Live and Let Die

Biographie d'Ian Fleming

Ian Lancaster Fleming was born in London in 1908. His first job was at Reuters news agency after which he worked briefly as a stockbroker before working in Naval Intelligence during the Second World War. His first novel, Casino Royale, was published in 1953 and was an instant success. Fleming went on to write twelve other Bond books as well as two works of non-fiction and the children's classic Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
The Bond books have sold over sixty million copies and earned praise from figures such as Raymond Chandler who called Fleming 'the most forceful and driving writer of thrillers in England' and President Kennedy who named From Russia with Love as one of his favourite books. The books inspired a hugely successful series of film adaptations which began in 1961 with the release of Dr No, starring Sean Connery as 007.
Fleming was married to Anne Rothermere with whom he had a son, Caspar. He died in 1964. Andrew Taylor is a determined linguist of questionable skill, who speaks enough French to make the French sneer at him, enough Arabic to make Arabs laugh at him, and enough Spanish to order a cup of coffee and have a hope of getting, if not necessarily what he asked for, at least a hot drink of some kind. He can ask for milk in Russian, and if he asks for directions in the street, he will understand the answer if it means 'straight on'.
He is better at English, in which language he has written ten books, including biographies and books on language, history and poetry. He has also been a senior journalist in Europe and the Middle East, a Fleet Street political correspondent at Westminster, a news reporter for the BBC and a columnist for The Sunday Times.