0 Reactions

Goldfinger (novel)

Goldfinger AuthorIan FlemingCover artistRichard ChoppingCountryUnited KingdomLanguageEnglishSeriesJames BondGenreSpy fictionPublisherJonathan Cape23 March 1959Media typePrint (hardback & paperback)Pages318OCLC220354671Preceded byDr. No Followed byFor Your Eyes Only
Goldfinger is the seventh novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series. Written in January and February 1958, it was first published in the UK by Jonathan Cape on 23 March 1959. The story centres on the investigation by the British Secret Service operative James Bond into the gold smuggling activities of Auric Goldfinger, who is also suspected by MI6 of being connected to SMERSH, the Soviet counter-intelligence organisation. As well as establishing the background to the smuggling operation, Bond uncovers a much larger plot: Goldfinger plans to steal the gold reserves of the United States from Fort Knox.

Fleming developed the James Bond character in Goldfinger, presenting him as a more complex individual than in the previous novels, and bringing out a theme of Bond as a St George figure. This theme is echoed by the fact that it is a British agent sorting out an American problem. In common with his other Bond stories, Fleming used the names of people he knew, or knew of, throughout his story, including the book's eponymous villain, who was named after the architect Ern? Goldfinger. On learning of the use of his name, Goldfinger threatened to sue, before the matter was settled out of court. Auric Goldfinger is obsessed by gold and�to Bond's eye�a gauche individual with unusual appetites; Fleming probably based the character on the American gold tycoon Charles W. Engelhard Jr. Fleming also used his own experiences within the book; the round of golf played with Goldfinger was based on a 1957 tournament at the Berkshire Golf Club in which Fleming partnered Peter Thomson, the winner of The Open Championship.

On its release, Goldfinger went to the top of the best-seller lists; the novel was broadly well received by the critics and was favourably compared to the works of the thriller writers H. C. McNeile and John Buchan. Goldfinger was serialised as a daily story and as a comic strip in the Daily Express, before it became the third James Bond feature film of the Eon Productions series, released in 1964 and starring Sean Connery as Bond. In 2010 Goldfinger was adapted for BBC Radio with Toby Stephens as Bond and Sir Ian McKellen as Goldfinger.

Plot

Happenstance
While changing planes in Miami after closing down a Mexican heroin smuggling operation, the British Secret Service operative James Bond meets Junius Du Pont, a rich American businessman whom Bond had briefly met and gambled with in Casino Royale. Du Pont asks Bond to watch Auric Goldfinger, with whom Du Pont is playing canasta, to discover if he is cheating. Bond soon realises that Goldfinger is using his assistant, Jill Masterton, to spy on Du Pont's cards. Bond blackmails Goldfinger into admitting his guilt and paying back Du Pont's lost money; Bond also has a brief affair with Masterton. Back in London, Bond's superior, M, tasks him with determining how Goldfinger is smuggling gold out of Britain; M also suspects Goldfinger of being connected to SMERSH and financing their western networks with his gold. Bond visits the Bank of England for a briefing on the methods of gold smuggling.

Coincidence
Bond contrives to meet and play a round of golf with Goldfinger; Goldfinger attempts to win the golf match by cheating, but Bond turns the tables on him, beating him in the process. He is subsequently invited to Goldfinger's mansion near Reculver where he narrowly escapes being caught on camera looking through the house. Goldfinger introduces Bond to his factotum, a Korean named Oddjob.

Issued by MI6 with an Aston Martin DB Mark III, Bond trails Goldfinger in his vintage Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost (adapted with armour plating and bulletproof glass), driven by Oddjob. Both travel by air ferries to Switzerland. Bond manages to trace Goldfinger to a warehouse in Geneva, where he finds that the armour of the Rolls-Royce is actually white-gold, cast into panels at his Kent refinery. When the car reaches the factory in Switzerland (Enterprises Auric AG), he recasts the gold from the armour panels into aircraft seats and fits the seats to the aeroplanes of Mecca Charter Airline, in which he holds a large stake. The gold is finally sold in India at a large profit. Bond foils an assassination attempt on Goldfinger by Jill Masterton's sister, Tilly, to avenge Jill's death at Goldfinger's hands: he had painted her body with gold paint, which killed her. Bond and Tilly attempt to escape when the alarm is raised, but are captured.

Enemy action
Bond is tortured by Oddjob when he refuses to confess his role in trailing Goldfinger. In a desperate attempt to escape being cut in two by a circular saw, Bond offers to work for Goldfinger, a ruse that Goldfinger initially refuses but then accepts. Bond and Tilly are subsequently taken to Goldfinger's operational headquarters in a warehouse in New York City. They are put to work as secretaries for a meeting between Goldfinger and several gangsters (including the Spangled Mob and the Mafia), who have been recruited to assist in "Operation Grand Slam"�stealing gold from the United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox. One of the gang leaders, Helmut Springer, refuses to join the operation and is killed by Oddjob. Bond learns that the operation includes killing the inhabitants of Fort Knox by introducing poison into the water supply. He manages to conceal a message in the toilet of Goldfinger's private plane, where he hopes it will be found and sent to Pinkertons, where his friend and ex-counterpart Felix Leiter now works.

Operation Grand Slam commences, and it transpires that Leiter has found and acted on Bond's message. A battle commences, but Goldfinger escapes. Tilly, a lesbian, hopes that one of the gang leaders, Pussy Galore (the leader of a gang of lesbian burglars), will protect her, but she (Tilly) is killed by Oddjob. Goldfinger, Oddjob and the Mafia bosses all escape in the melee. Bond is drugged before his flight back to England and wakes to find he has been captured by Goldfinger, who drugged a BOAC flightcrew and hijacked their jetliner. Bond manages to break a window, causing a depressurisation that blows Oddjob out of the plane; he then fights and strangles Goldfinger. At gunpoint, he forces the crew to ditch in the sea near the Canadian coast, where they are rescued by a nearby weathership.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

Load Full (0)