A Licence To Read: On Her Majesty's Secret Service

With the interest surrounding Ian Fleming and the upcoming centenary, we are pleased to present the return of 'A Licence to Read'.

In the spotlight of this article is On Her Majesty's Secret Service, one of Ian Fleming's most accomplished James Bond books, which deftly mixes espionage, action and the one true love story of the Bond novels.

Fancy Cover

Fleming's eleventh novel was first published by Jonathan Cape on April 1, 1963. The first edition has black boards, white design printed on front cover; gilt lettering and logo stamped on spine. Once again, the jacket featured artwork by the recently deceased Richard Chopping.
A Special edition signed by Fleming, with a full colour frontispiece, was also issued by Jonathan Cape. This edition was the only Fleming-signed limited edition released, and was limited to 250 copies, although some reports indicate that 293 copies were in fact printed.
The first American edition was published in September of that year by the New American Library.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service continues the SPECTRE storyline from Thunderball, as Bond continues to hunt down Ernst Stavro Blofeld. As it turns out, Blofeld has had surgery and taken the identity of Comte Balthazar de Bleuville. Bond travels to Piz Gloria, Blofeld's alpine retreat, disguised as Sir Hillary Bray of the College of Arms. Bond finds that Blofeld has set up a clinic for cure of allergies, which is merely a front for Blofeld's plot to launch a biological warfare attack.

Love For Breakfast

Running alongside the Blofeld plot is another, equally important storyline. Bond first meets a suicidal Contessa Teresa (Tracy) di Vicenso on his annual trip to Royale-les-Eaux (see Casino Royale). After Bond romances her and stops her attempted suicide, the two of them are captured by Teresa's father, who happens to be the head of the Union Corse - a French/Corsican mafia-like organisation. As Bond falls in love with his daughter, Marc Ange Draco helps Bond with information to track down Blofeld, in the hope that Bond will marry Teresa and tame his wayward child. Tracy is probably Ian Fleming's most important female creation - the woman who (almost) turns Bond into a one-woman-man.

'Irma La Not So Douce', 'Princess Ruby' and 'The Man From Ag. And Fish'

On Her Majesty's Secret Service also contains some of Ian Fleming's most memorable supporting characters. Aside from the main characters, ie Bond, Blofeld, Tracy and Draco, there is an excellent supporting cast. The wonderfully named Sable Basilisk is Bond's contact at the College of Arms. There is also the ammusing, if somewhat annoying Griffon Or, who is a rather over-enthusiastic genealogist. We also see M's home, called Quarterdeck, and meet Hammond who was M's Chief Petty Officer and now is runs M's home. Irma Bunt is also a memorable villainess - as the chapter heading describes her: "Irma La Not So Douce"!

The centrepiece location in the novel is the Swiss alps and in particular, Blofeld's sanitarium 'Piz Gloria'. A wonderfully isolated hideout, the perfect place from which to launch his biological warfare attack. The ingenuity of his plan is that the bacteria will be released by his allergy patients - all of them beautiful girls under hypnosis.

Despite the popularity of the book amongst James Bond fans, Ian Fleming himself wasn't very happy with it. In Andrew Lycett's biography - Ian Fleming: The Man Behind James Bond, Fleming is quoted saying, "It is really ghastly - I have never made so many mistakes in a book in my life." Well these mistakes don't seem to have put off the generations of fans who have had the pleasure of reading the novel.

An interesting point is that On Her Majesty's Secret Service was the first Bond novel published after the release of the first Bond film, Dr. No. The novel even has a direct reference to Bond's first cinematic adventure - while at Piz Gloria, Bond meets none other than Dr. No's Bond girl, Ursula Andress! The whole James Bond phenomenon was gaining pace. Cape arranged for life size models of James Bond, to be prominently displayed in WH Smith, and also promoted a competition to find the best Bond related bookshop window in Britain. This, alongside publicity for the forthcoming movie From Russia With Love meant assured success for the novel.

Personal Opinions

The novel is wonderfully engaging, and although the pace slows down dramatically for several chapters towards the end, the piece as a whole is wonderfully paced. There is a bit of Bond nostalgia with the return to Royale at the beginning, and the plot of the novel is one of Fleming's best. The fact that the film version kept the plot virtually intact is testament to this, as this is one of the few Bond novels to have been faithfully translated onto film. The character of Tracy is perhaps the most fascinating of Bond's women. Although the story is somewhat different from the other Bond books, the end result is one of the most satisfying reads in the Bond series
On an emotional level, the death of Tracy is one of the really moving moments in literature. In Casino Royale 007 feels betrayed by Vesper and it closes with the imortal line "Yes, dammit, I said 'was'. The bitch is dead now." The anger and raw emotion he is feeling is understood -but in On Her Majesty's Secret Service the emotion is so much more heartfelt and the reader empathises with Bond as the sheer horror of what has happened grips them. To have your newlywed wife ripped from you like that is obviously devastating. The novel has everything you want in a Bond story and although there may be the odd hole in the plot you really see a humanised 007 - Once Bond is stripped of some of that humanity you get an even blunter instrument which makes you understand why Fleming wrote this tale.

Critics' Opinions

"Solid Fleming" - Herald Tribune

"You can't argue with success . . . but they aren't writing bad books like they used to" - New York Times

"We all know its formula fiction, don't we? But that doesn't keep us from getting a fine surge of adrenalin in our veins from this novel" - Miles A Smith, AP Books and The Arts

"He's getting a little older. He's starting to look like his middle-aged creator. The time was in Goldfinger, when he could convert a life-long lesbian to heterosexuality in a paragraph or two, but now the lady yields only after he makes good her 40 million-franc gambling debt. Not quite old Bond, that... Fleming's book will not dissapoint his millions of fans - as did his last one, The Spy Who Loved Me" - Washington Post

"Fleming at his urbanely murderous best, a noteable chapter in the saga of James Bond." - Houston Chronicle

Cover Gallery

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