Colonel Sun is a novel by
Kingsley Amis published by
Jonathan Cape on 28 March 1968 under the pseudonym "
Robert Markham".
Colonel Sun is the first
James Bond continuation novel published after
Ian Fleming's 1964 death. Before writing the novel, Amis wrote two other Bond related works, the literary study
The James Bond Dossier and the humorous
The Book of Bond.
Amis drew upon a holiday he had taken in the Greek islands to create a realistic Greek setting and characters. He emphasised political intrigue in the plot more than Fleming had done in the canonical Bond novels, also adding revenge to Bond's motivations by including M's kidnapping. Despite keeping a format and structure similar to Fleming's Bond novels,
Colonel Sun was given mixed reviews.
Chapter 19 ('The Theory and Practice of Torture') was adapted for the torture scene in
Spectre (2015). Though
Blofeld replaced Sun as Bond's tormentor, much of Blofeld's dialogue in the scene was written by Amis for Sun, resulting in an acknowledgement to
Amis' estate in the end title credits, though no mention of the book itself.
Plot
Kidnappers violently take the Secret Service chief
M from his house and almost capture
James Bond, who is visiting. Intent on rescuing M, Bond follows the clues to Vrakonisi, one of the
Aegean Islands
Characters and themes
Continuation Bond author
Raymond Benson described Amis's Bond as a humourless interpretation of the character that Fleming used in his earlier novels.
Benson describes this personality as a natural continuation of the Bond developed in the final three Fleming novels.
Benson identifies Bond's desire for revenge as a central theme to the novel. Benson describes this as particularly striking: "Bond is particularly brutal in achieving his goal ... The revenge is very satisfying. This is Bond at his toughest."
Amis envisaged something different for the character: he did not like M and, as one reviewer pointed out that in
The James Bond Dossier, he had "spent a chapter running him down."
The main villain of the novel is Colonel Sun Liang-tan. Sun is a member of the Special Activities Committee of the Chinese
People's Liberation Army as well as a sadist and skilled torturer. Raymond Benson called him "very worthy of inclusion in the Bond saga".
Military historian
Jeremy Black describes the novel reflecting a shift in the balance of world power away from two-party Cold War politics. Black also notes an emotional and social sadness throughout
Colonel Sun.
Background
After Ian Fleming's death in 1964,
Glidrose Productions (now Ian Fleming Publications) held the rights to Fleming's works.
As the Bond character could not be copyrighted, and to retain rights in the Bond product, Glidrose decided to commission a sequel.Initially the company approached author
James Leasor to write a continuation novel, but he declined. Glidrose then commissioned Amis, who wrote
Colonel Sun.
Fleming's wife, Ann, did not endorse any further Bond works and disliked Amis, saying that he would create "a
petit bourgeoisred brick Bond".
Amis and his wife Jane spent September 1965 holidaying on the Greek island of
Spetses and Amis used his experiences as the background to the novel. Amis drew on the names of people he met in Greece for
Colonel Sun. The boat Bond uses—
The Altair—was the name of the boat Amis and his wife used on holiday, whilst the Bond girl's fictitious colleagues, "Legakis" and "Papadogonas" were friends who helped Amis in Greece, whilst the doctor who treats Bond in Chapter two was named after Amis and Jane's own doctor.
Reviews
Colonel Sun was broadly welcomed by the critics, although a number noted that despite Amis's abilities as a writer, Fleming's own persona was missing from the novel.
Roger Baker, writing in
The Times noted that, with
Colonel Sun "one might, justifiably, have expected a joyous rejuvenation or at least a devastating detour from the Fleming pattern. We get neither. It is a pale copy."
D. J. Enright, writing in
The Listener, considered that, "
Colonel Sun offers apt literary pabulum for Bond's fish-and-chip culture, for his neurotics, alcoholics and suicides. Good dirty fun, once read and soon forgotten".
Writing in
The Times Literary Supplement,
Simon Gray, unimpressed with the novel, called the Bond in
Colonel Sun "a chuckle-headed imposter whose arthritic thought processes would be a liability in a 'physical tussle' down at the pub." He went on to comment that the novel only "offers the frustrated Bond addict ... a small academic problem, of swiftly passing interest."
The
Daily Mirror's Alexander Muir considered the book to be "an exciting, violent, sadistic and sexy piece of reading matter", although, partly because of Amis' abilities as a writer,
Colonel Sun "is altogether too meticulous and well written – Fleming was a hypnotic but slapdash writer. And, at times, I sensed parody. This could be fatal."
Writing in
The Guardian,
Malcolm Bradbury called the novel "a reasonable read but no more: neither vintage Fleming nor vintage Amis." Bradbury also noted that "it lacks a convincing rhetoric ... and the traditional Fleming frissons emerge only in muted form."
The reviewer for the
Los Angeles Times,
Charles Champlin, noted that the novel "lacks the garish, outrageous, ridiculous, symbol-witted touch of the original article"; despite that, he still enjoyed the novel, commenting that it left "intact the reputations of both Messrs. Amis and Fleming."
Donald Stanley, writing in
Life magazine praised the villain Sun, saying he "is the kind of villain to make a Bondophile salivate."In general
The reviewer for
The New York Times noted that "the greatest flaw in Amis' conception of Bond is that he has attempted to transform the consummate spy-hero into something he was never meant to have been: a man with a job".
Adaptations
Colonel Sun is the only non-Fleming Bond novel adapted as a
comic strip by the
Daily Express newspaper. published from 1 December 1969 to 20 August 1970 and was subsequently syndicated worldwide. In 2005,
Titan Books reprinted
Colonel Sun and included
River of Death, another original James Bond comic strip story published before the
Colonel Sun strip in 1969.
The World Is Not Enough (1999)
The kidnap of M was borrowed from
Colonel Sun and used as a plot device in the 1999 Bond film
The World Is Not Enough.
Die Another Day (2002)
For the 2002 film
Die Another Day,
Eon Productions wanted to use the name Colonel Sun Liang-tan for the main villain, but when the Fleming estate insisted on royalties for the use of the name, they changed the name to
Colonel Tan-Sun Moon.
Spectre (2015)
The 2015 film
Spectre features a torture scene which was lifted from
Colonel Sun.
