Written by ‘SILHOUETTE MAN’

In his preface to the Coronet Books editions of the Bond novels first published in 1988, Anthony Burgess (1917-93), author of A Clockwork Orange (1962) gives an interesting introduction to and defence of the Fleming Bond novels entitled ‘The James Bond Novels: An Introduction.’ Of particular interest is the following passage:

The Spy Who Loved Me

“It is important, I think, to stress the point that, after the early films, whose budgets were too low to admit of too much extravagance, the James Bond whom Fleming created has only a nominal connection with the leering hero of the screen. This also goes for the titles: what has the film Octopussy to do with the brilliant short story in which Bond has a very marginal role? It is true that Fleming forbade the film adaptation of The Spy Who Loved Me, but that was no excuse for attaching the title to a very unflemingian hotchpotch. It is time for aficionados of the films to get back to the books and admire their qualities as literature.” (extract - Anthony Burgess, ‘The James Bond Novels: An Introduction,’ Lugano, 1987)

Burgess is making an entirely valid point here, but when his history with the film Bond is taken into account the contradiction between his words and his actions can be seen all too clearly, making his above comments, especially about the film of The Spy Who Loved Me appear highly ironic.

In Steven Jay Rubin’s The James Bond Films (1981) he states that,

“The writing of The Spy Who Loved Me was something of a nightmare. No less than twelve script writers had a crack at it and there were at least fifteen different drafts of the script on Broccoli’s desk at any one moment. It became a question of who could be the most innovative and yet stay within the bounds of credibility.

On this new project, the writers were asked to work from scratch, bearing in mind a guideline from Broccoli who thought that “The Spy” in question should be a Russian agent who falls in love with Bond.”

(—-)

On the screenwriting of The Spy Who Loved Me:

“[Anthony] Barwick left the [script writing] project and was followed in order by Derek Marlowe, Sterling Silliphant, John Landis and Anthony Burgess (the author of A Clockwork Orange). Burgess developed the most outrageous of all the scripts, an undisguised parody of the world of James Bond.”

Kiss Kiss Bang! Bang! The Unofficial James Bond Film Companion (2000), by Alan Barnes and Marcus Hearn confirms that, “the huge submarine silo seen in the finished film was reportedly Burgess’s inspiration.”

Burgess’s involvement with the script of The Spy Who Loved Me in 1976 and his send up of the world of Bond greatly contradict what he would later write in his Coronet introduction in 1987. I find it most odd that he would mark out a film that he wrote a screenplay verging on parody for and then later criticise it as being “a very unflemingian hotchpotch.” Only considering his 1987 comments, one would have assumed that Burgess would have been the man to put that right!