After the war was behind him and his service as a Commander of British Naval Intelligence was through, Ian Fleming settled in Jamaica at his new digs he called Goldeneye. It was here that the first Bond thriller Casino Royale was written at the age of forty-four. Before a diet of gin and sixty cigarettes a day drew a close to his talents in 1964 at age fifty-six, over forty million copies of thirteen Bond novels had been sold. Octopussy and The Living Daylights, a compilation of four 007 short stories, represents book number fourteen in the 2004 Penguin softcover James Bond series reissue.

Octopussy (1965)

At first glance, Major Dexter Smythe appears to have it all. Though in poor health for a man in his early fifties, the war veteran and recent widower plays the role of perfect gentleman at his opulent Jamaican oceanfront estate. A man of means and many vices, the leisurely sun-drenched afternoons involve his daily dive to visit the various and colorful fish he sees often enough to have invented equally colorful names for. His most fascinating tenants are the highly poisonous Scorpion fish and a reclusive octopus otherwise known as Octopussy.

Major Smythe’s exploits as a Royal Marine during the Second World War were legendary among his countrymen. His knowledge and experience with counter-intelligence made him privy to all manner of top-secret information. In wartime, the rule-of-law can often be as much a victim as any private citizen, with the honor system of conscience the biggest and saddest casualty of all. For the immediate future, the chickens of Major Dexter Smythe’s days long past are gathering for a belated homecoming roost in the form of one Commander James Bond.

James Bond is a mere condiment to the Fleming feast that is Octopussy. His appearance here could be handled by any fictional flatfoot, as Bond serves as mere pre-and-post bracket to the Major’s story relayed via flashback. Told with an autobiographical touch, the ailing Major parallels the author’s own physical decline in a fine retelling of the classic sin in haste, repent at leisure storyline. Fleming’s acute sense of irony provides the satisfying twists that made him the envy of peers such as Raymond Chandler.

The Property of a Lady (1963)

The weakest of the lot, this story finds Bond infiltrating Sotheby’s auction house for the once-in-a-lifetime sale of a bejewelled orb designed in 1917 by Carl Faberge. This Russian treasure has the world of espionage abuzz with rumor and supposition as to the variety and quality of customer the event will draw.

This rather conversational piece has Fleming layering-in some interesting intelligence procedural protocol, but plays more like a comedy of manners, without much comedy. Fleming the misogynist (with Bond’s inner thoughts as catalyst) appears with his “women as ugly-ducklings are hell-on-wheels” speech; well-written but dated beyond recognition. Bond’s boss “M” plays a significant role here, as does M’s secretary Mary Goodnight. Think of The Property of a Lady as the brief and nondescript intermission between two classic acts.

The Living Daylights (1962)

This is the stuff we plunked our money down to witness. We get a wild ride here with Bond on his way to Berlin for some Cold War target practice between tourist-y walks and knocked-back whiskey shots. The life of a 007 agent requires nerves of steel and Bond’s are tempered through training and experience. Here he becomes the key to an intricate and smoothly organized plan to assist a fellow agent’s return to the west in possession of vital Soviet intelligence. His mission - to remove all obstacles to the safe return of agent Number 272.

The long-term attraction to Fleming’s Bond is in the unexpected imperfections that shape his character. As he dons his telephoto scope to size-up the Badlands between west and east, he strays to the sidewalk appearance of an attractive all-girl orchestra from his vantage several stories up. He will go on report for the double-Scotch downed before the mission begins, but in spite of the faults that make him human, he has free rein in his indispensability borne from precision and adherence to duty. The Living Daylights is Ian Fleming at the top of his game in abbreviated and accelerated form.

007 In New York (1963)

When this story was first published in the New York Herald Tribune, its anti-New York sentiments prompted a request from the publisher for Fleming to add a disclaimer as a preface. The line “...a friend of mine with the dull name of James Bond, whose tastes and responses are not always my own...” in effect told readers that if they had a grievance, they should take it up with the most famous secret agent the world has ever known.

Back before New York’s Idlewild became Kennedy International Airport, James Bond flew in as messenger-boy, with an eye for some rest and relaxation after his contact was made and his job complete. His thoughts are the crux of the piece, with a condemnation of airport customs, American food, roads, landscape, cars and people. But all is not lost among the great unwashed, for those famous dry Martinis, exquisite smoked salmon and the Oyster bar at the Grand Central await, along with his favorite lady-friend, the beautiful if somewhat overly-hygienic Solange. Even the mission is comical - right down to the ironic closing line. 007 in New York is the relaxed and funny Bond we would never quite see again, as the irreplaceable yet fragile Ian Fleming would soon fail to write a similar happy ending to his own mortal stance.

Octopussy and The Living Daylights
Author: Ian Fleming
Penguin Reissue (2004)
The Penguin Group
375 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.penguin.com
ISBN: 0142003298

Recommended: Yes