Tue 30 Jan 2018
Reviewed by Barry Gardner: BURL BARER – The Saint.
Posted by Steve under Characters , Reference works / Biographies , Reviews[10] Comments
BURL BARER – The Saint: A Complete History in Print, Radio, Television and Film. 1928-1992. McFarland, hardcover, 1993.
Here’s the Edgar winner for 1994 [in the Best Critical/Biographical category]. The Saint was one of my earliest heroes among “grown-up” fictional characters, and I still retain more than a little fondness for him.
This is truly everything you wanted to know about the Saint but didn’t know enough to ask. It’s not about Leslie Charteris in a biographical sense, except as his life relates to the Saint. The book proper is a 240+ page chronological account of the creation and perpetuation of the Saint in all forms — books, magazines, comic books, newspapers, radio, movies, and television — in an order as nearly chronological as possible. It’s followed by another 160 pages of appendices (plus an excellent index) that include movie, tv and radio synopses and players, and a chronology of the Saint writings.
Leaving aside for the moment how well Barer did what he set out to do, how “good” a book this is depends entirely (as us the case will all specialized reference books) in how interested you are in the subject. That said, I thought he did a damned good job.
His prose style isn’t scintillating, but it’s also far from turgid. I thought he made excellent use of very extensive quotes from Charteris and many of the media people he dealt with. I hadn’t really realized how ubiquitous the character had been. I had no way of knowing either how complete or how accurate the hard data is, but I’m comfortable in saying that it’s the best available.
All told, I thought this was an excellent book and well worth the money for any true Saint fan.
January 30th, 2018 at 7:58 am
Now Roger is a saint.
January 30th, 2018 at 7:22 pm
None of the actors who have played the Saint have matched the picture I have of him in my head, but the Roger Moore TV shows have been the best of any of them.
January 30th, 2018 at 7:24 pm
The Wikipedia for Mr Barer says this:
“In 2010, Barer began research on a second edition for McFarland and Co., expanding the time period from 1992 through 2013 to include everything about the character of Simon Templar.”
I have found nothing else on line that mentions a second edition. Is there one? Will there be one?
January 31st, 2018 at 7:33 pm
Charteris originally had West End stars Jack Buchanan and Rex Harrison in mind when he created the Saint, but later decided Cary Grant was ideal. Moore was close to perfect for the last incarnation of the Saint if not the classic or hardboiled eras (like Ellery Queen there are distinct eras in Simon Templar’s history).
January 31st, 2018 at 7:49 pm
I had read about Charteris thinking that Cary Grant would be perfect in the role, and the author must know, but Grant just doesn’t seem right to me. But Rex Harrison? I kind of like the idea.
February 1st, 2018 at 2:47 pm
David–where did you get the idea that Leslie had Jack Buchanan and Rex Harrison in mind? I’m not disputing it, just never heard it before!
Leslie certainly did favor Cary Grant for the role but he wouldn’t have been my choice either.
As I understand it Burl has put a second Saint volume firmly on the back burner whilst he works at some better paying projects and we continue developing a new Saint film.
Of course being me I ought to recommend my books ‘The Saint on TV’ and ‘The Saint on the Radio’ which deal with…well, you can guess what/ I am currently hard at work on corresponding volumes for the Saint’s career in film and comics.
February 1st, 2018 at 6:20 pm
Ian
Thanks for the update on Burl’s updated second volume. With only the one reference to it that I found, I pretty much assumed that it has been shelved for a while.
Amazon (US) says your book about the Saint on the radio is in print, but they have no copies of the TV book. What can you tell us about that?
February 1st, 2018 at 10:08 pm
It’s a in depth study of the Saint’s history on TV; those shows that were made and those shows that were not.
It deals with everything, from Leslie’s attempts to get the Saint on air–and the scripts he wrote to show how it should be done–through to the Moore/Ogilvy and Dutton series. It also includes the script from what would have been the 1980s period revival that Roger Moore and Bob Baker were planning and would have starred Pierce Brosnan.
I’m working on an updated version (I actually *am* working on it!) as I need to include the latest TV movie in it.
February 2nd, 2018 at 6:53 am
I thought Leslie favored Jean Marais.
February 2nd, 2018 at 11:07 am
Nobody favored Jean Marais!