Ian Fleming was a British writer, best known for his postwar James Bond series of spy novels
On 28th May 1908 Ian Lancaster Fleming was born in London to Valentine and
Evelyn Fleming. Ian's father, Valentine, was the Member of Parliament for Henley and
the son of Scottish financier and philanthropist, Robert Fleming, whose hard work and
talent for figures helped him rise up from lowly roots in Dundee to become one of the
most successful merchant bankers of his day. Ian had an elder brother Peter, and two
younger brothers, Richard and Michael.
He was educated in England, Germany, and Switzerland, and he was a journalist in Moscow (1929–33), a banker
and stockbroker (1935–39), a high-ranking officer in British naval intelligence during World War II, and foreign
manager of the London Sunday Times (1945–49) before he became a full-time writer. After World War II he
spent his winters in Jamaica, where he did much of his writing.
Ian Fleming was the creator of James Bond, the fictional British secret service agent 007.
“Bond is not a hero,” Fleming once said, “nor is he depicted as being very likeable or
admirable.…He's not a bad man, but he is ruthless and self-indulgent. He enjoys the fight—but
he also enjoys the prizes.” Ian Fleming named James Bond after an ornithologist. The original
name for James Bond was ‘James Secretan’.He said he wanted 007 to have “the dullest,
plainest-sounding name I could find ... brief, unromantic, Anglo-Saxon and yet very
masculine”. The codename 007 stemmed from his Admiralty days, when all top secret
communications carried a double-zero prefix.
Ian Fleming bronze bust by sculptor Anthony
Smith
Fleming also published two
Fleming was a heavy smoker and collections of short stories
drinker throughout his adult life, and featuring Bond. In addition,
suffered from heart disease. In 1961, he wrote a children’s
aged 53, he suffered a heart attack book, Chitty Chitty Bang
and struggled to recuperate.Fleming Bang: The Magical Car
died at age 56 at Kent and (1964), which was made into
Canterbury Hospital in the early a feature film and whose
morning of 12 August 1964—his son main character, Commander
Caspar's 12th birthday . He was Pott, perhaps summarized
buried in the churchyard of best the Fleming/Bond
Sevenhampton, near Swindon. philosophy of life: “Never say
‘no’ to adventures. Always say
The hardcover three volumes (first ‘yes,’ otherwise you’ll lead a
Ian Fleming grave
editions)
very dull life.”
