Tue 26 May 2009
SAPPER [H. C. McNEILE] – Bulldog Drummond. Hodder & Stoughton, UK, hardcover, 1920. George H. Doran, US, hardcover, 1920. Reprinted many times in both hardcover and paperback.
As you’ve seen noted, I didn’t go into all of the various editions of this, Bulldog Drummond’s first adventure, but for the record, the one I read is a recent and rather hefty softcover edition (Wordsworth, 2007) subtitled “The Carl Peterson Quartet.”
This latter volume contains the following four novels: Bulldog Drummond, and the only one I’m commenting on now; The Black Gang (1922); The Third Round (1924); and The Final Count (1926). McNeile was a very prolific writer, the author of many, many short stories as well as novels, beginning in 1910 or so, and continuing on up to his death in 1937.
David Vineyard has a long article about Bulldog Drummond coming up, but I’ve only skimmed through it so far, wishing to form my own impressions first before getting it posted, but do look for it soon.
The year that Bulldog Drummond was published, 1920, as well as all four Carl Peterson books — through 1926 — is important, because it was only after the first world war could the general public really believe in the existence of super-criminals like Carl Peterson, ruthless men whose single-minded goal was absolute world control — or that the domination of the entire planet by a small group of like-minded men was even remotely feasible.
“How?” you might ask. Through financial means and countrywide strikes by the duped underclass. That there are four books in the series suggests that like certain other would-be emperors of the world, Carl Peterson is defeated at the end of each, but survives and lives to return another day.
As for Hugh Drummond himself, a veteran of the war in France, when he returned to England, he was bored and had an huge amount of time on his hands. Craving excitement, he took out an ad, offering his services to anyone in need of help. “Legitimate diversion, if possible,” the notice says, but “crime … no objection.”
Enter the girl. Phyllis Benton. Her father is in desperate straits, and she requires assistance. Drummond needs no other responders to his advertisement. He has all of the excitement, trouble — and then some — that he needs in dealing with the deadly Carl Peterson and his growing gang of thugs and respectable businessmen, all with an eye to their mutual good fortune.
Not to mention Peterson’s “daughter,” the equally beautiful and enigmatic Irma, who seems to have an eye for Captain Drummond, not that the latter needs the former to defeat his formidable opponent this round, at least.
I’ve chosen the word “round” deliberately, because it is a game that is being played between Drummond and Peterson, a deadly one, but one with the sort of unspoken rules that prevents one or the other from sneaking up and bumping the other off with no warning.
Deadly poisons, giant ape-creatures, vats of acid, all fair play, but shooting the other in the back? It’s hardly done.
The action back and forth gets a little repetitious and sags a little around the three quarter mark, but it’s only the lull before the finale, which comes fast and furious – and even more deadly for some of the participants.
Wonderful stuff, very much of its time and place, unfortunately, but Britain had a little less to fear between the wars while Captain Hugh Drummond was on the alert.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:34 am
Steve is right about the historical context of the Drummond books, which parlayed post Great War cynicism, modernism (hard to believe but Drummond was a very modern hero in 1920 — cigarettes, sports cars, martinis), and paranoia about the Russian Revolution into a whole category of modern fiction. It didn’t hurt that real life munitions kings like the Krupps and finaglers like Sir Basil Zalesoff actually existed.
The super criminal in popular fiction dates back at least to the Newgate Callendar and the likes of Jonathan Wild. William Godwin has a sort of criminal mastermind in Caleb Williams, and even Poe has Dupin encounter a master criminal in “The Purloined Letter.”
Wilkie Collins Count Fosco and Paul Feval’s John Devil and the Black Coats all contributed, and as noted elsewhere so had Dumas version of Joseph Balsamo, Cagliostro. Meanwhile Napoleon’s real threat to England had given the bogeyman a face. Jules Verne furthered the thing with Nemo and Robur, and even his ambitious American munitions kings in From the Earth to the Moon. Ker Kaje in the late novel For the Flag could be Ian Fleming’s Doctor No’s grandfather. Even in literature there is Balzac’s Vautrin (based on the real life Vidoq)shadowy figures beyond or even above the law manipulating the fate of the world.
Around the time Conan Doyle was combining all that in the shadowy Moriarity, we had Guy Boothby’s Dr. Nicola (the Italian menace), and then the deluge of the Yellow Peril, that reached it’s peak in Dr. Fu Manchu, and managed to last as late as Doctor No. Rider Haggard’s She gave the villain a female face and proved the female sex could be as much trouble as the male in such matters.
But Carl Peterson is a high point in the super criminal stakes. Even those who hate the Drummond books admit Peterson rises above his origins. Drummond may be dated and a distinctly out of step with the world we now live in, but we encounter variations on Carl Peterson every evening in the news whether they are dealing in blood diamonds, arms for terrorists, nuclear brinksmanship, or even Bernie Madoff’s ponzie schemes. I can’t quite see Carl testifying in front of Congress, but no doubt one of his henchmen is sweating his testimony out right now as Carl lurks threateningly in the background, his latest scheme taking it’s toll in lives and other people’s wealth, and being comforted by Irma, eternally beautiful and deadly.
The next time you settle down to watch the heroes on the big or small screen battle it out with powerful, ruthless, and wealthy types who will stop at nothing in their greed, think of Carl. He must be so proud.