p. 20 ILLUMINATUS, PART 1
ILLMINATI PROJECT MEMO #4
7/24
J.M. :
Here's a letter that appeared in Playboy a few years ago ("The Playboy Advisor," Playboy, April, 1969, page 62-64):
I recently heard an old man of right-wing views - a friend of my grandparents - assert that the current wave of assassinations in America is the work of a secret society called the Illuminati. He said that the Illuminati have existed throughout history, own the international banking cartels, have all been 32nd-degree Masons and were known to Ian Fleming, who portrayed them as Spectre in his James Bond books - for which the Illuminati did away with Mr. Fleming. At first all this seemed like a paranoid delusion to me. Then I read in The New Yorker that Alan Chapman, one of Jim Garrison's investigators i the New Orleans probe of the John Kennedy assassination, believes that the Illuminati really exist.....
Playboy, of course, puts down the whole idea as ridiculious and give the standard Encyclopedia Britannica story that the Illuminati went out of business in 1785.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Monday, October 19, 2009
.jpg)
James Bond & Ian Fleming meet
James Bond and Ian Fleming meet for the first time at Goldeneye, Orcabessa, Jamaica.
Photo: Mrs. Mary Bond
Saturday, June 20, 2009
JAMAICA for Beginners
JAMAICA For Beginners
By Bill Kelly
Atlantic City Monthly Casino Journal
April, 1990
Sitting at the mushroom bar by the pool of the Wyndham Rose Hall Hotel, Montego Bay, Jamaica, I concluded that it doesn’t take long to learn everything you have to know about Jamaica to enjoy it to its fullest.
Even if you’ve never been there before – so you can’t live up to the pitch to ‘come back’ – you have an idea what Jamaica is all about – Sea, sun, beautiful beaches, calypsos – reggae and no problem, mon. As far as I’m concerned, it ranks as the top contender in my own “as close to paradise” ratings war, a contest I’ve just begun.
For starters, it wasn’t my choice destination. I only went because my high school buddy Mark insisted I join him for a four-day weekend, Friday ‘til Monday. He would put the flight and hotel on his credit card, and I could pay him back later when I had the dough. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. I had to get out of Dodge.
Round trip on Air Jamaica, at $220, was less than many flights to Florida. No passport, no problem. Just bring a birth certificate and photo ID.
Mark said he chose the Wyndham Hotel adjacent to the historic Rose Hall Great House, because it had a golf course. The plan was for him to play golf on Saturday while I hired a car to visit Goldeneye, the north shore villa where English spy-thriller writer Ian Fleming penned his James Bond – 007 novels.
Bob Marley tunes graced the Air Jamaica cabin as we touched down in Montego Bay, which is the island’s second largest city after the capitol of Kingston. An island dancing and singing troupe greeted us at the gangplank, and a cashier changed our yankee dollars to Jamaican at 7 for 1.
As the taxi took us the ten miles east to our hotel, it was apparent that they were still making repairs after the devastating storm Gilbert hit, on September 12, 1988, leaving fifty people dead and much of the island in ruins. One wing of our hotel was still being renovated, and that which was open was relatively new.
If you visit Jamaica, you have three basic choices of accommodations: You can stay at a hotel like the Wyndham, and pay as you go, or try an all-inclusive resort, which includes everything, including meals and drinks from the bar, and for one set price. In either case, little cash changes hands on the hotel premises or compound, it seems. They either put it on your hotel tab or ring it up on your credit card.
The third choice is renting, through a travel agent, one of the small, beachside villas, like Goldeneye, or something less exclusive, which nonetheless comes with a maid, cook and resident native guide.
Many of the hotels and resorts were at one time winter homes and plantations of aristocratic English families, and each, like Rose Hall, has a unique story. Rose Hall for instance, was once the home of a women who killed each of her three husbands.
The Tryall Club, in Montego Bay, was owned by the late Sir William Stephenson, the paymaster who Churchill dubbed “INTREPID.” Tryall sports a world-class golf course.
Then there’s the Ruins, at Ocho Rios, now a restaurant built around waterfalls.
When we arrived at our hotel, I realized that the two best things about Jamaica for Americans are that it’s in the same time zone and the locals speak English at their native language. The rest of Jamaica still gives you the feeling that you’re visiting an exotic foreign port. And you are.
The bell captain who arranged for a car to drive me to Goldeneye on Saturday flashed an engaging smile as he promised me the best driver on the island. I had to laugh when I focused in on his name tag – Billy Love, a name that Fleming would have certainly appropriated for one of his characters.
It was cloudy and rainy on Friday afternoon when we arrived, but it was a beautiful sunny day when my driver, Douglas Scott, began the 74-mile drive east along the main coast road, which circumnavigates the island.
The first stop was to visit his friend, the Bush Doctor, who sold me herb medicine for sunburn, arthritis and a sex potion, all for $40 Jamaican, or $5.50 American. But he never told me whether the sex potion was ingested or applied locally.
Other tourist attractions along the route included Columbus Park, where Chris put ashore in 1494, nearly 500 years ago. Then there’s the Bauxite plant where James Bond tangled with SMERSH agents in the first 007 flick Dr. No.
We also passed a dozen all-inclusive resorts, like Jamaica Jamaica, Couples, Boscobel Beach and Hedonism. Each has beach view rooms, without TV (which you don’t miss), but plenty of food, sailing, snorkeling, pool and disco. Some have a nude beach, others welcome children.
After a few inquiries, we found Goldeney, a hundred yards off the main road, not far from the sleepy fishing village of Orcabessa. I took some pictures of the house and the beach, both of which have been kept pretty much the same as when Fleming wrote there. It is not however, a public tourist attraction like the nearby villa Firefly, Noel Coward’s home.
Back at the hotel on Sunday, I took a snorkel dive off the nearby reef, only forty yards from the beach and came up with a beautiful red and black conch shell that I thought would look good on my fireplace. I took off my mask, and looked around for a Bond girl in a bikini to show off my prize. But to my surprise, it was still alive, and something was squirming around inside it, so I chucked it back.
We took a taxi to town that night, requesting the island best drive, Mister Scott, and dropped off Billy Love, who finished work for the day and came along for the ride.
Scott and Love suggested that we try a local dish at Pork Pia, where we had the pork jerk and chicken jerk ($24 Jamaican, $3.50 American), with a bottle of Red Stripe beer. Jerk is the description of the way it is cooked, barbecue style, between a flame and burning wood above the meat that gives it a unique smokey flavor.
At the Cave disco, we met up with a contingent of Boston College students on spring break. Having been shunned at Fort Lauderdale and finding Key West too expensive, they found Montego Bay more accommodating. But after a while, dancing to the island’s number-one song “Twice My Age,” sung by an enchanting girl in reggae style with the refrain, “I’m in love with a man twice my age,” we went out to the beachside bar to sip Red Stripe with some Swedish sisters on a holiday, as the half-moon slipped into Montego Bay.
The next day, after a quick snorkel dive to the reef, we asked Mr. Scott to drive us to the airport for our return flight. I told Scott the next time we return, we want to circle the island via the main coast road, from Montego Bay to Kingston, where Morgan the Pirate’s Port Royale is located. Then on to Negril, which Fleming said is the most beautiful beach in the world.
As expected, Scott replied, “No problem, mon.” And he meant it.
By Bill Kelly
Atlantic City Monthly Casino Journal
April, 1990
Sitting at the mushroom bar by the pool of the Wyndham Rose Hall Hotel, Montego Bay, Jamaica, I concluded that it doesn’t take long to learn everything you have to know about Jamaica to enjoy it to its fullest.
Even if you’ve never been there before – so you can’t live up to the pitch to ‘come back’ – you have an idea what Jamaica is all about – Sea, sun, beautiful beaches, calypsos – reggae and no problem, mon. As far as I’m concerned, it ranks as the top contender in my own “as close to paradise” ratings war, a contest I’ve just begun.
For starters, it wasn’t my choice destination. I only went because my high school buddy Mark insisted I join him for a four-day weekend, Friday ‘til Monday. He would put the flight and hotel on his credit card, and I could pay him back later when I had the dough. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. I had to get out of Dodge.
Round trip on Air Jamaica, at $220, was less than many flights to Florida. No passport, no problem. Just bring a birth certificate and photo ID.
Mark said he chose the Wyndham Hotel adjacent to the historic Rose Hall Great House, because it had a golf course. The plan was for him to play golf on Saturday while I hired a car to visit Goldeneye, the north shore villa where English spy-thriller writer Ian Fleming penned his James Bond – 007 novels.
Bob Marley tunes graced the Air Jamaica cabin as we touched down in Montego Bay, which is the island’s second largest city after the capitol of Kingston. An island dancing and singing troupe greeted us at the gangplank, and a cashier changed our yankee dollars to Jamaican at 7 for 1.
As the taxi took us the ten miles east to our hotel, it was apparent that they were still making repairs after the devastating storm Gilbert hit, on September 12, 1988, leaving fifty people dead and much of the island in ruins. One wing of our hotel was still being renovated, and that which was open was relatively new.
If you visit Jamaica, you have three basic choices of accommodations: You can stay at a hotel like the Wyndham, and pay as you go, or try an all-inclusive resort, which includes everything, including meals and drinks from the bar, and for one set price. In either case, little cash changes hands on the hotel premises or compound, it seems. They either put it on your hotel tab or ring it up on your credit card.
The third choice is renting, through a travel agent, one of the small, beachside villas, like Goldeneye, or something less exclusive, which nonetheless comes with a maid, cook and resident native guide.
Many of the hotels and resorts were at one time winter homes and plantations of aristocratic English families, and each, like Rose Hall, has a unique story. Rose Hall for instance, was once the home of a women who killed each of her three husbands.
The Tryall Club, in Montego Bay, was owned by the late Sir William Stephenson, the paymaster who Churchill dubbed “INTREPID.” Tryall sports a world-class golf course.
Then there’s the Ruins, at Ocho Rios, now a restaurant built around waterfalls.
When we arrived at our hotel, I realized that the two best things about Jamaica for Americans are that it’s in the same time zone and the locals speak English at their native language. The rest of Jamaica still gives you the feeling that you’re visiting an exotic foreign port. And you are.
The bell captain who arranged for a car to drive me to Goldeneye on Saturday flashed an engaging smile as he promised me the best driver on the island. I had to laugh when I focused in on his name tag – Billy Love, a name that Fleming would have certainly appropriated for one of his characters.
It was cloudy and rainy on Friday afternoon when we arrived, but it was a beautiful sunny day when my driver, Douglas Scott, began the 74-mile drive east along the main coast road, which circumnavigates the island.
The first stop was to visit his friend, the Bush Doctor, who sold me herb medicine for sunburn, arthritis and a sex potion, all for $40 Jamaican, or $5.50 American. But he never told me whether the sex potion was ingested or applied locally.
Other tourist attractions along the route included Columbus Park, where Chris put ashore in 1494, nearly 500 years ago. Then there’s the Bauxite plant where James Bond tangled with SMERSH agents in the first 007 flick Dr. No.
We also passed a dozen all-inclusive resorts, like Jamaica Jamaica, Couples, Boscobel Beach and Hedonism. Each has beach view rooms, without TV (which you don’t miss), but plenty of food, sailing, snorkeling, pool and disco. Some have a nude beach, others welcome children.
After a few inquiries, we found Goldeney, a hundred yards off the main road, not far from the sleepy fishing village of Orcabessa. I took some pictures of the house and the beach, both of which have been kept pretty much the same as when Fleming wrote there. It is not however, a public tourist attraction like the nearby villa Firefly, Noel Coward’s home.
Back at the hotel on Sunday, I took a snorkel dive off the nearby reef, only forty yards from the beach and came up with a beautiful red and black conch shell that I thought would look good on my fireplace. I took off my mask, and looked around for a Bond girl in a bikini to show off my prize. But to my surprise, it was still alive, and something was squirming around inside it, so I chucked it back.
We took a taxi to town that night, requesting the island best drive, Mister Scott, and dropped off Billy Love, who finished work for the day and came along for the ride.
Scott and Love suggested that we try a local dish at Pork Pia, where we had the pork jerk and chicken jerk ($24 Jamaican, $3.50 American), with a bottle of Red Stripe beer. Jerk is the description of the way it is cooked, barbecue style, between a flame and burning wood above the meat that gives it a unique smokey flavor.
At the Cave disco, we met up with a contingent of Boston College students on spring break. Having been shunned at Fort Lauderdale and finding Key West too expensive, they found Montego Bay more accommodating. But after a while, dancing to the island’s number-one song “Twice My Age,” sung by an enchanting girl in reggae style with the refrain, “I’m in love with a man twice my age,” we went out to the beachside bar to sip Red Stripe with some Swedish sisters on a holiday, as the half-moon slipped into Montego Bay.
The next day, after a quick snorkel dive to the reef, we asked Mr. Scott to drive us to the airport for our return flight. I told Scott the next time we return, we want to circle the island via the main coast road, from Montego Bay to Kingston, where Morgan the Pirate’s Port Royale is located. Then on to Negril, which Fleming said is the most beautiful beach in the world.
As expected, Scott replied, “No problem, mon.” And he meant it.
James Bond and Ian Fleming
THE ATLANTIC CITY SUN
Friday, January 16, 1981
OFF BOARDWALK
By William Kelly
Will the real James Bond please stand up?
In the second week of January, 1952, Ian Fleming arrived at his Jamaican estate. After taking a swim in his private lagoon, he closed the jalousies of his workroom and sat down in front of his portable typewriter. Taking a cigarette from his oxidized gold case, he lit it, inhaled deeply and began typing:
“The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning. Then the soul erosion produced by high tension becomes unbearable and the senses awake and revolt from it.”
“James Bond suddenly knew that he was tired. He always knew when his body or his mind had enough and he always acted on the knowledge. This helped him avoid mistakes and the sensual bluntness that breeds mistakes…”
Thus began the “spy story to end all spy stories.” The legend of the world’s most famous spy. A story that remains incomplete.
Fleming first hinted that Bond really existed in an interview in Rogue Magazine in 1961. he referred to “the distinguished American ornithologist James Bond.”
Then after Fleming’s death, John Pearson published “The Life of Ian Fleming,” in which he states Fleming took the name for his hero from the author of the book, “The Birds of the West Indies.”
Another reference to Bond mentioned that he served as curator of Birds at the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. In center city Philadelphia, the Academy is a child’s playground. School children run about the tiled halls lined with exhibits of stuffed animals in glass cages. An older member of the predominately young staff remembers Bond.
“He is retired. Yes, I think there is a copy of his book in the vault in the library.”
The Princeton Antique Book Store in Atlantic City located a first American edition of “The Birds of the West Indies.” On the back cover is a picture of Bond in the field, dissecting a bird. The first thing that strikes you is the uncanny resemblance to Sean Connery, the Scottish actor who played him in the early films. Tall, thin, weith an angular face, he has a serious look about him.
In 1953, James Bond married Mary Wickham, the publisher of a small Philadelphia weekly newspaper (The Chestnut Hill Local). By 1954 he was still relatively unknown outside the fraternity of ornithologists, when early editions of Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale began to get around.
Then came the films and Fleming’s novel-a-year pace, and increasing notoriety.
After John Pearson wrote Fleming’s biography, Mrs. Bond began writing books about her travels with her husband. She wrote “Far Afield in the Caribbean,” subtitled, “The Migratory Flights of a Naturalists’ Wife,” and “How 007 Really Got His Name.” Now there is her recently published “To James Bond, With Love,” (1980 Sutter House Press)
In the last story he wrote, “Octopussy,” Fleming portrays an aging, retired intelligence officer who 007 visits at a beachfront home on the north shore of Jamaica.
On February 5, 1964 James and Mary Bond visited the ailing Fleming at his home in Jamaica. A photo of the two men shows them standing at the doorstep, with Fleming’s Jamaican housekeeper Violet in the background.
The occasion was described as a memorable, dramatic, unrehearsed, spur of the moment affair.” Fleming gave Bond a copy of his latest novel and inscribed it with the note, “To the real Bond, from the thief of his identity, Ian Fleming, Feb. 5, 1964 – A Great Day!”
Five months later Ian Fleming died. Mrs. Bond says that her husband has always resented the invasion of his privacy by the fuss Fleming created, but “I have tried to put a good face on the matter, to have some fun of it when possible.”
Now, the world can rest assured, secure in the knowledge that James Bond has quietly out-lived the image maker as well as his comic book adversaries.
At the age of 81, Bond is living discreetly with his wife at the their penthouse apartment in the suburbs of Philadelphia. A retired gentleman, Bond enjoys golf and his work with birds. He vacations seasonally (at Desert Island) Maine in the summer and the islands in the winter, not unlike his feathered friends.
Occasionally he will receive a visitor who inquires about the habitat of some obscure tropical birds.
Bond should be remembered as Fleming so precisely portrayed him – sitting at the bar of his favorite West Indian haunt, taking a drag from his gold-ringed Morlan special, and self assuredly order a dry-double vodka martini – shaken, not sturred.”
Friday, January 16, 1981
OFF BOARDWALK
By William Kelly
Will the real James Bond please stand up?
In the second week of January, 1952, Ian Fleming arrived at his Jamaican estate. After taking a swim in his private lagoon, he closed the jalousies of his workroom and sat down in front of his portable typewriter. Taking a cigarette from his oxidized gold case, he lit it, inhaled deeply and began typing:
“The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning. Then the soul erosion produced by high tension becomes unbearable and the senses awake and revolt from it.”
“James Bond suddenly knew that he was tired. He always knew when his body or his mind had enough and he always acted on the knowledge. This helped him avoid mistakes and the sensual bluntness that breeds mistakes…”
Thus began the “spy story to end all spy stories.” The legend of the world’s most famous spy. A story that remains incomplete.
Fleming first hinted that Bond really existed in an interview in Rogue Magazine in 1961. he referred to “the distinguished American ornithologist James Bond.”
Then after Fleming’s death, John Pearson published “The Life of Ian Fleming,” in which he states Fleming took the name for his hero from the author of the book, “The Birds of the West Indies.”
Another reference to Bond mentioned that he served as curator of Birds at the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. In center city Philadelphia, the Academy is a child’s playground. School children run about the tiled halls lined with exhibits of stuffed animals in glass cages. An older member of the predominately young staff remembers Bond.
“He is retired. Yes, I think there is a copy of his book in the vault in the library.”
The Princeton Antique Book Store in Atlantic City located a first American edition of “The Birds of the West Indies.” On the back cover is a picture of Bond in the field, dissecting a bird. The first thing that strikes you is the uncanny resemblance to Sean Connery, the Scottish actor who played him in the early films. Tall, thin, weith an angular face, he has a serious look about him.
In 1953, James Bond married Mary Wickham, the publisher of a small Philadelphia weekly newspaper (The Chestnut Hill Local). By 1954 he was still relatively unknown outside the fraternity of ornithologists, when early editions of Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale began to get around.
Then came the films and Fleming’s novel-a-year pace, and increasing notoriety.
After John Pearson wrote Fleming’s biography, Mrs. Bond began writing books about her travels with her husband. She wrote “Far Afield in the Caribbean,” subtitled, “The Migratory Flights of a Naturalists’ Wife,” and “How 007 Really Got His Name.” Now there is her recently published “To James Bond, With Love,” (1980 Sutter House Press)
In the last story he wrote, “Octopussy,” Fleming portrays an aging, retired intelligence officer who 007 visits at a beachfront home on the north shore of Jamaica.
On February 5, 1964 James and Mary Bond visited the ailing Fleming at his home in Jamaica. A photo of the two men shows them standing at the doorstep, with Fleming’s Jamaican housekeeper Violet in the background.
The occasion was described as a memorable, dramatic, unrehearsed, spur of the moment affair.” Fleming gave Bond a copy of his latest novel and inscribed it with the note, “To the real Bond, from the thief of his identity, Ian Fleming, Feb. 5, 1964 – A Great Day!”
Five months later Ian Fleming died. Mrs. Bond says that her husband has always resented the invasion of his privacy by the fuss Fleming created, but “I have tried to put a good face on the matter, to have some fun of it when possible.”
Now, the world can rest assured, secure in the knowledge that James Bond has quietly out-lived the image maker as well as his comic book adversaries.
At the age of 81, Bond is living discreetly with his wife at the their penthouse apartment in the suburbs of Philadelphia. A retired gentleman, Bond enjoys golf and his work with birds. He vacations seasonally (at Desert Island) Maine in the summer and the islands in the winter, not unlike his feathered friends.
Occasionally he will receive a visitor who inquires about the habitat of some obscure tropical birds.
Bond should be remembered as Fleming so precisely portrayed him – sitting at the bar of his favorite West Indian haunt, taking a drag from his gold-ringed Morlan special, and self assuredly order a dry-double vodka martini – shaken, not sturred.”
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Quantum of Solace - The Real Story
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/nov/01/greer-bond-steel
guardian.co.uk
Books Web News
Books The week in books
Series: The week in booksPrevious | Next | Index The week in booksThe male desire for explanation; the real Quantum of Solace; and merchandising fiction
Andrew Lycett writes:
It has been half-term, but I was not expecting the eager hordes when I visited the Imperial War Museum's exhibition on James Bond's creator. Ian Fleming's centenary has put him firmly back on the cultural map. Strange, then, that Quantum of Solace, the Bond film released this week, should bear no relation, bar the title, to Fleming's short story of that name. The title has a Hollywood portentousness, but the story - about a bitter matrimonial struggle in the colonies - is most unBond-like: no action; rather, a tropical mood piece in the style of Somerset Maugham.
By 1959, Fleming had written seven well-received 007 novels. But he was not satisfied with his success. His books might be popular, but not with the people he wanted. The previous year, Paul Johnson in a New Statesman essay had described Dr No as "without a doubt the nastiest book" he had ever read. Closer to home, Ann, Fleming's high-born wife, could not disguise her distaste for Bond - a standing joke with literary friends such as Evelyn Waugh and Cyril Connolly.
Every winter, Fleming would go for three months to Goldeneye, his house in Jamaica, where he knocked out the latest of his Bond stories. But in 1959 his fire had gone. Ann had refused to accompany him and, unable to concentrate on a full-scale novel, he attempted a book of short stories, published the following year as For Your Eyes Only. But even a quota of five mini-007 tales proved beyond him. So he turned to his girlfriend in Jamaica, Blanche Blackwell, for the real-life tale that became his story "Quantum of Solace". Blackwell revealed how, in 1938, she had visited her then husband, Joe Blackwell, in Mandeville, where he had been seconded to the local constabulary at the time of a rebellion that threatened to bring the colony to its knees. She had been appalled to witness one of his fellow officers being humiliated by his wife's very public extramarital affair.
She had been reminded of these events when her friend, Sylvia Foot, the wife of a recent governor general, asked her to help an unfortunate woman who had been abandoned by her husband, a former deputy police commissioner on the island. This was Elspeth Smith, the brazen adulteress of Mandeville. According to Foot, the police officer, Clive Smith, had become deputy commissioner in Jamaica. But his wife's infidelities rankled. After a trip abroad, he told her he would no longer communicate, except in writing. When, a year later, she asked for a divorce and alimony, he informed her she would be financially secure since she had the house, the car and all the furnishings. Soon afterwards, he moved to Barbados as commissioner of police. When Elspeth Smith came to sell up, she found nothing paid for. Thus Foot's appeal for charity. But Blackwell, recalling Elspeth's behaviour in 1938, felt no inclination to help.
Fleming changed the Smiths' home to Bermuda and made the policeman a diplomat, but kept the gist of the story, which in his version was told to Bond in an after-dinner conversation in Nassau about the nature of marriage. He had the narrator, the governor of the Bahamas, defining the Quantum of Solace as a precise equation of the amount of comfort necessary between two people if love is to flourish. If this figure is zero, there can be no love. Bond clearly understood, for he added that "when the other person not only makes you feel insecure but actually seems to want to destroy you ... you've got to get away to save yourself".
In taking this line, Fleming was commenting on his own parlous marriage. The new film makes some small obeisance to this idea by insisting that Bond is inspired by a residual sense of love to find the killers of Vesper Lynd, his girlfriend in his previous cinematic outing, Casino Royale
Blackwell at least received recompense for her authorial help. Fleming acknowledged her role by giving her what he called "a fat present" - in reality a slim wristwatch from Cartier. At last, a true Bond touch.
guardian.co.uk
Books Web News
Books The week in books
Series: The week in booksPrevious | Next | Index The week in booksThe male desire for explanation; the real Quantum of Solace; and merchandising fiction
Andrew Lycett writes:
It has been half-term, but I was not expecting the eager hordes when I visited the Imperial War Museum's exhibition on James Bond's creator. Ian Fleming's centenary has put him firmly back on the cultural map. Strange, then, that Quantum of Solace, the Bond film released this week, should bear no relation, bar the title, to Fleming's short story of that name. The title has a Hollywood portentousness, but the story - about a bitter matrimonial struggle in the colonies - is most unBond-like: no action; rather, a tropical mood piece in the style of Somerset Maugham.
By 1959, Fleming had written seven well-received 007 novels. But he was not satisfied with his success. His books might be popular, but not with the people he wanted. The previous year, Paul Johnson in a New Statesman essay had described Dr No as "without a doubt the nastiest book" he had ever read. Closer to home, Ann, Fleming's high-born wife, could not disguise her distaste for Bond - a standing joke with literary friends such as Evelyn Waugh and Cyril Connolly.
Every winter, Fleming would go for three months to Goldeneye, his house in Jamaica, where he knocked out the latest of his Bond stories. But in 1959 his fire had gone. Ann had refused to accompany him and, unable to concentrate on a full-scale novel, he attempted a book of short stories, published the following year as For Your Eyes Only. But even a quota of five mini-007 tales proved beyond him. So he turned to his girlfriend in Jamaica, Blanche Blackwell, for the real-life tale that became his story "Quantum of Solace". Blackwell revealed how, in 1938, she had visited her then husband, Joe Blackwell, in Mandeville, where he had been seconded to the local constabulary at the time of a rebellion that threatened to bring the colony to its knees. She had been appalled to witness one of his fellow officers being humiliated by his wife's very public extramarital affair.
She had been reminded of these events when her friend, Sylvia Foot, the wife of a recent governor general, asked her to help an unfortunate woman who had been abandoned by her husband, a former deputy police commissioner on the island. This was Elspeth Smith, the brazen adulteress of Mandeville. According to Foot, the police officer, Clive Smith, had become deputy commissioner in Jamaica. But his wife's infidelities rankled. After a trip abroad, he told her he would no longer communicate, except in writing. When, a year later, she asked for a divorce and alimony, he informed her she would be financially secure since she had the house, the car and all the furnishings. Soon afterwards, he moved to Barbados as commissioner of police. When Elspeth Smith came to sell up, she found nothing paid for. Thus Foot's appeal for charity. But Blackwell, recalling Elspeth's behaviour in 1938, felt no inclination to help.
Fleming changed the Smiths' home to Bermuda and made the policeman a diplomat, but kept the gist of the story, which in his version was told to Bond in an after-dinner conversation in Nassau about the nature of marriage. He had the narrator, the governor of the Bahamas, defining the Quantum of Solace as a precise equation of the amount of comfort necessary between two people if love is to flourish. If this figure is zero, there can be no love. Bond clearly understood, for he added that "when the other person not only makes you feel insecure but actually seems to want to destroy you ... you've got to get away to save yourself".
In taking this line, Fleming was commenting on his own parlous marriage. The new film makes some small obeisance to this idea by insisting that Bond is inspired by a residual sense of love to find the killers of Vesper Lynd, his girlfriend in his previous cinematic outing, Casino Royale
Blackwell at least received recompense for her authorial help. Fleming acknowledged her role by giving her what he called "a fat present" - in reality a slim wristwatch from Cartier. At last, a true Bond touch.
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