You Did What__ Mad Plans and Great Historical Disasters - Bill Fawcett [51]
In the end, however, Edward Smith did what any good captain would. He went down with his ship.
You Demand What?
Sometimes even the most gifted author is a lot dumber than the characters he creates. See what we mean with this romp through literary stupidity.
AUTHORS, EVERYWHERE, ALL THE TIME
Brian M. Thomsen
No one ever said that authors were perfect.
Far from it.
Margaret Mitchell thought Groucho Marx would be the perfect thespian to assay the role of Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind.
John Kennedy O’Toole killed himself when he had trouble placing A Confederacy of Dunces at the publishing house of his choice.
And it is even rumored that an author turned down having his novel chosen as an Oprah pick.
Some authors even took action to derail themselves from the gravy train that their ongoing works had provided for them.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had a quiet medical practice in Southsea, England, where he dabbled in storytelling in his off hours, occasionally making a sale to one of the literary magazines such as the Strand. One of these stories, a novelette entitled “A Study in Scarlet,” introduced the now-famous consulting detective Sherlock Holmes to the world. Unfortunately, Doyle soon tired of his creation and after twenty-four stories and another novelette by the name of “The Sign of Four” decided to remove himself from the successful series that he felt was getting in the way of his other works.
So in a story entitled “The Final Problem” Holmes finally confronts his archnemesis and, in a life-and-death struggle, falls with him to both of their deaths over a waterfall.
The Strand was disappointed at the prospect of no new Holmes stories, and readers were devastated.
Though Doyle continued to be published, his literary fame and following began to dissipate as it soon became apparent that there were more Holmes fans than Doyle fans. As a result, ten years later Doyle resurrected his detective in a series of new stories that started off with what really happened at the end of “The Final Problem,” whereby Holmes managed to survive…as did the literary career of Doyle.
A similar situation existed with retired spy Ian Fleming, whose creation of secret agent MI5 hero James Bond provided him with a nice supplement to his pension from the Crown.
After the initial surprise success of Casino Royale (1953), Fleming found himself pressured to continue the series with a new book each year. The 1954 book Live and Let Die did fine and met with Fleming’s own satisfaction, but subsequent volumes (Moonraker and Diamonds Are Forever) were not as strong, and definitely showed signs of a waning of interest on the part of the author despite the ongoing commercial success of the series, and as long as the books sold the publishers wanted more.
Fleming saw only one way out of his gilded cage, so in the next book in the series, From Russia with Love, he conspired against his hero and delivered probably the best Bond book of all time, with one unfortunate problem: Bond died on the last page of the book.
The publisher wasn’t pleased, and the readers were shocked, but what Fleming had done, he had done, and there was no turning back.
Or was there?
In his administering of his coup de grâce for James Bond, Fleming became reinterested in his character and began to think of ways of making the series more interesting for himself, so much so that he even regretted killing the master spy.
So what did he do?
He admitted his mistake to his publisher and resurrected the resilient spy in a new book in the series the following year, and though the explanation of his survival was lame and contrived, no one cared.
Bond was back and better than ever.
Sometimes mortal mistakes are not forever, and indeed some characters do only live twice.
Author mistakes aren’t always confined to their fictional works either.
Sometimes, in hindsight, they screw up on the business side.
Sometimes it’s a