Monday, February 27, 2023

IFP issues statement about Anniversary edition edits

Ian Fleming Publications has issued a statement about the edits to their upcoming Anniversary re-issues of the original Ian Fleming James Bond novels. Click the image below to have a read at the official Ian Fleming Publications website.

Sunday, February 26, 2023

Variety reports 70th ANNIVERSARY editions will be edited

Today's Variety is reporting that IFPs new 70th anniversary editions of Ian Fleming original James Bond books will contain edits to remove perceived racist content. You can read the full article HERE. Below is an excerpt:

A commonly used pejorative term used for Black people by Fleming, whose Bond books were published between 1951 and 1966, has been removed almost entirely and replaced with “Black person” or “Black man.” In other instances, references have been edited.

For example, in “Live and Let Die” (1954), Bond’s opinion of Africans in the gold and diamond trades as “pretty law-abiding chaps I should have thought, except when they’ve drunk too much” has been altered to “pretty law-abiding chaps I should have thought.”

Another scene in the book, set during a strip tease at a Harlem nightclub, was originally “Bond could hear the audience panting and grunting like pigs at the trough. He felt his own hands gripping the tablecloth. His mouth was dry.” This has been revised to “Bond could sense the electric tension in the room.” A segment in the book describing accented dialogue as “straight Harlem-Deep South with a lot of New York thrown in,” has been removed.

For some additional context, both U.S. editions of Live and Let Die and Diamonds Are Forever were edited for sensitivity back in Fleming's day, so this isn't entirely new. But these edits appear to be going further than those and I'm sure this news is going to draw a lot of comment from Bond fans.

For me personally, I want the original unedited texts. Full stop. I was very happy when the U.S. editions were finally updated with the UK texts in 2002. Fleming's words and thoughts should remain unchanged, even if offensive. History and art should not be altered. But a disclaimer is certainly appropriate and I think a good idea.

But I also understand IFPs dilemma. They are marketing these editions to a mass audience and they have to deal with the times we are in. For those who want the unedited texts, you can certainly still find those. And maybe some day the texts will be returned to the original. I'm not sure if these changes will make these 70th Anniversary editions more collectible or less so, but they better have some pretty spectacular cover art to overcome the taint that I think these will forever have for Fleming purists.

Cover art above is from a 1970 Pan edition of The Man With The Golden Gun. UK cover art for the 70th Anniversary editions have not been revealed.

UPDATE: IFP have issued a statement HERE.

Friday, February 17, 2023

70th Anniversary eBOOKS released

Today new digital eBook versions of the fourteen Bond adventures, plus the two Fleming non-fiction titles Thrilling Cities and The Diamond Smugglers, have been released to retailers of digital books within the UK. The release of the eBooks marks 71 years to the day that Ian Fleming sat down at his typewriter in Goldeneye, Jamaica, and began writing Casino Royale.  

These digital releases represent the first step in Ian Fleming Publications’ 70th Anniversary reissues of the original books. For now, the eBooks are being distributed with holding covers. IFP says the official new covers will remain "top secret a while longer."

Wednesday, February 8, 2023

WITH A MIND TO KILL UK paperback cover art

Cover art for the UK paperback edition of Anthony Horowitz's With A Mind To Kill has appeared on Amazon. I'm excited to see they've gone with an original design instead of using the hardcover art.

Pre-order the With A Mind To Kill UK paperback at Amazon.co.uk. Release date is April 27, 2023.