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When is Robert Markham's Colonel Sun (1968) set exactly?
Dragonpol
https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
This thread does what it says on the tin, folks.
Lately I've been pondering when Robert Markham's (Kingsley Amis') Colonel Sun (1968) is actually set in terms of time frame. Obviously we know it is some time in the 1960s and that it was first published on 28 March 1968. I have read theories that it was meant to be set in 1965, i.e. a year after the events of The Man with the Golden Gun (1965) with Francisco Scaramanga and his Derringer slug that hit Bond "the summer before" as it says on the first page of the novel. However, it seems that this date is ruled out if we take the following into consideration:
"Markham tries to place Colonel Sun not too far after the Fleming stories - but, as ever, time has marched on and, while all the other internal evidence points to this taking place in 1965, Ariadne [Alexandrou] talks bout Oleg Penkovski being shot in 1965, clearly some time in the past. (We suppose this could almost count as a continuity point, given Fleming's notorious weaknesses in this department). [Taken from Andy Lane and Paul Simpson, The Bond Files: The Unofficial Guide to the World's Greatest Secret Agent, (Virgin Books Ltd., 2nd ed., 2000), p. 69.
So this would therefore seem to rule out 1965 as the year of Colonel Sun or was this merely a mistake on Amis' part with the timeline as the authors of The Bond Files seem to infer?
Then again I've read others on Bond fora say that Colonel Sun must have been set during the time of the fascistic "Regime of the Colonels" in Greece - it was a Greek military junta which lasted between 1967 and 1974. Is it possible that Amis got mixed up in his Colonel Sun timeline with more recent events and that time had indeed "marched on" since 1965. This was a coup d'etat by some Greek colonels and it lasted some 7 years and 3 months between 21 April 1967 and 24 July 1974.
As always, I'd be very grateful for any help with this conundrum at the heart of Amis' Colonel Sun. As the first Bond continuation novel and the only one (besides the unpublished Per Fine Ounce) to have been actually written in the 1960s, Colonel Sun has always held a special fascination for me. I intend to write a min-series on Amis and Bond for my blog later on this year.
Lately I've been pondering when Robert Markham's (Kingsley Amis') Colonel Sun (1968) is actually set in terms of time frame. Obviously we know it is some time in the 1960s and that it was first published on 28 March 1968. I have read theories that it was meant to be set in 1965, i.e. a year after the events of The Man with the Golden Gun (1965) with Francisco Scaramanga and his Derringer slug that hit Bond "the summer before" as it says on the first page of the novel. However, it seems that this date is ruled out if we take the following into consideration:
"Markham tries to place Colonel Sun not too far after the Fleming stories - but, as ever, time has marched on and, while all the other internal evidence points to this taking place in 1965, Ariadne [Alexandrou] talks bout Oleg Penkovski being shot in 1965, clearly some time in the past. (We suppose this could almost count as a continuity point, given Fleming's notorious weaknesses in this department). [Taken from Andy Lane and Paul Simpson, The Bond Files: The Unofficial Guide to the World's Greatest Secret Agent, (Virgin Books Ltd., 2nd ed., 2000), p. 69.
So this would therefore seem to rule out 1965 as the year of Colonel Sun or was this merely a mistake on Amis' part with the timeline as the authors of The Bond Files seem to infer?
Then again I've read others on Bond fora say that Colonel Sun must have been set during the time of the fascistic "Regime of the Colonels" in Greece - it was a Greek military junta which lasted between 1967 and 1974. Is it possible that Amis got mixed up in his Colonel Sun timeline with more recent events and that time had indeed "marched on" since 1965. This was a coup d'etat by some Greek colonels and it lasted some 7 years and 3 months between 21 April 1967 and 24 July 1974.
As always, I'd be very grateful for any help with this conundrum at the heart of Amis' Colonel Sun. As the first Bond continuation novel and the only one (besides the unpublished Per Fine Ounce) to have been actually written in the 1960s, Colonel Sun has always held a special fascination for me. I intend to write a min-series on Amis and Bond for my blog later on this year.
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Comments
My ever-growing (and seemingly impossible, at this point) throwback Skyfall novelization is also set at the cusp of the 70's, building on the events of the last few Fleming books to boost the tension between M. and 007. So if I am successful in my adaptation, make that four universes ;)
As far as helping @Dragonpol,
I have not read Colonel Sun, or TMWTGG for that matter (which is why my book is on hold). I do know from my research that there were similar coup d'etat's in Turkey in the late 60's and early 70's, as well as the issues Britain was having with Ireland.
Having not read the book yet, I can only offer the idea that time passes between the 'previous summer' comment in the book, and the reference to the shooting of someone in 1965.