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up by the incisive onomatopoeia of his name. Beautiful, transparent, telepathic Solitaire evokes the coldness of the diamond. Chic and interested in diamonds, Tiffany Case recalls the leading jewellers in New York and the beauty case of the mannequin. Ingenuity is suggested by the very name of Honeychile; sensual shamelessness, by that of Pussy Galore. A pawn in a dark game? Such is Domino. A tender Japanese lover, quintessentially of the Orient? Such is Kissy Suzuki. (Would it be accidental that she recalls the name of the most popular exponent of Zen spirituality?) We pass over women of less interest such as Mary Goodnight or Miss Trueblood. And if the name Bond has been chosen, as Fleming affirms, almost by chance, to give the character an absolutely common appearance, then it would be by chance, but also by guidance, that this model of style and success evokes the luxuries of Bond Street or treasury bonds. |
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By now it is clear how the novels of Fleming have attained such a wide success: they build up a network of elementary associations to achieve something original and profound, Fleming also pleases the sophisticated readers who here distinguish, with a feeling of aesthetic pleasure, the purity of the primitive epic impudently and maliciously translated into current terms and who applaud in Fleming the cultured man, whom they recognize as one of themselves, naturally the most clever and broadminded. |
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Such praise Fleming might merit if he did not develop a second facet much more cunning: the game of stylistic oppositions, by virtue of which the sophisticated reader, detecting the fairy-tale mechanism, feels himself a malicious accomplice of the author, only to become a victim, for he is led on to detect stylistic inventions where there is, on the contraryas will be showna clever montage of déjà vu. |
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Fleming 'writes well', in the most banal but honest meaning of the term. He has a rhythm, a polish, a certain sensuous feeling for words. That is not to say that Fleming is an artist; yet he writes with art. |
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Translation may betray him. The beginning of the Italian version of Goldfinger''James Bond stava seduto nella sala d'aspetto dell'aeroporto di Miami. Aveva già bevuto due bourbon doppi ed ora rifletteva sulla vita e sulla morte.'' (James Bond was seated in the departure lounge of Miami Airport. He had already drunk two double bourbons and was now thinking about life and death)is not the same as "James Bond, with two double bourbons inside him, sat in the final departure lounge of Miami Airport and thought about life and death." In the English phrase there is only one sentence, an elegant display of concinnitas. There is nothing more to say. Fleming maintains this standard |
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