James Bond lives in a nightmarish world where laws are written at the point of a gun | ||
| --Yuri Zhukov, Pravda, 30 September 1965 | ||
Bond: Just a moment. Three measures of Gordon's, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it's ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon peel. Got it? | ||
| --Casino Royale, Chapter 7: Rouge et Noir (1953) | ||
James Bond is a precise man. Like a physicist, he seems to see order in a world where others see chaos. Another mission, another romance, another shaken drink, another crashing car or helicopter or skier, and another gunshot do not change the way the world works or the way the Cold War worked. He seems to take comfort in this consistency.
A psychologist might say that Bond has a habit of re-enacting an unhappy childhood, which the novels reveal to us in brief glimpses. The boy lacked a permanent home. His father was an international arms dealer for the Vickers company...