy Draco's mother in On Her Majesty's Secret Service was essentially the same woman as Darko Kerim's mother in From Russia with Love from the description of them in both novels.
It seems like the first half of the novel was, with doubt, Fleming's hand. The second half and beyond of the novel when he meets Mary Goodnight in Jamaica appeared to be someone else's hand.
One of the things I have noticed about Fleming is that Fleming borrowed a lot from Fleming. He was a good story teller, however I was amussed to discovered that Tracy Draco's mother in On Her Majesty's Secret Service was essentially the same woman as Darko Kerim's mother in From Russia with Love from the description of them in both novels.
It seems like the first half of the novel was, with doubt, Fleming's hand. The second half and beyond of the novel when he meets Mary Goodnight in Jamaica appeared to be someone else's hand.
"And if I told you that I'm from the Ministry of Defence?" James Bond - The Property of a Lady
Comments
Then again, maybe Amis would have 'fessed up in later life had he done.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
John Cork was the man concerned.
I used to believe (because I'd read this) that Amis did a review and a partial rewrite on TMWTGG, but subsequently I've come to disagree. Fleming wrote all his novels in Jan-Feb of one year, he then spent almost 9 months revising the plot, adding detail like food, guns,locations etc, altering dialogue, developing characters etc. He wrote TMWTGG in Jan 1964 and of course died later that year - before his revisions of TMWTGG could be finished.
That's why the novel is a bit up and down, with some sections feeling alive and quite sensuous, while others are berift of any detail at all. It is a rather lazy novel, as you suggest Fleming borrows a lot from his previous work, but the storytelling and style isn't dramatically different to any of his previous 12 efforts.
Amis by contrast would IMO have provided a more closely tailored persona of all the characters in the novel, especially Bond himself, who is underwritten, and some of the KGB operatives. He would also be interested in the politics and the injustice of society of the Jamaica, which Fleming, while touching on it, clearly is not. This is one of the contrasts between CS and Fleming's novels and is quite apparent in Amis' work.
I think Amis understood the need for Fleming's work to stand on its own merits, however poor it might appear. What I am certain of, is that there was a completed manuscript. And IMO that basically what we're reading on the page; a first draft with minor alterations from Fleming but no extensive re-write & review.
One of the things that I thought was odd, was the strip scene and how graphic it was compared with the strip scene in LALD.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Also SPECTRE, Blofeld, and Tracy was essentially a repeat of SMERSH and Vesper.
http://jamesbond.ajb007.co.uk/a-licence-to-read-tmwtgg/
However, it is given the wrong interpretation, namely used as evidence that Amis 'may have actually re-drafted the novel'. Read the letter carefully - it makes it clear he did not. First of all, Amis mentions he has enclosed a 'list of errors' - these are clearly the sort of thing that is done by copy editors and proofreaders. We don't have Maschler's letter to him, but I think it is very clear that he has been asked to give it a read through, point out any mistakes he sees, and say what he thinks of it, as a Fleming aficionado. He says that 'several passages that need to be rewritten by someone with a feeling and flair for style: this is especially true of the 2½ pages of dialogue that will have to be entirely re-drafted (pp.127-129)'. But he specifically rules out doing such a thing himself:
'There are no doubt all sorts of reasons why we can’t have the book in its original version, the most telling of which is that it probably doesn’t exist any more, if it ever did. I could re-jig it for you, but there are all sorts of reasons against that too. But if you think you could initiate a discreet inquiry about whether there was a buggery thread at some stage, I should be most interested to learn of any confirmation for my brilliant flash of insight.
I’m sending the typescript back under separate cover.'
That's the last mention of the book in Amis' considerable correspondence.
The novel is also rather weak. I suspect that at most a couple of paragraphs were cleaned up here and there - but by someone other than Amis. Amis ruled himself out of doing it. He simply proofread it and spotted a few errors and offered his opinion.
Case closed, surely?
Actually that is EXACTLY the type of thriller that Fleming aspired to.
Bond’s Beretta
The Handguns of Ian Fleming's James Bond