A Most Misunderstood Classic

The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning.

Casino Royale. 

Ian Fleming

Ian Fleming’s popular James Bond character first lived in the written word before he ever came to life in technicolor. Published first in 1953, Casino Royale is full of Riviera glamour, the likes of which we only see in classic movies like To Catch a Thief (1955), and the backdrop of a deepening Cold War between the Allies and the USSR.

Unfortunately, in our highly sensitized present-day, we have forgotten what the world used to be, and that, along with some seriously campy treatments in the movies means many readers will judge this, and the other books unfairly, in my own opinion. Add to that a distinct inability to suspend our disbelief and you have a book that’s undoubtedly a classic, but one where all the excellence is thrown over for perceived failings.

I came to Casino Royale with as much of a blank slate as possible. I knew the movies were based on the books, but any bookworm or fan can tell you Hollywood is very consistent in its infidelity to the original material.

What I found wasn’t the swaggering, glib lothario of the movies who hides behind fancy tech and high-end cars, but someone who’s far more calculated and, frankly, human.

The thrill isn’t in the violence.

The light from the broad satin-lined shades which had seemed so welcoming now seemed to take the color out of his hand as he glanced at the cards. Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

There is one explosion at a nearby cafe where Bond meets his French contact and another under cover operative called Vesper Lynd, one car chase where Bond is captured, and two instances where Bond knows he’s the one being spied on. Most of the “thrill” in this novel isn’t in the action, but in the tension and in the details.

Most of the “action” such as it is, takes place in one location. There isn’t any globetrotting, no mad rush to different countries, no exotic modes of transportation aside from Bond’s Bentley.

Casino Royale, however, has an entire chapter dedicated to M reading reports from other departments recommending this operation and the records they have on the key players: Le Chiffre and SMERSH. This is information that sometimes gets woven in to the movie script, but it’s not whole, and it’s not as obvious.

We get to see what actually starts Bond on his particular mission in this book. Wait, you say, don’t we get to see that in the movies too? Not really. We rarely see the actual paperwork that goes into a Bond mission. We may get to see M brief Bond, and tell him what to do. We may even get to glimpse the occasional file.

This may bore some readers, but if you work in a paperwork-heavy job like an admin position, or know how much work goes into the paperwork, then you will appreciate Fleming’s nod to the report-writers, typists, etc who make the mission possible.

In fact, I would say that in the novel, the extra details actually beg for you, as a reader, to get more involved to piece everything together before Bond does much in the same way a murder mystery from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction does.

You can even, if you’re particularly observant, guess exactly what is going to happen at the end because there are just one or two “loose ends” that never quite get tied up until the final twist is revealed and the book ends.

Two criticisms about Bond as a character have an explanation. 

One of the most common criticisms I see, aside from Bond’s sexism, is that he’s really a mediocre agent. He doesn’t consider some possibilities; he ignores blatant red flags, and he overindulges in alcohol.

Personally, I lay two points before you. The first is that the thriller genre itself has changed drastically since Fleming’s time, just as the detective novel has changed from Agatha Christie’s. Why shouldn’t Bond get a little enjoyment while on the job? He’s in the French Riviera! Pat of the charm is in the fantasy. So, yes, Bond can drink very strong martinis and still have a clear head. Yes, he can let his guard down and have a nice dinner. Why not? It’s fiction.

The second is that there is more going on that neither Bond nor we see. In Chapter 1, for instance, Bond considers that M, or someone else in the department at least is having him watched and reported on. He has no illusions that he’s in total control. And, if he was too careful, that would seem suspicious.

Then, there’s also the possibility that he wasn’t briefed exactly with the same documents the reader gets to see. We don’t even know that he has all the information he needs at any given moment. We are on the outside looking in. He’s not.

Ultimately, Bond’s seeming blindness or mediocrity, if you want to call it that, is intentional so that we not only see Bond as a human being subject to human foibles but also so that we have the pleasure of knowing that Bond doesn’t know everything. He’s acting on the information that he has in the moment and with whatever state of mind he’s in at the moment, too.

Isn’t that what we all do at some point? If we say anything different, then we’re lying to ourselves.

Bond’s sexism largely falls into the same category as us perceiving something because we’re outside looking in and from a far larger distance. I consider myself a classical feminist. I do not dismiss brutish behavior as “boys will be boys” as a general rule nor do I condone women being erased or dismissed. 

But, I understand it within the context of the character and what he has to do for a living. Think about it, this is a man who is expected to kill or neutralize other human beings for a living. They trained him to be a hunter, a weapon, a means to an end against an enemy. He will not be all sunshine and roses and it’s not like he can just turn off years of combat training in the blink of an eye.

So of course he’s going to be cold, he’s going to disdain anything he sees as a distraction or a potential weakness. For him, that’s women. If he were a woman and thought the same about men, we’d probably not think anything of it.

Moreover, if we compare Bond’s stated attitude to his actual actions, we’ll find two different things.

Take the frustration with Vesper getting kidnapped after the baccarat game. We see his frustration as sexism. But he still goes after her. Now, don’t you think that he her truly saw women as mere objects, he would have left Vesper to her fate? That was his first reaction. What makes him change his mind? She’s not usually in the field, she’s not had the years of combat experience like he has, nor has she ever killed anyone.

It’s mercy and compassion, even if begrudgingly given. And when, at the last, what he thought was love turns to disgust, it’s because the most sacred law of any relationship was broken: commit no treason. And, as we all know from Dante, treason is the worse of all the sins because the hurt it brings is like a living death.

And it hurts because for one, brief moment in the book, Bond softens from the cold hard weapon he was trained to be. He dares to want something other than combat. And, for an even briefer moment, he believes he’s capable of having and appreciating a normal life.

Until those beliefs are shown to be based on a lie. After that, I can’t really blame him for his cold reaction. Anger is far easier sometimes than grief, especially if betrayal is involved.

Fleming’s writing gets no credit at all when it’s truly excellent.

The sea was smooth and quiet in the sunrise. The small, pink waves idly licked the sand. Ian Fleming, Casino Royale 

Fleming combines several literary techniques that really go unappreciated. The most obvious is one we’ve already seen: his inclusion of reports within the text of the novel. This changes the writing style slightly from one that is narrative to one that you might see if you were reading a report. 

Even if you think the reports in themselves are boring to read, they’re full of clues and tidbits that come into play in the rest of the novel. Modern writers will use the same technique. Ruth Ware, for instance, uses text messages in some of her novels as part of the plot. Some put fictional newspaper articles within their manuscript. Here, it’s government reports. 

Word choice is also part of Fleming’s writing style. He doesn’t use simple words 100% of the time. In our own world of quick consumerism, interesting language has rather fallen by the wayside. AI-based editors and grammar checkers also try to rob language of much of its flavor and character.

Of course, the fact you have too many easily offended people doesn’t help either. 

Ian Fleming juxtaposes short, choppy sentences, with technical terms, and old-fashioned words we don’t use like “rendezvous,” “refrained,” and even a few lesser known terms like “pawky.” He gives very detailed descriptions of card games, which few of us today would care to read, but then he goes off into detail about what Vesper is wearing to dinner.

It’s utterly delightful, and there’s enough in there to please everyone. I found the description of the small beach-side place where Bond and Vesper go on a short break after the fateful baccarat game to be transporting. It’s not overly done, but simple. Enough to for you to build a vivid picture in your mind without losing sight of what’s happening. 

In short, this is like Asimov’s Foundation–a true classic that’s been robbed of its due in literature. It’s enjoyable, quick, and makes you want to read more. It’s exactly the kind of summer reading you can enjoy and still feel challenged.

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