James Bond First Editions

From Russia, With Love; [together with] On Her Majesty's Secret Service; [and] Murder Before Breakfast [From a View to a Kill]. In the Daily Express.

FLEMING, Ian.

The Daily Express, 1957-1963. Together 26 issues. From Russia, With Love, 12 issues; On Her Majesty's Secret Service, 9 issues (of 10); Murder Before Breakfast [From a View to a Kill], 5 issues. Each issue illustrated by Andrew Robb. Wanting first issue of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, supplied with a photocopy. A few issues stamped "First edition fudge" on first pages. Some wear to spines and extremities, strengthened in many places with tape, central folding crease and occasional spotting as expected. Overall a very attractive set. The first appearance in print of two Bond stories, together with the first serialisation of another in the Daily Express. The collection comprises the first appearances in print of On Her Majesty's Secret Service (first issue not included) and From a View to a Kill, the latter published here under the alternative title Murder Before Breakfast, together with the first complete serial publication of From Russia, With Love, the opening paragraphs of which were previously published as Visitor in the magazine Now and Then in late February/early March (Gilbert, p. 162). From Russia, With Love: Episodes had been considered by the London Evening Standard before the rights were sold to the Daily Express, who had serialized the previous Ian Fleming novel Diamonds are Forever, and who would similarly issue the present title just before release of the British hardback, upon which Fleming commented "Let us hope they don't murder the book too much before your [Cape's] publication date" (Jonathan Cape Archive, Special Collections, Reading University). On Her Majesty's Secret Service: There are no surviving copies of any instalment in the Jonathan Cape archive at Reading University, although a letter to Ian Fleming from director Michael Howard, dated 14 February 1963, confirms the printing; "Peter Janson-Smith [Ian Fleming's literary agent] is also having a couple [of advance copies] so that the Express can get to work with the editing of the serial. They are so keen to have an absolute scoop on the Bond wedding that although we have moved our publication date forward, they are likely to serialize earlier still so as to complete it by the time we publish." Murder Before Breakfast [From a View to a Kill]: The Daily Express published Ian Fleming's short story as a five-part adventure under the title Murder Before Breakfast. Although not the original name, it was at least in keeping with Fleming's inspiration for the title From a View to a Kill, which was adapted from the third stanza of John Woodcock Graves's 1820 Cumberland hunting song, D'Ye Ken John Peel, which read in part: "From the drag to the chase. From the chase to the view. From the view to a death in the morning." The literary agent Peter Janson-Smith was very active in promoting the short stories prior to publication in book form, and Fleming acknowledged and indeed defended this in writing to his publisher, who may have felt their bound edition was to be somewhat compromised or undermined. This was the first James Bond short story to appear in the United Kingdom and was not published in a book-form edition until April 1960. Copies are recorded in the Bibliographical Archive and in the Cape files at Reading University. The Fleming bibliographer Jon Gilbert notes that the present set of On Her Majesty's Secret Service was the first he had ever seen, and that the only other Daily Express copies of From Russia, With Love and Murder Before Breakfast he has viewed were the publisher's file copies. These sets are from the significant Ian Fleming collection of Martin Schøyen (b.1940), whose private collection of manuscripts, which span all cultures and all time periods, is one of the largest and most comprehensive of its kind. Item #156633

Gilbert A5a, A8a, A11a; The Schøyen Collection, Nos. 38, 81, 110.

Price: £17,500.00