James Bond

James Bond, also known as 007 (pronounced "double-oh seven"), is a fictional British spy introduced by writer Ian Fleming in 1953. Fleming wrote numerous novels and short stories based upon the character and, after his death in 1964, further literary adventures were written by Kingsley Amis, John Pearson, John Gardner, Raymond Benson, and Charlie Higson; in addition, Christopher Wood wrote two screenplay novelizations and other authors have also written various unofficial permutations of the character.

 

 

James Bond is best known from the EON Productions film series. Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman produced most of the official films up until 1974 when Broccoli became the sole producer. His daughter, Barbara Broccoli, and his stepson, Michael G. Wilson, carried on the production duties beginning in 1995.

To date, Bond has been portrayed in the official series by:

Sean Connery
George Lazenby
Roger Moore
Timothy Dalton
Pierce Brosnan
Daniel Craig

Broccoli's family company, Danjaq, L.L.C., has co-owned the James Bond film series with United Artists Corporation since the mid-1970s, when Saltzman sold UA his share of Danjaq. Currently, the Comcast/Sony consortium distributes the series through United Artists' parent, the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer company.

Two other James Bond films were made independent from EON: Casino Royale starring David Niven (1967), and Never Say Never Again, starring Sean Connery (1983). An American television adaptation of Fleming's first novel, Casino Royale also aired in 1954 starring Barry Nelson.

In addition to novels and films, Bond is a prominent character in many computer and video games, comic strips and comic books and has been the subject of many parodies. 

 

The 007 character

Commander James Bond is a member of MI6, the international arm of the British Secret Service, under which he holds the code number "007". The 'double-oh' prefix indicates his discretionary licence to kill in the performance of his duties.

Fleming named James Bond after an ornithologist of the same name who had written A Field Guide to the Birds of the West Indies. Fleming, a keen birdwatcher, was in Jamaica with a copy of Bond's field guide when he chose Bond's name for the lead character of his first novel, Casino Royale in 1953. He later explained that the man's name was "brief, unromantic, Anglo-Saxon, and yet very masculine… just what I needed."

The look of James Bond is famed for being "suave and sophisticated." In Casino Royale Fleming's character Vesper Lynd says of Bond, "He reminds me rather of Hoagy Carmichael, but there is something cold and ruthless." Carmichael would later be the basis as James Bond for artist Mike Grell and his series of James Bond comic books.

Fleming drew inspiration for the Bond character from his personal life. The author was known for his glamorous and licentious lifestyle. Fleming was also inspired by his contemporaries in British Intelligence during World War II, specifically events that were purported to have taken place at the Estoril Casino in Estoril, Portugal where spies of warring regimes mingled with European royalty. The atmosphere inspired Fleming's imagination and set the scene for his very first Bond novel, Casino Royale. (See Inspirations for James Bond.)

Bond is the consummate womaniser, drinker, and smoker. He is also an elite spy, very good at his job.

According to a website detailing Bond’s drinking habits, the agent consumed 102 alcoholic beverages in the films, and well over 300 in Fleming's novels. On film, Bond drinks champagne 32 times, and 20 vodka martinis. In the novels, he has a strong preference for bourbon whiskey.

The literary 007 is a heavy cigarette smoker, at one point smoking up to 70 a day. Bond quit smoking when John Gardner authored the stories in the 1980s. On film, Bond gave up the habit in Tomorrow Never Dies, although he is seen smoking a Cuban cigar in Live and Let Die and Die Another Day.

The cinematic Bond became known as all-knowing and all-powerful. In Goldfinger, he could calculate how many trucks it takes to transport all the gold in Fort Knox, and how long the gold would be radioactive after Goldfinger's bomb had exploded. Bond's "genius" became a running joke during Moore's era, reaching new heights in Moonraker. It was scaled back, if not completely eliminated, during Dalton's tenure as 007.  

James Bond biography (Spoiler alert)

James Bond is the son of a Scottish father, Andrew Bond, and a Swiss mother, Monique Delacroix, both of whom died in a mountain climbing accident in the Aiguilles Rouges, when Bond was 11 years old. James went to live with his Aunt, Miss Charmian Bond, in Kent. Bond's family motto, which was later adopted by James Bond during "Operation Corona" in the novel On Her Majesty's Secret Service is Orbis non sufficit (Latin for "The world is not enough").

Bond's date of birth is much debated; according to John Pearson's James Bond: The Authorized Biography of 007, Bond was born on November 11, 1920; no Fleming novel supports this date. According to an obituary of James Bond in the novel You Only Live Twice, Bond left school when he was 17 years old and joined the Ministry of Defence in 1941. If Bond was 17 in 1941, then he was born in 1924. Fleming also establishes that Bond bought his first car, a Bentley (driven in several early novels and the second Bond film, From Russia With Love), in 1933, contradicting both birthdates—he would have been too young to buy a car had he been born in either 1920 or 1924. Many Fleming biographers agree that Fleming never really intended to write as many James Bond adventures as he did and to keep writing the novels he had to "tinker with Bond's early life" and change dates to ensure Bond was the appropriate age for the service. The issue of the car is one such example. Ian Fleming Publications recognised this issue for their new series of novels featuring Bond as a teenager in the 1930s (Young Bond) and along with its author, Charlie Higson, defined Bond being born in the year 1920.

It is also debated where James Bond was born. According to Pearson, Bond was born near Essen, Germany; however, Charlie Higson, in his novel SilverFin claims Bond was born in Switzerland.

Bond briefly attended Eton College starting at the age of 12, but was expelled after two halves when some "alleged" troubles with one of his maids came to light. In Fleming's short story "From a View to a Kill," Bond admits to losing his virginity on his first visit to Paris at the age of 16. John Gardner's novel Brokenclaw also references this moment in Bond's life. After Eton, Bond attended and continued his education in the prestigious Fettes College in Edinburgh, Scotland. In Octopussy, Fleming writes that Bond briefly attended the University of Geneva. With the exception of Fettes, Bond's attendance at these schools parallels Fleming's own life, as he attended these same schools.

In 1941, Bond lied about his age in order to enter the Royal Navy's Volunteer Reserve during World War II, from which he emerged with the rank of Commander before joining MI6. During his tenure writing James Bond novels in the 1980s and 1990s, John Gardner promoted Bond to Captain, but he was subsequently demoted in Raymond Benson's novels, without explanation.

In both the literary and cinematic versions of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, James Bond marries, but his bride, Teresa di Vicenzo (Tracy), is killed on their wedding day by his archenemy, Ernst Stavro Blofeld; the event resonates in both versions of the character for many years thereafter. In the novels, Bond gets revenge in the following novel, You Only Live Twice, when he by chance comes across Blofeld in Japan, whilst the cinematic Bond takes on Blofeld in Diamonds Are Forever with mixed results.

Bond had one child, by Kissy Suzuki in You Only Live Twice, although he did not know of the boy's existence until sometime later as Kissy did not inform Bond of her pregnancy before he left for Russia and the events described in The Man with the Golden Gun. Exactly when he learned this is not known, however he is aware of his son, James Suzuki, by the time of Raymond Benson's short story "Blast From the Past."

Ian Fleming often described James Bond's physical resemblance to singer Hoagy Carmichael; actor Timothy Dalton (who twice played the character in the late 1980s), is said to most closely resemble this description. In the novels (notably From Russia, With Love), Bond's physical description has generally been consistent: a three-inch, vertical scar on his left cheek (absent from the cinematic version); blue-grey eyes;a "cruel" mouth; short-cut, dark hair, a comma of which falls on his forehead (greying at the temples in John Gardner's novels), and (after Casino Royale) the faint scar of the Russian cyrillic letter "Ш" (SH) on the back of one of his hands (carved by a SMERSH agent).

The literary and cinematic secret agent's attitude towards his job is similar. Although licensed to kill, Bond dislikes killing—resorting to flippant jokes and off-hand remarks as after-the-fact relief, often misinterpreted as cold-bloodedness. Pearson's biography (disputed canonically) suggests Bond first killed as a teenager. The novel Goldfinger begins with Bond's memory haunted by the small-time, Mexican gunman he had killed with his bare hands days earlier. In the films, there is a subtle hint in GoldenEye that he might be haunted so, and, in The World Is Not Enough, he admits that cold-blooded killing is a filthy business. Nonetheless, James Bond kills when needed, and in film commits acts that may be murder in other circumstances (in Dr. No, shooting Professor Dent in the back; killing the unarmed Elektra King in The World Is Not Enough). The literary James Bond was reserved in his licensed killing; there are Fleming works in which Bond does not kill anyone.

The cinematic Bond is famous for ordering his vodka martinis "shaken, not stirred." The literary Bond prefers vodka, but also drinks gin martinis, and in Casino Royale orders a martini that includes both types of liquor. Bond initially calls it "The Vesper" martini, after his lover in that book, Vesper Lynd. Throughout the novels, 007 orders his martinis with a slice of lemon peel (Fleming felt that olives were added by bartenders to decrease the amount of liquor in the drink), though this only occurs on film in Dr. No. In real life, martini bars often dub a martini made "shaken, not stirred" as a "Martini James Bond." (See martini cocktail for a detailed description of how a shaken martini differs from a stirred one). In the novels, most of the drinks that Bond has—beyond Casino Royale—aren't martinis at all.

Age is the notable difference between the literary and the cinematic versions of James Bond. Per Fleming's novel Moonraker, agent 007 faced mandatory retirement from active duty at age 45, while many of the films feature a considerably older hero. Assuming the correctness of either the 1920 or 1924 birthdates, Bond would have been retired between 1964 (when Fleming died) and 1969 (after Colonel Sun's 1968 publication). Pearson's biography suggests Bond continued working for MI6 as a special agent, beyond retirement age, and continued serving as agent 007 into the 1970s. John Gardner's version of James Bond is a man born after Fleming's version, since he remains an active agent in the 1980s and the 1990s, but depicted as not much older than 50. Raymond Benson's version of Bond appears based upon Pierce Brosnan's cinematic portrayal, suggesting Bond was born in the 1950s.

The cinematic James Bond (introduced in 1962) already had a history with MI6. In Dr. No, when reluctantly re-equipped with a 7.65 mm Walther PPK pistol replacing his under-powered .25 calibre Beretta automatic pistol, agent 007 protests, telling M that he has used the weapon for ten years, suggesting he has been a secret agent for at least that long. In the cinematic Dr. No, Bond has just returned from six months in hospital, recovering from wounds suffered in his previous assignment when the Beretta jammed.

Bond in the films is a graduate with a degree in Oriental languages from Cambridge University, as stated in You Only Live Twice—contradicting the novels, and Tomorrow Never Dies, wherein he cannot use a Chinese computer keyboard. Raymond Benson's Tomorrow Never Dies novelisation suggests Bond lied to Miss Moneypenny about his language degree in the earlier film. In The World Is Not Enough, he speaks Russian fluently, claiming he studied at Oxford (while he was impersonating a Russian scientist). Bond can also be seen in other films speaking a variety of different languages.

Although never stated outright, in his books, Fleming drops hints that Bond was smuggled into Hungary during its anti-Soviet uprising in 1956. A popular legend holds that a British secret agent was sent to Hungary to attempt to train the rebels, although they eventually lost. Using his literary licence, Fleming implies that Bond was this agent. 

Books by Ian Fleming

In January 1952, Ian Fleming began work on his first James Bond novel. At the time, Fleming was the Foreign Manager for Kemsley Newspapers, an organisation owned by the London Sunday Times. Upon accepting the job, Fleming asked that he be allowed two months vacation per year. Every year thereafter until his death in 1964, Fleming would retreat for the first two months of the year to his Jamaican house, "Goldeneye" to write a James Bond novel.

1953 Casino Royale
1954 Live and Let Die
1955 Moonraker
1956 Diamonds Are Forever
1957 From Russia With Love
1958 Dr. No
1959 Goldfinger
1960 For Your Eyes Only
1961 Thunderball
1962 The Spy Who Loved Me
1963 On Her Majesty's Secret Service
1964 You Only Live Twice
1965 The Man with the Golden Gun
1966 Octopussy and The Living Daylights


Between 1953 and 1966, Ian Fleming had twelve James Bond novels and two short story collections published, with one novel and one short story collection published posthumously. To this day, it is still debated whether Fleming himself actually finished 1965's The Man with the Golden Gun, as he died very soon after completing the book. His first anthology of short stories, For Your Eyes Only mostly consisted of converted screenplays for a CBS television series based on the character. When the project fell through, Fleming turned them into short stories: (i) "From a View to a Kill", (ii) "For Your Eyes Only", (iii) "Risico", plus two additional stories, "The Hildebrand Rarity" and "Quantum of Solace", which were previously published. The second anthology, Octopussy and The Living Daylights (in many editions titled only Octopussy), originally only contained two short stories, "Octopussy" and "The Living Daylights"; a third story, "The Property of a Lady" was added in the 1967 paperback edition, and a fourth, "007 in New York", was added in 2002.

Post-Fleming James Bond novels

Following Ian Fleming's death in 1964, Glidrose Productions, publishers of the James Bond novels, planned a new book series, credited to the pseudonym "Robert Markham" and written by a rotating series of authors. Ultimately, only one Markham novel saw print, 1968's Colonel Sun by Kingsley Amis. Amis had previously written two books on the world of James Bond, the 1964 essay The James Bond Dossier and the tongue-in-cheek 1965 release The Book of Bond, or Every Man His Own 007 (written under the pseudonym "Lt.-Col. William ("Bill") Tanner", a recurring character in the Bond novels. Amis had also been claimed for many years as the ghost writer of The Man with the Golden Gun, although this has been debunked by numerous sources. (See The controversy over The Man with the Golden Gun.)

In 1973, Ian Fleming biographer John Pearson was commissioned by Glidrose to biograph the fictional character James Bond. Pearson wrote James Bond: The Authorized Biography of 007 in the first person as if meeting the secret agent himself. The book was well-received by aficionados—readers and viewers, alike. Since the book has many discrepancies with Fleming's Bond (for example his birth year), the canonical status of James Bond: The Authorized Biography of 007 is debated among fans—some consider it apocryphal, though at least one publisher issued it as an official novel along with the rest of Fleming's series. Glidrose reportedly considered a new series of novels written by Pearson, but this did not come to pass. Prior to writing this, Pearson had written an early biography of Ian Fleming, The Life of Ian Fleming.

In 1977, the film The Spy Who Loved Me was released and was subsequently novelised and published by Glidrose due to the radical difference between the script and Fleming's novel of the same name. This would happen again with 1979's Moonraker. Both novelisations were written by screenwriter Christopher Wood and were the first official novelisations, although technically, Fleming's Thunderball was a novelisation having been based on scripts by himself, Kevin McClory, and Jack Whittingham (although it predated the movie), and the For Your Eyes Only collection was also, for the most part, based upon unproduced scripts.

In the 1980s, the series was finally revived with new novels by John Gardner; between 1981 and 1996, he wrote fourteen James Bond novels and two screenplay novelisations, surpassing Fleming's original output. The biggest change in Gardner's series was updating 007's world to the 1980s; however, it would keep the characters the same age as they were in Fleming's novels. Generally Gardner's series is considered a success although their canonical status is disputed.

1981 Licence Renewed
1982 For Special Services
1983 Icebreaker
1984 Role of Honour
1986 Nobody Lives For Ever
1987 No Deals, Mr. Bond
1988 Scorpius    
1989 Win, Lose or Die
1989 Licence to Kill (novelisation)
1990 Brokenclaw
1991 The Man from Barbarossa
1992 Death is Forever
1993 Never Send Flowers
1994 SeaFire
1995 GoldenEye (novelisation)
1996 COLD

In 1996, John Gardner retired from writing James Bond books due to ill health, and American Raymond Benson quickly replaced him. As a James Bond novelist, Raymond Benson was initially controversial for being American, and for ignoring much of the continuity established by Gardner. Benson had previously written The James Bond Bedside Companion, a book dedicated to Ian Fleming, the official novels, and the films. The book was initially released in 1984 and later updated in 1988. Benson also contributed to the creation of several modules in the popular James Bond 007 role-playing game in the 1980s. Benson wrote six James Bond novels, three novelisations, and three short stories.

1997 "Blast From the Past" (short story)
1997 Zero Minus Ten
1997 Tomorrow Never Dies (novelisation)
1998 The Facts of Death
1999 "Midsummer Night's Doom" (short story)
1999 "Live at Five" (short story)
1999 The World Is Not Enough (novelisation)
1999 High Time to Kill
2000 Doubleshot
2001 Never Dream of Dying
2002 The Man with the Red Tattoo
2002 Die Another Day (novelisation)

Benson abruptly resigned as Bond novelist at the end of 2002, despite having previously announced plans to write a short story collection. Low sales figures for the books, and plans by Ian Fleming Publications to focus on reissuing Fleming's original novels for the 50th anniversary of the character, were among reasons speculated by fans as to why Benson departed. The year 2003 marked the first year since 1980 that a new James Bond novel had not been published.

Young Bond

In April 2004, Ian Fleming Publications (Glidrose) announced a new series of James Bond books. Instead of continuing from where Raymond Benson ended in 2002, the new series would feature James Bond as a thirteen-year-old boy attending Eton College. Written by Charlie Higson (The Fast Show) the series is expected to align with the adult Bond's back-story established by Fleming and Fleming only. Since the concept was announced the series has taken heavy criticism for being aimed at the "Harry Potter audience" and has been seen by some as a desperate attempt to find a new audience for Bond. Regardless, the first novel became a bestseller in the United Kingdom and was released to good reviews. A second novel is due for release in January 2006. The series is currently planned out for five novels according to Charlie Higson.

2005 SilverFin
2006 Blood Fever

Source and additional information: James Bond