BOOK REVIEWS
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crawl for a cycle or two, but in the mid 1950s, you might bring down a
government over it. The 21st century demands more, aside from the inevitable
YouTube posting.
Were you to employ, say, weapons-grade radioactive material in a
state-sanctioned killing, you would rather spectacularly be following Fouche’s
dictum: the collateral benefits of such a murder would far exceed the actual
value of the murder itself. Half a century ago, Ian Fleming had his fingers on
this pulse. Quoting Fouche, with typical “Fleming effect,” is one thing;
identifying and dramatizing the keen Russian appreciation of Fouche is quite
another. A lot of history has passed under the bridge in the last fifty years, yet
what some would lightly regard as a plot point appears in fact to be an
astonishing Realpolitik analysis by Fleming delivered with the spoonful of sugar
otherwise known as a thriller.
Defying narrative convention, and at the thumping heart of the novel’s
authentic sense of dread, the entire first third of From Russia with Love treats its
readers to an unprecedented glimpse into the intelligence apparat of the Soviet
Union and its “central horror,” SMERSH, the Soviet “organ of death.” No doubt
drawing upon Ian Fleming’s real-life adventures as a journalist in Russia during
the 1930s (expertly detailed in Andrew Lycett’s 1995 biography of hiim),
Fleming devotes nearly one hundred pages to SMERSH’s sinister “konspiratsia”
that targets 007 as well as the masterful rogue’s gallery behind the plot.
While the trove of fact-based details regarding Soviet intelligence in
this extended overture might suggest it was written by an author such as Tom
Clancy, the sheer literary quality of From Russia with Love surely suggests
writing other than Clancy’s. Even though the previous four 007 novels remain
widely praised for their colorful (if sadistic and/or lascivious) characters and
exciting (if fantastic) narratives, here Fleming’s narrative skills reached new
heights which he himself struggled to reach in later 007 adventures.
In their online synopsis of the novel, Universalexports.net calls From
Russia with Love's cast of characters “the best feature of this tour de force.
Every character is fully and artistically developed, none lacking in depth and
dimension.” In the novel, as well as a body of work, chock full of such
characters, few Ian Fleming creations are mo^'e terrifyingly memorable than
From Russia with Love's Donovan “Red” Grant and Colonel Rosa Klebb.
Described by his own Soviet masters as an asexual narcissist and
advanced manic depressive whose periods coincided with the full moon. Red
Grant, the result of “a midnight union between a German professional weightlifter and an Irish waitress on the damp grass behind a circus tent in Belfast,” is
a one-man portal to Hell. No bone-chilling highlight is spared, from Grant’s
Journey from his troubled Irish childhood to British Army defector to becoming
Chief Executioner in SMERSH, right down to the animal fear a masseuse feels
as she works on his fine yet malevolent naked body. There is enough vivid
material in Grant’s back story alone to launch a miniseries. Yet he is nothing