MALE BONDING:

A QUEER ANALYSIS OF THE JAMES BOND CANON

by

Grant C. Hester

A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of

Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

Florida Atlantic University

Boca Raton, FL

May 2019

ii

Copyright 2019 by Grant C. Hester

MALE BONDING:

A QUEER ANALYSIS OF THE JAMES BOND CANON

by

Grant C. Hester

This dissertation was prepared under the direction of the candidate's dissertation advisor, Dr. Jane Caputi, Center for Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Communication, and Multimedia and has been approved by the members of his supervisory committee. It was submitted to the faculty of the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters and was accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

Khaled Sobhan, Ph.D. Interim Dean, Graduate College

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Jane Caputi for guiding me

through this process. She was truly there from this paper’s incubation as it was in her

Sex, Violence, and Hollywood class where the idea that James Bond could be repressing

his homosexuality first revealed itself to me. She encouraged the exploration and was an

unbelievable sounding board every step to fruition.

Stephen Charbonneau has also been an invaluable resource. Frankly, he changed

the way I look at film. His door has always been open and he has given honest feedback

and good advice.

Oliver Buckton possesses a knowledge of James Bond that is unparalleled. I

marvel at how he retains such information. I am eternally grateful that he agreed to not

only serve on my committee, but also let me sit in on classes he was teaching, and

encouraged me to participate in conferences where my ideas could be heard.

Additionally, I need to acknowledge the faculty and staff of the Dorothy F.

Schmidt college of Arts and Letters. They have made my time there as a student sheer

joy. In particular, Michael Horswell and Adam Bradford who could always be counted

on for sound advice.

Also, I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the crew from the University of

St. Thomas in Houston, TX. Dr. Ravi Srinivas always pointed me in the right direction

and told me not to overthink things. Dr. James Barloon always pushed me when I needed

it and then cut me slack when I needed that too. And I will forever be envious of Dr.

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Clinton Brand’s passionate ability to read Shakespeare with an accent and spark that

passion in his students. Finally, Dr. Bernard Bonario simply taught me everything I

know about art—and this paper proves you never know when you need to know about a

Renaissance painting.

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ABSTRACT

Author: Grant C. Hester Title: Male Bonding: A Queer Analysis of the James Bond Canon

Institution: Florida Atlantic University Dissertation Advisor: Dr. Jane Caputi Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Year: 2019

The character of James Bond which was first introduced in Ian Fleming’s first

novel Casino Royale in 1953 and was then featured in 11 subsequent novels, 2 volumes

of short stories, and 24 film adaptations has long been considered to be the ultimate

man’s man. There is no feat he cannot conquer, villain he cannot best, or lady he cannot

bed. However, in an examination of both the novels and the film, clues exist to Bond’s

deeper psyche—most notably his repressed homosexuality. While much discussion has

been had of Bond’s misogyny, in many ways it masks his true identity possibly even

from himself.

Utilizing a framework of theoretical analysis drawing upon Sigmund Freud, Jack

Hallberstam, Judith Butler, Susan Sontag, Laura Mulvey, and Charles Klosterman

(among many others), this dissertation will fully explore the character Fleming created.

Additionally, by examining how the male gaze and camp elements have been utilized by

the filmmakers in the Bond films, analysis will be conducted how those elements

contribute to a “queerness” of the character’s film incarnations

DEDICATION

This dissertation is dedicated to my late husband, Steven Weingarten who passed

away rather suddenly between the submission of this dissertation to my committee and its

defense. He not only put up with my years of repeating the cycle of deadline,

procrastination, panic, and writing, he was completely supportive of the entire process.

When I told him I wanted to change careers, his only response was simply, “Go for it.” I

wish everyone to have such support in their lives. His memory will be an eternal comfort

for me.

Additionally, it is dedicated to my mother, Norma Hester, and my late father,

Willis Hester. They always encouraged me to read what I wanted to read and watch what

I wanted to watch. It sparked a curiosity which I still have. In my mind, there is no

better gift that parents can give a child.

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MALE BONDING:

A QUEER ANALYSIS OF THE JAMES BOND CANON

List Of Figures ............................................................................................................... ix

A Man’s Man: An Introduction to Queer Analysis of Bond ......................................... 1

Performing Bond: How Hypermasculinity Masks Repressed Homosexuality in

the James Bond Canon ............................................................................................ 20

Camp Bonding: An Analysis of Camp Elements in the James Bond Film Series....... 56

Gazing at James Bond: The Subversion of Mulvey’s Male Gaze ............................... 80

The Enemy Within: An Examination of James Bond and How His Adversaries

Reflect His Own Psyche ......................................................................................... 99

The Bond Among Men: Misogyny, Desire, and Death ............................................. 118

References ................................................................................................................... 130

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1 Daniel Craig’s Bond being tortured by Le Chiffre in Casino Royale ............... 49

Figure 2 Halle Berry as “Jinx Johnson” in Die Another Day .......................................... 64

Figure 3 The militaristic Famke Janssen as Xenia Onatopp. ........................................... 65

Figure 4 Xenia Onatopp killing the Admiral with her thighs during intercourse. ........... 65

Figure 5 May Day (Grace Jones) in the obligatory Bond seduction scene. ..................... 67

Figure 6 “The Bondola” in front the Doge’s Palace in Venice. ....................................... 77

Figure 7 Side by Side comparisons of Daniel Craig and Ursula Andress emerging

from the sea. ................................................................................................................ 87

Figure 8 Sean Connery’s Bond in the infamous laser scene. ........................................... 93

1

A MAN’S MAN: AN INTRODUCTION TO QUEER ANALYSIS OF BOND

“This is my big beef with, for example, James Bond. You have a license to kill. You

have the fastest car in the world. Every girl wants to go to bed with you. How about a

smile? How about a little smile once in a while? What's all the internal strife?” --Jerry

Seinfeld1

In the 2012 film Skyfall, James Bond, the ever-resurrected British superspy first

created in Ian Fleming’s 1953 novel Casino Royale, casually alludes while held captive

by erstwhile spy turned villain Raoul Silva that the possibility exists Bond has been with

another man intimately. While much chatter and discussion has been generated about the

scene by critics, little research beyond mentioning the exchange has been completed.

Yes, Bond mentions he might have been with another man.2 However, was it simply to

throw Silva off his game? Was it a confession? Was it merely homoerotic overtones in

an effort to pull in more, perhaps gay, viewers during a time of increased pressure to

draw viewers to a film with a budget inching towards $200 million? The answer does not

seem simple or apparent. As a cynic, I tend to believe the first and third options; yet, as a

gay critic the confessional aspect of the exchange certainly seems worthy of further

exploration.

Said exploration, though, proves complicated. The character of James Bond is

one that has now spanned almost 70 years. First serialized by Ian Fleming in the novels,

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Bond has outlived that iteration and has thus outlived Fleming in the film franchise for

over 50 years. Simply, there are many interpretations of the original character as

depicted in the novel. Screenwriters have taken liberty with Fleming’s novels and in

many ways changed the character— for example, his famous contraptions used to

conquer his adversaries in the earlier films now seem tame compared to today’s

ubiquitous smartphone where practically anyone can be located merely by its GPS

tracking system. Judith Roof explains that Bond has never been a singular or linear

character, but instead has “always and ever increasingly been a moving collection of

projections, defenses, and compensations coexisting through time, portrayed through a

same-yet-always-different version of the solitary, inventive hero who is licensed to break

the law in order to enforce a higher law and greater good.”3 Fleming’s version of the

character in the novels themselves, though, must remain central to any serious analysis.

As a result, the question presents itself: did Fleming create a character in James Bond

who appears on the queer spectrum?4 While certain issues pertaining to acceptable social

norms exist in applying today’s standards to works written six decades ago5, I would

argue that Fleming did create such a character—a character who has been continually

interpreted as queer in the Bond film series.

As such, a literary review of Bond in general proves difficult. It is certainly easier

to compare the novels (written and published over a span of 14 years from 1952-66) to

novels of contemporary writers as well as writers prior and after. However, as will be

demonstrated later, from a queer perspective, the field certainly narrows to the relatively

few “queer” novels that have achieved any type of commercial success or notoriety from

the era. On the other hand, the films literally span the last 65 years of cinema making

3

their placement in any sort of canon practically impossible. One can arguably place some

sort of context of a Bond film with basically any film since 1962 as the series can be

viewed as contemporary to each film made since that time.

Each film in many ways represents the cultural zeitgeist of its time. For example,

the first Bond film, Dr. No (1962) introduces Honeychile “Honey” Rider portrayed by

Ursula Andress who emerges from the ocean in a now iconic white bikini with a large

knife strapped to the belt around her waist. Honey Rider could in many ways be viewed

as the bombshell prototype that later appeared in the form of Jane Fonda in Roger

Vadim’s Barbarella (1968) or Raquel Welch’s sex-symbol-in-the-making turn as

Loanathe doe-skin bikini-clad sensation in Don Chaffey’s One Million Years, BC. Later,

in the 1971 film adaptation of Diamonds Are Forever, Bond, in a departure from the

novel encounters Trina Park’s Thumper, an African-American (shockingly) bikini-

wearing villainess who along with her Caucasian counterpart Bambi (Lola Larson)

proceed to engage in a physical showdown with Bond. In hindsight, the scene seems to

foreshadow the “blacksploitation” films of the era for which Pam Grier became

known.6Then, a couple of years later in the film version of Live and Let Die, Bond

becomes sexually involved with Rosie Carver played by Gloria Hendry marking the first

time that 007 was linked to an African-American woman.

The comparisons do not end there. The 1985 film, A View to a Kill, not only

features Grace Jones as Mayday reflecting the androgynous societal fashion of the time

(to be explored in great depth in the chapter 3),7 the plot of the movie centers around the

villainous Max Zorin portrayed by Christopher Walken who was trying to control the

newly-formed epicenter of America’s—if not the world’s—computer age. In short, the

4

filmmakers often incorporated the current perceived enemy in the world and made that

archetype the film’s antagonist. An important example would be the Soviet Union with

SMERSH8 which later switches to other countries and villains with the end, or rather

interruption, of the so-called Cold War. In the case of A View to a Kill, the primary

villain is trying to control Silicon Valley whose existence presented the world with a new

consideration and computers and robots were thought to be in development which could

eventually overtake the world.9 Imagine then, at the height of these newly-formed fears,

Bond fans are presented a diabolical villain in the form of Max Zorin to play upon those

fears with his desire to harness the power of computer technology for his own ill-gotten

gain. This story, coupled with his entanglements in every way (business, personal,

sexual, etc.) with Grace Jones’s Mayday who certainly does not fit the conventional

beauty standards of previous Bond Girls, leaves viewers to ponder where the Walken

character’s boundaries lie. Is he evil? Is he on the queer spectrum? Does appearing on

the queer spectrum somehow contribute to his villainy (to be explored in more depth in

Chapter 5)? Additionally, the filmmakers have Roger Moore’s Bond sleep with Mayday

in a scene filled with queer innuendo. Where does that leave Bond in this scenario?

Arguably, Bond is the same as Max Zorin in many ways.

Considering how the filmmakers seem to constantly and consistently play on the

concerns of society with their ever-changing enemies depicted in the films, perhaps it is

worthwhile to re-examine the interchange in 2012’s Skyfall between Daniel Craig’s Bond

and Javier Bardem’s Raoul Silva. At the time of the film, the world seemed to be coming

to terms with the concepts of gay rights, transgender rights, and marriage equality10.

Silva then reveals, while threatening to torture Bond with him tied to a chair (although at

5

least this time he as fully-clothed as opposed to the 2006 adaptation of Casino Royale),

that he is more than likely non-heteronormative11. In turn, Bond confesses somewhat

flippantly that he might be as well. If either proves true, how does that play into society’s

fears? If Silva is the arch-villain he proves to be and is in fact a homosexual, does that

not align perfectly with the opinion of those who seek to vilify homosexuals in real life?

Arguably, it does. After all, it is not uncommon for the LGBT community to be

maligned by homophobes with criminal activities such as pedophilia or bestiality in an

effort to further marginalize and vilify them. However, with Bond admitting that if he

were to engage (whether forcibly or not) in a sexual activity with Silva it might not be his

first time, where does that leave the viewer? Bond is the hero who saves the world in a

manner not dissimilar to Superman or Batman and always winds up with the girl at least

temporarily. Are the filmmakers on some level trying to force the viewpoint that

heteronormativity is the only “good” existence? Arguably, they are; however, it is a

complicated position.

Bond, in an attempt to defuse the situation with Silva is not implying that he has

been the victim of another adversary forcing himself sexually on Bond but, rather, that he

has been a willing participant in a male to male sexual encounter. As such, Bond’s

admission—be it true or not—troubles the existing trope of the evil gay man who is a

deviant not only sexually but in all aspects of his existence. The simple supposition of

Silva is: Silva is bad. Silva is gay. Gay is bad. So, if Bond has also been intimate with

other men, are filmmakers suggesting that such a supposition is not so simple? A more

complicated reading suggests: Bond is good.; Bond is gay or bisexual; Gay is good.

Gayness would merely be a disturbance to Bond’s identity as a result. It would not be the

6

definition of his identity. Detractors of queer theory would certainly disagree, but I put

forth that the presentation of Silva and Bond’s reaction to him is merely another example

of the filmmakers representing the current cultural zeitgeist. As Matthew Tinkcom

explains, “Any commentary about American masculinity (and by implication the status of

male heterosexuality, be it valedictory or critical, had to emerge obliquely, give the

constraints of censorship and contemporaneous homophobia).”12 As sexual mores and

attitudes have changed, yes, Silva may represent the fears of those on one side of the

argument, but Bond’s sexuality may also be depicted to represent the more liberal

viewpoint more accepting of homosexuality as he has always been sexualized in a way

to preclude a traditional, monogamous relationship.13

There are many other examples in the Bond films that warrant comparisons to

other films and cultural movements as they span more than five decades. Still, many of

the issues addressed in the films stem directly from Fleming’s novels which were written

between 1952 and Fleming’s death in 1964. The novels do not answer the current

cultural issues and texts in the same way the films do. For example, the film version of

Casino Royale was released in 2006. While the basic plot is certainly based on the novel

published in 1953, the contemporary cultural comparisons are certainly more current in

the film. The Bond filmmakers have never set out to make a so-called “period piece.”

As such, each of the films is as current as its release date. While Fleming wrote scenes

that appear in their respective adaptations almost verbatim, both the films and the novels

are seen as both popular and culturally significant depending on the reader.

In turn, it is not shocking that critical reception to Fleming’s work and its

adaptations has undoubtedly been a mixed bag, so to speak. Fleming, himself, expressed

7

little consternation that he was writing spy novels whose sole purpose was to entertain.

To that regard, Umberto Eco, whose analysis of Fleming’s works in The Role of the

Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts is arguably the most respected criticism of

the subject, basically reduced the plot of Fleming’s Bond stories (with the exception of

The Spy Who Loved Me) to struggles between good and evil, Bond’s virility versus the

impotence or “sissification” of the villain, as one of nine basic plot points,

A. M moves and gives a task to Bond;

B. Villain moves and appears to Bond (perhaps in vicarious forms);

C. Bond moves and gives first check to Villain or Villain gives first check to

Bond;

D. Woman moves and shows herself to Bond;

E. Bond takes woman (possesses her or begins her seduction);

F. Villain captures Bond (with or without Woman, or at different

moments);

G. Villain tortures Bond (with or without Woman);

H. Bond beats Villain (kills him or kills his representatives or helps at their

killing)

I. Bond, convalescing, enjoys Woman, whom he then loses.14

Largely, this can be viewed as accurate analysis of the novels. Arguably, one can easily

see where a reader could take the novel at face value and not consider other readings in

the subtext of the work.

8

However, as a gay critic, I would point to Vito Russo’s observation of Queer

Theory in The Celluloid Closet.15 Russo notes that his work is not about who is gay in

Hollywood. However, his work relates how studying gays on film proves difficult

because it is a group that in history has been “almost exclusively closeted.”16 As a result,

queer theory does not necessarily concern itself with things that appear to be gay on the

surface because many of the things depicted were simply a reflection of the closeted

mentality of the gay filmmakers.17 To understand queer theory is to understand a secret

language—one of the codes used to signify others to recognize something long-kept

secret. Russo even mentions Bond when he states, “Popular sex farces and James Bond

spy thrillers used sissies and dykes to prove the virility of cartoon heroes and to stress the

sterility of homosexuality.”18 Russo did not equate Bond’s actions with those of a

repressed gay man, however, I (along with other critics) certainly do. Most notably,

Judith Halberstam19 wrote of Bond in her work Female Masculinity,

In Goldeneye (1995), for example, Bond battles the usual array of bad

guys: Commies, Nazis, mercenaries, and a superaggressive violent femme

type. He puts on his usual performance of debonair action adventure hero,

and he has his usual supply of gadgetry to aid him—a retractable belt, a

bomb disguised as a pen, a laser weapon watch, and so on. But there’s

something curiously lacking in Goldeneye, namely, credible masculine

power.20

Not that femininity is necessarily always linked to homosexuality, but for better or worse,

the two often coincide in a more than stereotypical fashion. Richard Dyer puts forth a

queer theory that it is “especially interested in manifestations of male-male sexual

9

attraction where you wouldn’t expect to find it, where it’s been diverted or repressed or

else obliquely expressed or unknowingly sublimated.” He continues, “But it does not

focus on these to separate them from queerness nor does it buy into the notion of an

erotica that is distinguishable from a sexual??.”21 However, sissies and dykes are

marginalized and traditional roles are examined every day.22 Simply, as with the vast

majority of queer theory, my work does not look only at the obvious queer characters in

the Bond canon such as Wint and Kidd in Diamonds Are Forever or Scaramanga in The

Man With the Golden Gun, but also at the coded and slanted doppelgänger depictions of

the protagonist where Fleming and the filmmakers had to rely on the acceptable social

norms of the time to convey an arguable queerness in the character.

Also, in as much as I will later argue for Bond’s repressed homosexuality, I will

not argue that the relationship between Bond and his American counterpart Felix Leiter

goes beyond a platonic working relationship. It is Bond’s relationships with the villains

and even M that seem to be homoerotic or basically indicative of what Fleming often

referenced as “homosexual tendencies.”23 Dyer theorizes, “Homo-eroticism tends to

stress libidinal attraction without sexual expression, sometimes even at the level of

imagination and feeling” (Culture of Queers 3). Bond is certainly depicted in numerous

examples of such attraction in the films and novels, both as the object of said attraction

and the one who is attracted. Dyer continues, “While in some usages, homo-eroticism can

be a wider term which includes homosexuality, or can be a euphemism for

homosexuality, it importantly indicates a sense of spiritually or ethically masculine

qualities which cannot be contained by (or discourses of homo-eroticism would tend to

say, reduced to) the idea of queerness.”24 Considering such a position, it is important to

10

realize that a theorization of repressed gayness does not mean such desire has been acted

upon or even will be acted upon.

Further, I have no interest in attempting to “out” Ian Fleming. While I will say

that there has been speculation to his sexual proclivities, frankly, as a critic I do not

concern myself with those rumors and as a gay man, I have no desire to try to prove

someone’s homosexuality in a time when it was largely not accepted socially and was

even considered illegal.25 Additionally, Sheldon Lane argues in For Bond Lovers Only

that the character of Bond certainly grew to something much larger than Fleming ever

imagined. He puts forth, “It is probably fair to say that James Bond has become

something bigger than Ian Fleming ever intended. Bond was, or so Fleming claimed,

"the author's pillow fantasy…the Walter Mitty syndrome--the feverish dream of the

author of what have been--bang, bang, kiss, kiss--that sort of stuff.”26

Bond’s sexuality, however, is another story. And, I do feel that Fleming’s

character--as explored in greater detail by Roof in her article “Living the Bond

Lifestyle”--certainly evolved with the social norms of his respective time both in the

books and films. Fleming depicts things in the books that certainly would not be

appropriate today that were appropriate then and vice versa. For example, in You Only

Live Twice, Fleming describes Bond in Japan as having tinted his skin darker and shaved

his eyebrows to be more angular in an attempt to appear more like the Japanese that

surround him. Fleming describes in the novel,

It was indeed a new man who followed Tiger through the thronged halls of

Tokyo main station. Bond's face and hands were of a light brown tint, his

black hair, brightly oiled, was cut and neatly combed in a short fringe that

11

reached halfway down his forehead, and the outer corners of his eyebrows

had been carefully shaved so they now slanted upwards.27

The filmmakers even opted to present Sean Connery in a similar fashion. However, such

a depiction today would certainly be considered politically incorrect (racially offensive)

if depicted at all there would undoubtedly be justified cries of racism. Additionally, in

numerous places throughout the novels, Fleming uses the n-word and Negro. While not

acceptable today, their use was considered somewhat (if not totally) normal at the time.

One could argue that while these references seem questionable, they are in no way related

to my argument of Bond as a repressed queer individual. On the contrary, one must

consider the appropriateness of depicting homosexuality at the time just as one considers

the appropriateness of these racial depictions. Homosexuality was verboten, but racist

language and innuendo was not. Nowadays, the converse would prove true.

In considering Bond as a repressed or closeted homosexual, an important

consideration should be that the depiction of a homosexual relationship would have

destroyed any commercial sales as evidenced by queer novels of the time. Additionally,

Fleming made quite clear that he enjoyed the spoils afforded him by his novels’

commercial success. For example, E.M. Forster, certainly a respected novelist, wrote

Maurice in 1913-14 about a character who happened to be a homosexual. The novel was

not allowed to be published until 1971. Patricia Highsmith, who had achieved great

success with the publication of Strangers on a Train chose to follow it up with The Price

of Salt—a story of two women who fall in love in New York and pursue an affair causing

Carol (the object of Therese’s affections) to lose custody of her child. Still, the novel

presented a somewhat happy ending for the two in 1952 and publication was declined

12

until Highsmith agreed to use the fictitious name of Claire Morgan for its publication. As

late as the early 1980s, she was offered $5000 to republish it under her own name or

$2000 to continue its publication under the pseudonym. Highsmith opted for the latter.

Highsmith then published The Talented Mr. Ripley in 1955 featuring the character of

Tom Ripley who was homosexual; however, he was also a psychopath who killed his

victim Dickie Greenleaf to assume his identity, so the publication of that novel (and its

sequels) was considered acceptable because he was a flawed character in many ways and

not intended to be a hero (shades of Raoul Silva among other Bond villains).

Similarly, it is acceptable for Fleming to depict Pussy Galore and her band of

acrobats as lesbians in Goldfinger, because Bond is ultimately able to seduce her and turn

her attention towards men (as was also the case with one of the lesbian characters, Janet

Pardoe, in Graham Greene’s Orient Express). In the novel, she had turned to lesbianism

because as a product of the south, Fleming posited that a virgin was merely a girl who

could run faster than her brother. Pussy Galore tells Bond, “I come from the South. You

know the definition of a virgin down there? Well, it's a girl who can run faster than her

brother. In my case I couldn't run as fast as my uncle. I was twelve. That's not so good,

James. You ought to be able to guess that.”28 Fleming depicted the story of a lesbian,

but not one who was simply attracted to women. He creates a lesbian who only turned to

women because of the sexual abuse she had suffered as a girl. Bond, of course, was able

to turn her back to men with his own “tender loving care treatment.”29 Highsmith’s Carol

in The Price of Salt, however, left her husband to be with a woman. The difference is

telling and arguably reflected in the respective commercial success of each novel.

While there were degrees of “acceptable” homosexuality, same sex relations

13

really did remain a taboo topic in literature. Christopher Isherwood, himself an out

homosexual, did not openly make his characters—both based on him: William Bradshaw

and the eponymous Christopher Isherwood—gay in the 1935 publication of The Berlin

Diaries (actually two novels Mr. Norris Changes Trains and Goodbye to Berlin) for fear

that it would ultimately do harm not just to his career but to himself. It was not until his

memoirs, Christopher and his Kind in 1971 that he discussed the matter more thoroughly

and offered his explanation. Still, he did publish A Single Man in 1964 where he told the

story of George, a lonely professor grieving the loss of his partner Jim who had been

killed in an automobile accident. George would routinely drown his sorrows with his

equally sad-sack of friend Charlotte. However, the novel does offer a fairly frank

depiction of George’s fantasy of escapades with his student Kenny following an evening

of drinking together (Kenny showed up at George’s usual haunt) and skinny-dipping in

the nearby Pacific Ocean. Isherwood writes of George being a “dirty old man” and

describes the conversation and interaction as being that of “flirtation,”30 Yet, at the time

of its publication—a contemporary of the later Bond works—Isherwood’s A Single Man

hardly enjoyed similar commercial success31.

While there are certainly other works in the queer canon (Gertrude Stein’s

Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, certain works by Willa Cather, the writings of James

Baldwin, etc.), commercial success—something Fleming was open about enjoying

(although he did also long for critical respect)—was rarely, if ever, achieved by openly

queer fiction. Even in 1994, PBS stations in America broadcast an adaptation of

Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City written in the late 1970s. The adaptation was

received with both acclaim and revolt. While the mini-series was well-received by critics

14

and even won a Peabody Award, boycotts were called for because of the depiction of

Michael “Mouse” Tolliver openly living a gay life in San Francisco. Mrs. Madrigal, his

landlady, was not revealed to be transgender until a subsequent book in the series

(“Culture Shock”). While these authors sacrificed commercialism to tell their stories,

Fleming could not openly depict James Bond as being gay or make obvious the

character’s “homosexual tendencies” without forfeiting the commercial success that

afforded him his livelihood.

Still, such descriptions of Bond’s “homosexual tendencies” do exist both in the

novels and in the films. Obviously, there is the example from Skyfall. While several

critics seem to have jumped on the bandwagon with that particular scene, an in-depth

analysis of possible homo-erotic and homosexual acts in the novels and short stories of

Fleming has yet to materialize, other indicators certainly exist. Yes, the scene proves an

interesting starting point because much is made of the fact that Bardem’s character was in

fact a British Intelligence agent of the same standing as Bond and that a similar

psychological profile is sought for all agents. Still, revisiting Fleming’s own descriptions

of the characters seems even more interesting as one looks at what was acceptable at the

time versus what would be depicted today in accordance with our own social norms.

Admittedly, Bond is never depicted in Fleming’s writings as engaging in sexual

intercourse with another man. However, there are many instances where Fleming offers

insight that arguably would place Bond on a queer continuum. To fully understand

Fleming’s stance, one should consider the social, legal, and psychological issues

surrounding homosexuality at the time of publication of the novels. In Great Britain,

homosexuality was considered a mental disease and homosexual acts (i.e. intercourse

15

with same-sex partners) were considered criminal acts with very serious punitive

consequences32. For example, in the novel On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963),

Fleming writes, “Now, there is plenty of medical evidence for the efficacy of hypnosis.

There are well-authenticated cases of the successful treatment by these means of such

stubborn disabilities as warts, certain types of asthma, bed-wetting, stammering, and even

alcoholism, drug-taking, and homosexual tendencies.”33 In the next book in the series,

You Only Live Twice (1964), Fleming writes, “And now he had just come from breaking

off relations with the last resort---the hypnotist, whose basic message had been that he

must go out and regain his manhood by having a woman.”34 On their own, each

statement can seem rather benign. However, when looked at together as statements made

about the same character by the same author, it offers a telling insight. Additionally, it

should be noted that “homosexual tendencies” were viewed as a mental disorder at the

time—something worthy of treatment in the same way alcoholism, drug use, or even

smoking would have been. The passages, then, taken together allow the reader to

question what so-called vices Bond was seeking treatment to discontinue. Bond, certainly

known to partake of his martinis and fancy cigarettes, could merely have just viewed his

own “tendencies” as another vice of which he needed to absolve himself.

Still, there are other examples sprinkled throughout the texts which will be

explicated and explored in subsequent chapters: the villain pulls back the sheet and

vividly describes Bond’s body in Dr. No.35 Bond imagines a man lying in bed and

thinking of him and smiles at the thought of him doing so in Live and Let Die. Fleming

describes, “Bond gazed for a moment towards the northern horizon, where another man

would be in his bedroom asleep, or perhaps awake and thinking conceivably of him,

16

Bond, whom he had seen with Dexter on the steps of the hotel. Bond looked at the

beautiful day and smiled.”36 And, Fleming depicts scenes in a hotel known of “petty

crime” in London and at a bath house in Diamonds Are Forever37. Homosexuality was

still outlawed and would have been considered a petty crime. Overall, there are enough

textual items that one barely has to rely on the subtext to make a case for Bond’s

homosexual tendencies as Fleming termed it or as I prefer, repressed homosexuality.38

Additionally, Fleming offers the reader Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd in Diamonds Are

Forever, a homosexual pair of villains, who similar to Highsmith’s Tom Ripley, are

allowed to exist as homosexuals because they are villains who are ultimately killed by

Bond. In discussing Scaramanga, the villain in The Man with the Golden Gun, Fleming

places him outside the social norm by disclosing that he has a third nipple and is thought

to have “homosexual tendencies” because he cannot whistle and it is thought that

homosexual men cannot whistle.39 However, on that particular subject, I feel quite

certain that I, myself, am no anomaly in the fact that I am by all accounts a gay man who

can indeed whistle. Scaramanga is also depicted as being intensely private, thus lending

credence to the “homosexual tendencies” theory of the agents.

Yet, the subtext of Fleming’s writings offers further insight into what I argue is

Bond’s repressed homosexuality. While there are many critics who offer insight into the

subject (certainly including Leo Bersani in his work Homos)40, I feel that the most

effective argument to be applied to Bond is that of Judith Butler’s gender performativity

which builds the work of Michel Foucault and Sigmund Freud. Butler puts forth that

gender (and to a degree sexuality) is a performed aspect of one’s personality rather than

being an essentialist part of a person’s being. As it applies to a homosexual man, Butler

17

(along with Freud and Foucault) posits, “Masculinity is taken on by the male homosexual

who, presumably, seeks to hide—not from others, but from himself—an ostensible

femininity.”41 As such, in order to mask the inherent femininity associated with a male

homosexual due in large part to the act of sexual intercourse itself between two men,

homosexual men will often perform a “hypermasculine” role in society to hide their true

being from not just the people around them, but also from themselves. With this in mind,

Bond certainly is depicted as living a promiscuous, heterosexual existence. In fact, it is

often remarked by so many different individuals that it seems rather impossible to give

one person credit the statement that “Bond is the person every man wants to be and every

woman wants to be...with.” In fact, Pussy Galore tells him that he could “turn” her

because she had never known a man before. Honeychile Rider was described as

undeniably beautiful and even compared to Botticelli’s Venus, depicting the goddess

stepping out of a clamshell. However, Bond was also known to complain and remark that

it was simply part of the job.

So while Bond seduces all these women, with one notable exception, he never

truly seeks a lasting commitment from them.42 In On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Bond

does marry Tracy (a nickname for Theresa di Vicenzo) and seems to want to pursue a

heteronormative existence with her. However, shortly after their wedding she is gunned

down in their car. The film version depicts Blofeld driving by while Irma Bunt, a

particularly butch female, shoots her as she sits in the car with Bond. The irony should

not be lost on us that Bond’s chance for a relatively run-of-the-mill heteronormative

existence is destroyed by an arguably queer character. Bond, then, in subsequent novels

and films is back to his caddish ways declaring himself disinterested in marriage with the

18

notable exception of Diamonds Are Forever where he declares that the closest thing to

marriage in his live is with M (a male character in the novel not to be confused the later

casting of Judi Dench in the role). Relating back to Butler, the greater the number of

women he beds, the more masculine he must be as part of her theory of hypersmasculine

performativity to mask one’s fear of his own inherent femininity. However, it is really

just a cover for the exact things Butler, Robin Wood, and, first of all, Sigmund Freud,

theorize homosexual men cannot acknowledge about themselves.

Butler’s theory also proves interesting when looking at Bond’s relationship with

the villain. As previously mentioned in Eco’s plot summary for most of the Bond novels,

Bond is always captured and tortured by the villain before he kills him. Arguably, there

are times when Bond lets the villain torture him, so he can merely prove to the villain

what obstacles he can overcome to in fact come out on top. It appears that killing the

villain with his gun has in some way become a substitute for penetrating the villain with

his penis. In his psyche of repressing his own desire of taking another man sexually,

Bond has substituted killing him instead. It offers shades of Highsmith’s Tom Ripley who

never has a sexual relationship with Dickie Greenleaf, but kills him instead. Still, Bond is

quick to defend himself as not being a psychopath. In fact, Bond even says in the film

version of The Man With the Golden Gun, “When I kill it is on the specific orders of my

government and those I kill are killers themselves.”43 Yet, such a statement feeds into

Butler’s position of proving how masculine Bond actually is. It is not the weak that Bond

kills, rather it is the strong. Bond, himself, must be the strongest of the strong.

Still, I know detractors will persist. Honestly, Bond will probably never be

depicted on screen as having a male lover. On October 24, 2015, the Daily Mail in the

19

United Kingdom published an interview that was subsequently picked up by other media

outlets throughout the world with the now-deceased actor (and former Bond) Sir Roger

Moore who stated unequivocally a narrow view of the character. He put forth, “I have

heard people talk about how there should be a lady Bond or a gay Bond. But they

wouldn’t be Bond for the simple reason that wasn’t what Ian Fleming wrote. It’s not

about being homophobic or, for that matter, racist—it is simply about being true to the

character.”44 However, I would argue that Moore has either not read the books in a while

or is unaware of the subtext of the novels indeed written by Ian Fleming (they were

adapted by other writers for the screen). I feel that Fleming arguably did portray Bond as

possibly being at least open to the idea of participating in homosexual acts. Additionally,

filmmakers have taken license with other characters in the series: Felix Leiter has been

portrayed by both black and white actors, M has been portrayed by both men and women,

etc. I remain hopeful. I think the deeper exploration of Bond’s psyche would provide an

interesting interpretation of the character. As we all know of Bond’s world, one should

never say never…again.

20

PERFORMING BOND: HOW HYPERMASCULINITY MASKS REPRESSED

HOMOSEXUALITY IN THE JAMES BOND CANON

You've got a secret. Something you can't tell anyone, because you don't trust anyone.

–Eve Moneypenny to James Bond in SPECTRE45

I want to deceive him enough to make him—want me…

--Blanche Dubois, A Streetcar Named Desire46

Bond. James Bond. 007. With his shaken (not stirred) martinis, unbelievable

gadgets, babe on his arm, and his license to kill, he is (as the story goes) the man every

other man wants to be and the man every woman wants to be…with. While being

interviewed for The James Bond Archives, ultimate Bond Girl Honor Blackman who

portrays Pussy Galore in the film adaptation of Goldfinger remarks, “Harry Saltzman

(producer of numerous Bond films) always said that women came out of a Bond film

dreaming about Bond and the men came out walking tall.”47 In a perfectly homogenized,

heterosexual world that is likely the case. However, as a gay critic, I look at the iconic

character of James Bond in a different light. My critical view is not one of a man

gallivanting around saving the world On Her Majesty’s Secret Service as the ultimate

heterosexual hero. Rather, I view the undercurrent subtext of the novels and films and

see viewpoints that are far from heteronormative. In fact, upon examination of several

21

films and novels in the Bond franchise including Casino Royale, Goldfinger, and the

more recent Skyfall, I discover a subtext relating to James Bond that is certainly queer if

not homoerotic resulting in a viewpoint that challenges one of the quintessentially

masculine characters depicted over the past sixty years.

The queer subtext of the James Bond is a complicated one. On the surface, the

depiction of James Bond represents the pinnacle of masculinity: there is no physical act

he cannot perform and no villain—or woman for that matter--he cannot conquer. Yet,

how does one define masculinity? Traditionally, in many ways, masculinity is a

continued demonstration of dominance over a subject through whatever means

appropriate and necessary be it physical, psychological, economical, etc. As such,

dominance has been traditionally associated with maleness as its regulatory norm.

To support my theory of Bond’s repressed homosexuality, I feel it is important to

fully explore the queer subtext of both the novels and films in accordance with an

academically accepted theoretical framework. As such, my exploration begins with the

work of Sigmund Freud in his article “Certain Neurotic Mechanisms in Jealousy,

Paranoia, and Homosexuality” first published in 1922.48 First, it should be noted that the

1920s was not a time of acceptance for gayness and homophobia was the prevalent

attitude of most people. Homosexuality was considered a mental disorder until the

American Psychiatric Association, the largest psychiatric organization in the word, issued

a resolution in 1973 declaring that homosexuality was not a mental illness or sickness.49

Additionally, homosexual activity was considered a criminal act in the United Kingdom

until 1967 when the Parliament decriminalized it.50 With this in mind, Freud’s work

decades earlier was both groundbreaking and controversial at the time. However, his

22

theory of repressed homosexuality is now commonly accepted as the framework upon

which other theorists have developed their own ideas or at least used as a starting

point.theory

In his article, Freud sets forth three layers of jealousy, which he feels mask a

repressed homosexuality. Those three types are competitive (or normal) jealousy,

projected jealousy, and delusional jealousy.51 However, he notes that in a delusional

case, the subject will show indications of jealousy of all three types and never just the

delusional subset.52 To be explored later, the three types of jealousy in conjunction with

paranoia lead to Freud’s recognition of homosexuality—often repressed—and its effect

on a subject. Similarly, I will employ this methodology to examine the character of

James Bond in his various incarnations to determine the queer subtext, which underscores

Bond’s repressed homosexuality.

Freud plainly states about his theory of competitive jealousy, “It is noteworthy

that in many persons it is experienced bisexually; that is to say, in a man the suffering in

regard to the loved woman and the hatred against the male rival, grief in regard to the

unconsciously loved man and hatred of the woman as a rival will add to its intensity.”53

As a result, he posits that it is not a rare individual with underlying feelings for the same

sex. “Many persons” possess the desire for the same sex whether or not it is ever

physically acted upon. Secondly, Freud describes projected jealousy as being one that is

derived from men and women either from actual unfaithfulness on their part or from

impulses towards unfaithfulness, which have been suppressed by them. Freud describes

how a person who represses such an action will still be provoked strongly in the direction

of infidelity that he will ultimately be relieved to use his unconscious alleviation of the

23

situation. He states, “This relief—more, absolution by his conscience—he achieves when

he projects his own impulses to infidelity to the partner to whom he owes faith.”54

Freud’s third layer of jealousy, delusional jealousy, also has its origin in the repressed

impulses of infidelity. However, Freud notes that in this case, the object of the impulse is

of the same sex as the subject. He states, “Delusional jealousy represents an acidulated

homosexuality, and rightly takes its position among the classical forms of paranoia.”55

To be clear, it is repressed homosexuality that is being termed a form of paranoia and not

acknowledged homosexuality.

Freud also points out that it is an inadequate description to depict the behavior of

jealous and persecuted paranoiacs as merely projecting outwardly onto others what they

do not want to acknowledge in themselves.56 Still, he ultimately draws the path from

jealousy and paranoia to repressed homosexuality. As with many of Freud’s theories,

this theory relates to a boy and his relationship with his mother. Freud states,

The typical process, already established in innumerable cases, is that a few

years after the termination of puberty the young man, who until this time

has been strongly fixated to his mother, turns in his course, identifies

himself with his mother, and looks about for love-objects in whom he can

re-discover himself, and whom he wishes to love as his mother loved him.

The characteristic mark of this process is that usually for several years one

of the “conditions of love” is that the male object she be the same age as

he himself was when the change took place.57

Freud also talks of factors contributing to this result and the varying degrees that said

factors play a role in the determination of an individual’s repressed homosexuality. With

24

the mother as the son’s first love-object, his fixation on her makes transferring his

affection to another female difficult. Second, there is the seeming inclination to what

Freud terms a “narcissistic object-choice” as previously mentioned. Third, the

depreciation of women and the subject’s aversion from them is thought to originate from

the subject’s earlier discovery that females do not have a penis. Finally, Freud points to

one of the more powerful motives towards the selection of a homosexual object-choice:

regard for the father or fear of him. Freud explains in relation to the father, “For the

renunciation of women means that all rivalry with him (or with all men who take his

place) is avoided.”58 Freud refers to the latter two components of his theory as the

“castration complex.”

Ultimately, Freud describes the case study of one of his patients. The description

could practically be that of James Bond himself. Freud details,

The homosexuality of this patient was easily surveyed. He had made no

friendships and developed no social interests; one had the impression that

the delusion had constituted the first actual development of his relations

with men, as if it had taken over a piece of work that had been neglected.

The fact that his father was of no great importance in the family life,

combined with the humiliating homosexual trauma in early childhood, had

forced his homosexuality into repression and barred the way to its

sublimation.59

To be explored in greater detail, Bond has no friends or lasting relationships. As revealed

in Skyfall and the film version of Casino Royale, his family life was lacking, and like

many British boys he was then educated in a boarding school situation, where he was

25

likely to have homosexual experiences.60 Simply, this patient could be the prototype for

Bond’s personality.

Of course, little is actually known about Bond’s childhood. Fleming did not

really explore the life of a young James Bond in any of the novels, but officially-

sanctioned clues have been provided in the films. Arguably, the most information is

revealed in the film Skyfall. M, Bond’s supervisor played by Dame Judi Dench, asks

Bond how old he was when his parents died upon first seeing his childhood home aptly

named Skyfall. Bond replies, “You know the answer to that. You know the whole

story.” After sighing, M laments, “Orphans always make the best recruits.”61 One other

kernel of information gleaned about Bond’s childhood is when Kincade, the long time

caretaker of the estate, shows M the secret passageway in Skyfall and reveals that young

James hid in the tunnel for two days upon learning of his parents’ death. Kincade

regretfully reveals, “When he did come out (of the tunnel), he wasn’t a boy anymore.”62

As a child, Bond loses his mother and father. While it is unclear if it was post-puberty as

Freud describes, Kincade has made it clear that even though it could have been at an

earlier age than the typical perceived rejection of a mother by her son, the loss of his

parents was clearly the end of Bond’s childhood. As a result, Freud’s patterns for the loss

of the mother as the love-object and the regard and/or fear of the father are jointly

removed from Bond’s psyche setting Bond forth on a path of repression not just of

homosexual urges, but of all emotion.

Additional information can be inferred about Bond’s childhood from an exchange

he shares with Bond Girl and object of desire Vesper Lynd in the film Casino Royale.

26

Vesper, who in a game of verbal cat-and-mouse seems to be baiting Bond (as he is her),

surmises,

All right…by the cut of your suit, you went to Oxford or wherever.

Naturally, you think human beings dress like that. But you wear it with

such disdain, my guess is that you didn’t come from money, and your

school friends never let you forget it. Which means you were at that

school by the grace of someone else’s charity: hence that chip on your

shoulder. And since your first thought about me ran to ‘orphan,’ that’s

what I’d say you are.63

Bond smiles as his way of acknowledging Vesper is correct without verbalizing it. We

later learn in Skyfall that Bond’s parents did perish and his psychological evaluation to

determine his fitness to return to work after being shot reveals that Bond has a

“pathological rejection of authority based on unresolved childhood trauma.” Vesper, one

of the two women with whom Bond unsuccessfully seeks a long-term relationship (the

other being Tracy who he actually marries in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service), sees

through his self-constructed armor and analyzes his mentality in a way that few have

before. However, it should be noted that as Freud discussed and as Butler also details in

her discussion of gender performativity, sexual relations with a member of the opposite

sex does not preclude one’s repressed homosexuality, but often contributes to it.

While the loss of his parents and ensuing childhood trauma certainly signifies on

Freud’s theory of the loss of the mother resulting in the transference of the love-object. I

also contend that Bond, arguably a sufferer of the Peter Pan syndrome64 whereby he in

many ways remains a man-child, once again faces the rejection of the mother in Skyfall

27

by M (as played by Judi Dench).65 In a tense scene, M orders Bond shot by a fellow agent

in an effort to protect the mission. The scenario draws parallels to Medea’s killing of her

own children or the infamous Sophie’s Choice.66 While Kincade does refer to Bond as

“son,” to show a paternal role in Bond’s early life, M is clearly the only maternal

influence Bond has had for years. For all the armor he has built around himself and his

emotions, in the film Casino Royale when Bond receives a note from M with his new

company car, an Aston Martin, he mutters, “I love you too, M.”67 Bond is not a character

who typically shows love for another person. His declaration of love—no matter how

flippant--reveals his true feelings for M. Yes, he encounters many sexual conquests, but

love rarely enters the picture. As a result, even in the rather throwaway fashion by which

he shares his emotional connection to M, the mere fact he expresses such a sentiment

holds importance.

After he perceives himself to have been rejected by M in the beginning of Skyfall

after she orders a shot which injures him, Bond nurses his gunshot wound, flees to an

island to drown his sorrows, and allows his superiors at MI-6 to believe he has in fact

perished. It is only when their headquarters is the target of a terrorist attack that Bond

resurfaces and privately reveals himself to M. She questions his return and Bond plays

coy as to the reason for his proverbial rise from the ashes. Finally, M declares that he is

back, “because we’re under attack and you know we need you.”68 However, the subtext

of her line is that Bond is back because she in fact is under attack and Bond knew that she

will need him. Further, M reveals that with his presumed death, his flat has been sold and

his things moved into storage. She describes such action as “standard procedure on the

death of an unmarried employee with no next of kin.”69 However, as the head of a major

28

intelligence agency, M would clearly have greater things to concern herself with than the

disposition of the assets of a deceased agent. She was playing the maternal role for her

beloved “son.” M even went so far as to write his obituary. When Bond says it was

“appalling,” M replies, “I knew you’d hate it. I did call you ‘an exemplar of British

fortitude.’”70 Writing the obituary is not typically the role of one’s employer. It is one

that typically falls to family. With no remaining family of his own, M has clearly taken

on that role and recognizes that she has done so.

In fact, it could be argued that M sees herself as “mother” to all agents in the

Double 0 program and they view her in the same way. Raoul Silva, himself a former

member of the Double-0 program and the villain in Skyfall, also seems to recognize the

role of surrogate mother that M has played to Bond. Obviously, he recognizes the role

because it is the same one she played to him at some point. As Vesper Lynd notes in her

assessment of Bond in the film version of Casino Royale, “MI-6 looks for maladjusted

young men, who give little thought to sacrificing others in order to protect queen and

country.”71 Given that, it is probable that Bond and Silva share many characteristics in

their respective psychological analysis profiles. As a result, in many ways they can be

viewed as the same person who merely finds himself opposing a version of…himself (to

be explored in Chapter 5 in an examination of Bond’s almost mirror state with the

villains he pursues). In said opposition, Silva often taunts Bond in a typical schoolboy

manner reminiscent of the taunts Bond received as part of his childhood traumas, still

affecting him. Silva scoffs, “Ah well, mother’s calling. I will give her a goodbye kiss for

you.” Additionally, Silva mocks Bond with “She sent you after me, knowing you’re not

ready—knowing you would likely die. Mommy was very bad.” Finally, Silva declares,

29

“The two survivors…this is what she made us.”72 By stating that she “made” them,

clearly Silva also draws the parallel that M is the mother in both their lives. She created

them just as if she had given birth to them, reared them, and nurtured them into

adulthood.

Like Bond, M has also rejected Silva during his tenure and continues to do so as

his “bad boy” behavior escalates throughout the film. As M explains to Silva, “Regret is

not part of our profession.” However, her rejection and abandonment of him still clearly

disturbs Silva. He bemoans, “They (the enemy) kept me or five months in a room with

no air. They tortured me, and I protected your secrets. I protected you, but they made me

suffer. And suffer. And suffer. Until I realized, it was you who betrayed me. You

betrayed me.”73 By leaving him to be tortured, Silva views M as rejecting him in the

same manner Freud describes a mother rejecting her son. The rejection still clearly eats

at him as he implores M, “Say my name. Say it. My real name. I know you remember

it.” M refuses. Her rejection of Silva continues. Ultimately, M shows that, for her, her

job comes first. While her agents may see her as some earth-mother/protector/maternal

force guiding their lives, ultimately they are expendable to her. She protects them as long

as she can, but in the field they ultimately have to leave the metaphorical nest and fend

for themselves. She is left with little choice but to “reject and abandon” them in an effort

complete her job and save her country.

Consequently, the exchange between the two agents provides an interesting point

worthy of analysis with regard to the queer subtext of the Bond canon. With both men

having experienced the same rejection by the same mother figure, the queer subtext of the

already blatantly homo-eroticized scene becomes even more vivid. Silva is clearly trying

30

to goad Bond with the threat of homosexual rape. As he unbuttons Bond’s shirt, runs his

fingers across Bond’s bare chest and caresses between Bond’s thighs, Silva even teases,

“How you’re trying to remember your training now. What’s the regulation to cope with

this?”74 Bond, however, debunks his threat by simply implying that it would in fact not

be his first time with a man. Whether that is in fact true has not yet been portrayed either

on the page or screen. But while it is presumed that Silva would (and has) let his

jealousy and paranoia lead to an actual homosexual encounter, it must also be presumed

that Bond’s similar circumstances would lead him to at least have repressed such a desire.

As Alexander Doty pointed out, the queerness of the text can result merely from adopting

positions that can be considered “queer” regardless of a person’s (or character’s)

declared sexual allegiance. While the exchange is the most obvious reference to the

possibility of Bond’s queerness, it is not the only one. Bond’s exchange with Silva

certainly speaks to Freud’s rejection by the mother component of repressed sexuality. In

fact, the case can be made for it representing a “narcissistic object-choice” for both

characters, as they are in many ways the same person: similar age, similar background,

similar psyches. Bond and Silva have both been placed in the same situation. However,

their reaction to that stimulus is the only thing that separates the two of them—although

both kill people for supposedly different reasons. However, each feels that he is justified

in those actions. As a result, there is truly little difference in the two men.

Certainly, it would seem plausible for critics to dismiss this observation as

filmmakers taking liberty with the character that stray from the author’s vision and

interpretation long after Fleming’s death. However, I would disagree as Fleming offered

his own clues to Bond’s repressed homosexuality. There are rather benign clues such as

31

the scene in the novel Dr. No, where Fleming describes in a homoerotic depiction a scene

of Dr. No observing Bond while he sleeps. Fleming writes,

The man spent longer beside Bond’s bed. He scrutinized every line, every

shadow on the dark rather cruel face that lay drowned, almost extinct, on

the pillow. He watched the pulse in the neck and counted it and, while he

pulled down the sheet, he did the same with the area around the heart. He

gauged the curve of the muscles on Bond’s arms and thighs and looked

thoughtfully at the hidden strength of the flat stomach. He even bent

down close over the outflung open right hand and examined hits life and

fate lines. Finally, with infinite care, the steel claw drew the sheet back to

Bond’s neck. For another minute the tall figure stood over the sleeping

man, then it swished softly away and out the corridor and closed the door

with a click.75

While a villain would certainly want the opportunity to observe his adversary, the almost

longing with which Fleming described the scene reads true. Bond is the object of Dr.

No’s desire. Bond, on the other hand, for all his training and supposed keen awareness of

his surroundings (even during sleep) allows it to happen and is, as a result, complicit to

Dr. No’s admiration of him. Is the reader really supposed to believe that one of the

world’s greatest spies would have his nemesis sneak into his room while he was asleep

and not be awakened or aroused? I would argue that the answer is simply no. Bond’s

training would undoubtedly include sleep training to protect him at a time when he is

vulnerable to the threat of others. Interestingly, Fleming also describes how No “swished

softly away.” Such a description is one that seems atypical for a man whose evil prowess

32

threatens the entire world. It would be more apt to describe a drag persona exiting stage

right at the end of her number.

However, there are more blatant clues if one seeks them. Umberto Eco points

out, “Bond ceases to be a subject for psychiatry and remains the most physiological

object, a magnificent machine” in his discussion of what is often perceived as Bond’s

lack of introspection “at least in the novels.”76 He does point out, though, that Bond

seems to “indulge in such intimate luxuries” in the short stories.77 I also point to a couple

of incidents in the short stories where Fleming exposes Bond as a person whose sexual

proclivities certainly deviate from a milquetoast, heteronormative existence. In “For

Your Eyes Only” for example, Fleming reveals that when Bond was sixteen on a trip to

Paris, Bond followed the advice of an advertisement for Harry’s Bar in the Continental

Daily Mail which “started one of the memorable evenings of his life culminating in the

loss, almost simultaneous, of his virginity and his notecase.”78

While the notecase plays little importance to my argument, the loss of the

virginity in Paris does contribute—particularly in light of the following passage.

Fleming also describes “For Your Eyes Only,”

Today had been so beautiful—one of those days when you almost believe

that Paris is beautiful and gay—and Bond had decided to give the town

just one more chance. He would find himself a girl, and take her to dinner

at some make-believe place in the Bois like the Armenoville. To clean the

money-look out of her eyes, for it would certainly be there—he would as

soon as possible give her fifty thousand francs. He would say to her, “I

33

propose to call you Donatienne, or possibly Solange, because those are the

names that suit my mood and evening.79

It seems like a rather simple description and I certainly acknowledge that it does not

make the case for Bond’s sexual desires to be something other than heteronormative.

Granted, he is paying a prostitute for sex and Paris is described as being “gay,” but

neither of those things make the case. At the time, “gay” was also commonly used to

describe something as “happy.” It did mean same-sex sexual activity, but the case could

easily be made that such was not Fleming’s intention.

However, Fleming’s intention comes into question when one examines another

passage from the short story “007 in New York” where Fleming describes Bond’s

proclivities and desires for the city. Fleming writes, “Again, New York had everything.

He (Bond) had heard, though he had never succeeded in tracing them, that one could see

blue films with sound and colour and that one’s sex life was never the same thereafter.

That would be an experience to share with Solange.”80 With this statement, Fleming

makes it clear that Solange (from another short story) is a character who at least recurs in

Bond’s thoughts. Fleming continues, “And that bar, again still undiscovered, which Felix

Leiter had told him was the rendezvous for sadists and masochists of both sexes. The

uniform was black leather jackets and leather gloves. If you were a sadist, you wore the

gloves under the left shoulder strap. For the masochists, it was the right.”81 With this

description, Fleming is beginning to show Bond as existing outside the heteronormative

world. An S&M club is something that is arguably outside the realm for a person who is

in a monogamous, same-sex relationship within the confines a traditional marriage

between a man and a woman. Additionally, in today’s world, the explanation of which

34

side the gloves were to be worn on is something that could easily be identified in a

google search for some of the many symbols and signals that gay men have historically

used for identification to other gay men in a world where openness was not tolerated or

even allowed.

Yet, it is the last sentence of this passage where Fleming offers the greatest clue to

Bond’s with the last sentence of the passage. Fleming describes, “As with the

transvestite places in Paris and Berlin, it would be fun to go and have a look.”82. This

sentence is the one that ultimately helps make the case of Bond’s predilection for sexual

activities with members of the same gender. Use of the antiquated term “transvestite”

aside, Fleming shows that Bond is familiar with clubs in both Paris and Berlin where

transgendered people are known to frequent. Then, one should also consider it was a

nameless club in Paris where Bond wanted to pick up a “girl,” pay her for intercourse (in

the long-held trope, stereotype, and actuality of the transgendered individual as a sex

worker), and call her “Solange.” The case is simple, “Solange” is a transgendered sex

worker from Paris with whom Bond has either been intimate (virginity loss) or desires to

be intimate. As with the incident of the hypnotist discussed in the previous chapter,

Fleming may have hidden the clues about Bond’s “homosexual tendencies,” but he hid

them in the open. Just as Eco pointed out that introspection for Bond was most apparent

in the short stories, so were revelations about his sexuality.

Even with Fleming’s clues of “homosexual tendencies,” one cannot overlook the

fact that Bond is a character who is often portrayed as being not just a “lover” of women,

but the ultimate lover, himself. As a result, an exploration of his homosexuality needs to

reconcile that observation. To accomplish that end, I feel that the theories of Judith

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Butler, built on the work of Freud to a large degree prove insightful . Butler theorizes that

gender is performed through a process, which must be repeated in order to create its own

existence resulting in an unstable image that emerges from the acts of doing things and

their comparison to regulatory norms. As such, gender is an unstable entity because of its

performative aspect. Considering this theory, in looking at the hyper-masculine

phantasm that Bond creates in his own performance of gender, one should also consider

Butler’s assertion of the homosexual male. As previously discussed, she relates that an

exaggerated version of masculinity is often taken on by gay men who are trying to hide

their own “femininity” not just from others but also from themselves.83 As such, the

depiction of Bond, in all his masculine glory, merely hides an underlying truth of his

being: the character’s own clandestine homosexual leanings. Therefore, arguably, his

hypermasculine performance is a façade he has created for himself to mask his own

insecurities and perceived inadequacies as a gay man struggling to exist in what was at

the time Fleming created the character (and arguably still is) a homophobic world where

such “tendencies” would not have been accepted.

Additionally, one should address and evaluate the hegemonic matrix in which

Bond exists throughout the franchise. Within what societal regulatory norms must he

operate? What model performances and philosophies shape his performance? How does

the construction of his hypermasculinity depend upon queer energies and thus retain

them? On one hand, Bond is a secret agent who must keep certain secrets in order to

survive. However, are there some secrets the authors have yet to reveal even about Bond

himself? Additionally, how does the preeminence of the closet structure all “secrets” in

culture? Butler, along with other critics, provides a framework to explore exactly what

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those secrets are and puts forth a framework by which those secrets can be examined and

explored. In fact, Butler argues that central to her view is the notion that gender is

something that is a self-identical being within a hegemonic language. She posits, “This

appearance is achieved through a performative twist of language and/or discourse that

conceals the fact that ‘being’ a sex or gender is fundamentally impossible.”84

Considering this observation, coupled with her position on performativity, one could also

argue that “being” a superspy with orders to do whatever necessary to accomplish a goal

with a psychological profile full of ambiguity, means that whatever necessary could

include a certain fluidity with his own sexuality. In exploring Bond’s hypermasculine

performance, his agency (or possible lack thereof) in said performance, and the

homosexual aspect of his personality hidden by that performance becomes apparent. In

looking at his masculinity through the lens of performativity, it is clear that Bond is far

from the heteronormative individual he is often presented as being.

To fully examine the hypermasculine performance of Bond and the latent queer

tendencies it masks, I feel it is important to first look at the performativity itself and an

exploration of how masculinity is presented in the franchise. In fact, producers of the

first film made clear that the actor playing Bond must possess an almost palpable

masculine energy. Of the initial casting process for the first Bond film Dr. No, producer

Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli explains, “To be candid, all the British actors I had

interviewed, while very talented, lacked the degree of masculinity Bond demanded. To

put it in the vernacular of our profession: Sean (Connery) had the balls for the part.”85

Simply, perceived masculinity was foremost in the casting process. Additionally, with a

canon spanning as long as Bond’s has, most people have experienced Bond as part of the

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cultural zeitgeist for their entire adult lives. Arguably, most Bond fans do not examine

the subtext of the novels or films; they simply view Bond as the epitome of masculine

energy.

As such, altering the view to see Bond as a character who exists on the queer

spectrum shows not just a different viewpoint, but hopefully ultimately an understanding

that gender and sexuality are entities that are not simply an all or nothing dichotomy.

Rather, masculinity and femininity are much just a component of such things and in some

ways unrelated to a person’s sexuality. Additionally, the subtext of the novels and films

is not that simple or that obvious. As Nikki Sullivan points out in her book A Critical

Introduction to Queer Theory, “If there is no single correct account of sexuality, then

contemporary views of particular relationships and practices are not necessarily any more

enlightened or any less symptomatic of the times than those held by previous

generations.”86 She continued with the importance of remembering that point in the

examination of texts. As the novel Casino Royale was first published in 1953 and the

film SPECTRE was released in 2015 and production currently underway for Bond 25—

the as-yet-untitled next film, this paper examines sources over a period of roughly sixty

years, each of which is arguably a representation of its time’s own respective zeitgeist.

I am certainly not the first queer critic to examine Bond’s masculinity. As briefly

mentioned in Chapter 1, in the introduction to Female Masculinity, Judith Halberstam

offers a view of Bond’s masculinity in the 1995 film Goldeneye in which he was

portrayed by Pierce Brosnan. Halberstam is quick to point out the negative aspects of

Bond’s character including being called a “dinosaur” by M as she also “chastises him for

being a misogynist and a sexist.”87 Halberstam also notes, “His secretary, Miss

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Moneypenny, accuses him of sexual harassment, his male buddy betrays him and calls

him a dupe, and ultimately women seem not to go for his charms—bad suits and lots of

sexual innuendo—which seem as old and ineffective as his gadgets.”88 Halberstam

continues with her position stating, “Masculinity, in this rather actionless film, is

primarily prosthetic and, in this and countless other action films, has little if anything to

do with biological maleness and signifies more often as a technical special effect.”89

Halberstam posits that Judi Dench’s M is the character who more convincingly performs

masculinity in the film as Halberstam describes her as a “noticeably butch older

woman.”90 I tend to disagree with Halberstam’s classification of the character as I frankly

feel that she has an oversimplified view of Dench’s M. Granted that M has Dench’s

trademark short haircut and is in a position of power, but one also has to look at the

traditional depictions of masculinity and their significations.

Dench is the first woman to have portrayed the role of M. Like Bond, the

character has had numerous actors—five in fact—play the part.91 So in some ways,

Dench’s M of course has masculine characteristics; it is a role that has been traditionally

played by men. Plus, as head of MI-6 (the British secret agency), M is a character who

will of course be called upon to make tough decisions. Yet, in Skyfall, however, to reduce

her to simple masculinity or “butchness” misses the nuance of the character. Dench, a

woman of a certain age, portrays the role in full makeup (traditionally feminine) and

patrician dress (often suits with skirts, heels, and jewelry). I will agree she acts in

traditionally masculine ways, but also quotes Tennyson when testifying before a

government panel in Skyfall. By invoking a poem not to mention her motherly treatment

of Bond, Dench’s M is far from the traditional butch role Halberstam categorizes. In fact,

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M, along with the decision to cast a woman to play the role, further blurs the tradition of

masculine gender roles in the franchise.92

Yet, it is those traditional masculine roles Bond not only portrays, he also plays

against depending on which version of Bond one is viewing. If the traditional masculine

role is that of hunter, war-monger, and superior athlete, Bond certainly fits the bill. In the

opening fifteen-minute scene of Skyfall, Daniel Craig’s Bond demonstrates that he

possesses all those characteristics. First, Bond leaves a colleague who has been shot to

face an uncertain future and possible death. He then joins with a female agent in an SUV

to chase their adversary through the streets of a middle-eastern market. When his female

counterpart is not driving to suit Bond’s goals, he literally jerks the steering wheel from

her hands to crash their vehicle into the sports car driven by the villain. Bond then

defends himself against an automatic rifle with merely a handgun before both he and the

nameless villain commandeer dirt bikes for a high-speed chase on the roofs of buildings

surrounding the bazaar. Bond then leaps from the motorcycle to the roof of a moving

train. On freight car, he first takes shelter in a front-end loader (a bull-dozer type piece of

machinery) and then uses it in pursuit of his target. He knocks two cars off the open train

car before driving over the others using the loader to block the shots of his villain. In this

process, Bond is shot in the shoulder but does not allow the wound to slow his pursuit.

When the villain manages to uncouple the car Bond is on from the rest of the train, he

uses the front-end loader to form a bridge between the two parts of the train and then

walks across it. At this point, Bond and the nameless villain engage in a mano a mano

fight on top of the train through a series of tunnels where Bond is disadvantaged because

the villain swings at him repeatedly with a large metal chain. Ultimately, in spite of his

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display of masculine prowess, Bond does fall victim to an “unclean” shot from his female

colleague. He falls from the roof of the train off a bridge down possibly hundreds of feet

to a waterfall-laden river where he washes away to his apparent death. Of course, he

does not die or the movie would be over in 15 minutes.

The lengthy description of the scene is not intended to merely summarize the

movie. Rather the description is intended to show Bond’s hyper-masculine prowess. In

the scene, he utilizes none of the gadgets for which Bond is known. He simply has

himself, a couple of vehicles, and a standard-issue handgun. Halberstam asserts that

Bond in this depiction relies much more heavily on “biological maleness” and much less

on “technical special effects.”93 Contrary to her claims, this was Bond without the “toys”

as she described them; he could not use his gadgets to “prop up his performance of

masculinity.”94 That is not to say that the filmmakers did not take an opportunity to blur

the gender lines slightly. In the beginning of the scene, Bond wanted to stop his

colleague’s bleeding. It was M who urged him through audio communication to leave

him in pursuit of the villain. Still, Bond took a moment to position his fellow spy’s hand

in a manner that would at least impede the flow of blood. Again, it was M who urged

Eve to take the “unclean” shot that ultimately “took” Bond’s life. Still, I argue that while

M makes traditionally masculine decisions as her job requires and she has been trained to

do, said decisions do not necessarily make her a “butch” individual. M can still be a

feminine character in spite of making tough decisions.

The opening scene of Skyfall contrasts strongly with the opening scene of Bond’s

1985 outing in A View to a Kill. In the six-minute opening scene of A View to a Kill,

Roger Moore’s Bond is battling the Russians in some unnamed, oceanfront mountain

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range “5 days to Alaska.” In contrast to Craig’s hypermasculine, super-athletic version

of Bond, we get Roger Moore’s arguably campy version. We first see him in a white ski

suit with a very large fur-trimmed collar and sporting enormous white aviator-style

sunglasses. As he is discovered by the Russians, on his skis he leaps into a large crevice

and down the mountain as Russian agents pursue him on skis with machine guns. The

Russians shoot off one of his skis, so Bond is immediately able to hijack one of their

snowmobiles using a rope and couple of hooks. When the snowmobile is blown up by

the helicopter looming overhead, Bond conveniently fashions a snowboard from a blade

of the snowboard that landed nearby and Roger Moore’s obvious stunt double proceeds

to board down the mountain and across a lake while the soundtrack blares the Beach

Boys’ “California Girls.” Of course, the Russian agents are unable to glide across the

lake on their skis as he was on his primitive snowboard, so Bond is left to simply take

down the helicopter with his hand-held rocket launcher before seeking comfort in a boat

disguised as an iceberg with a female agent/conquest awaiting inside. Bond then brags to

his fellow agent that he was able to secure her “the best beluga, vodka rather shaken, and

one microchip” before he lures her onto the bed and sets the boat on automatic.

The contrast between the two openers could not be more apparent. The

filmmakers show Craig’s Bond as the height of masculinity. Everything he is shown

doing, the viewers believe he is doing. By comparison, Moore’s Bond with his

flamboyant fur-trimmed outfit and questionable hijinks set forth a fantasy that is

impossible to believe. With a canon spanning over sixty years, the portrayal of Bond’s

masculinity has clearly changed over time. As the franchise has evolved, it has shed

many of the campy elements from the earlier Bond films. It is doubtful that viewers will

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again see Bond sent into space as he was in Moonraker (1979) or tangling with sharks as

he did in Thunderball (1965). Simply, the filmmakers have evolved Bond’s portrayal of

masculinity to reflect the masculine ideal of the respective times. Moore’s scene in the

beginning of A View to a Kill encapsulated 1980s excess perfectly. Bond’s flamboyant

attire was not that different from that of pretty boy pop band Duran Duran who provided

the theme song moments later with a neon laden video. Bond then battles Zorin a villain

using computers in the relatively new Silicon Valley. Similarly, Craig’s Bond begins

Skyfall battling a villain in the Middle East (the current target of fear and xenophobia)

and then faces a villain reflecting 2012’s fear—an agent who had been turned against his

agency and was willing to release confidential information regarding the agency,

endangering operations all over the world. While double-agents have certainly been a

fear of any spy organization, Bond’s villains seem to evolve as the world has evolved.

When Fleming wrote the novels, Russia and the communist block were certainly the

enemy of the time. In 2012, with wars in the Middle East spanning over a decade, a

Middle Eastern villain was the appropriate villain for Bond to battle. Each displays the

actor’s own version of masculinity (and arguably a representation of the masculine ideal

of the time), but my contention is that masculinity is a ruse designed to cover for the

secret agent’s own secrets.

Butler provides an interesting framework to examine this latency within the

character. By looking at societal norms presented in a world of heteronormativity, she

puts forth a groundwork where masculinity is merely a cover for other aspects of a

person’s sex and gender. Halberstam agrees. Of Bond, Halberstam states,

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Because masculinity tends to manifest as natural gender itself, the action

flick with its emphases on prosthetic extension, actually undermines the

heterosexuality of the hero even as it extends his masculinity. So, in

Goldeneye, for example, Bond’s masculinity is linked not only to a

profoundly unnatural form of masculine embodiment but also to gay

masculinities.95

Halberstam’s notion of gay masculinities is a complex one. By its inherent nature, a gay

masculinity would converge gender and sexuality. While traditionalists typically

stereotype gay men in terms of their femininity, many different forms of the gay man

exist including those of a more “butch” variety whose gender and sexuality would

intersect as a masculine (if not macho) man who still sexually desires another man.

Halberstam theorizes that Bond’s masculinity is defined by his weapons and gadgets?.

Once they are removed, he is left in his natural, more feminine, state. While I am not

certain I agree with the assertion, Halberstam’s point is an interesting one to consider.

The theory certainly lends credence to my theory that Bond in all his supposed

masculinity blurs the line between the gay/straight binary. If he is indeed on the queer

spectrum—as arguments will later show—does his life in the closet (self-imposed or

otherwise) color other aspects of his mission to serve and protect society/normalcy? If he

blurs the gay/straight binary, does he also then blur the ally/enemy binary? Arguably, if

one cannot view oneself in simplistic forms, determining the right course of action for

sex partners or national security both come into question not just for the character being

portrayed but also for the individuals viewing, identifying with, or fantasizing about that

character.

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Arguably, viewing Bond as a character hiding his own sexuality makes him a

more interesting character with a greater depth than simply a super-agent with a license to

kill. The training the character goes through merely exacerbates an often-inherent aspect

of a queer individual: the keeping of the secret about their sexual desires, which in turn

leads to secrets of all types. Frankly, it stands to reason that a closeted homosexual

would excel at keeping State secrets because he (or she) has arguably spent a lifetime

keeping their own secret. In his essay “The Ethics of Sexual Shame,” Michael Warner

posits, “People whose gender identity differs from the norm are despised, often violently,

whether they desire those of their own sex or not. Nelly boys and butch girls can be fag-

bashed or taunted, and being heterosexual will not protect them very much.”96 He does

point out, though that the inverse is also true. He relates, “In the same contexts,

homosexuals whose gender conforms to the norm can often be silently accepted.”97 To be

clear, there is a distinction between gender identity and sexuality. However, the

delineation is often blurred or oversimplified when looking at an individual.

In Bond’s case, the delineation between sexuality and gender identity has been

blurred intentionally. Warner points out,

If you are born with male genitalia, the logic goes, you will behave in

masculine ways, desire feminine women, desire them exclusively, have

sex in what are thought to be normally active and insertive ways and

within officially sanctioned contexts, think of yourself as heterosexual,

identify with other heterosexuals, trust in the superiority of heterosexuality

no matter how tolerant you might wish to be, and never change any part of

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this package from childhood to senescence. If you deviate at any point

from this program, you do so at your own cost.98

As a spy, the character of Bond finds it necessary to quickly assimilate into any

environment in which he finds himself. As a result, he must perform as a heterosexual in

order to do so. If as Warner posits, deviation from the heterosexual norm would lead to

his peril, Bond who often finds himself in life and death situations and relies on

information obtained through liaisons with the female consorts (or former consorts as is

often the case) of many of his nemeses, must perform his hypermasculine role.

With this in mind, we can look once again at the comparison of Bond with Raoul

Silva in Skyfall. The only difference between them perhaps is that Silva, by having

escaped the hegemonic lair of the MI-6, is free to more openly explore his own repressed

homosexual leanings. Bond must still keep his closeted. Bond must continually perform

his role of the hypermasculine, heteronormative male. The brief glance given to his

deeper, queer psyche in Skyfall, though, is only one of the more obvious insights in the

oeuvre. Yet, it is perhaps the most telling one. Butler notes that there are three

contingent dimensions of “significant corporeality” namely anatomical sex, gender

identity, and gender performance.99 Arguably (although I admittedly have not performed

a personal inspection) Bond is depicted to have male genitalia and gender identity.

However, it is performance that comes into question. Again, I refer to the opening

sequence of Skyfall. The filmmakers use all three characters (M, Bond, and Eve

Moneypenny) to blur the lines of the traditionally masculine performance. Bond in a

seemingly feminine and emotionally soft act seems more concerned about caring for his

injured colleague than in the pursuit of his adversary. M is the one who orders him to

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leave the injured spy and continue; she demonstrates dominance over Bond (as is her role

as his superior in the organization) but a harder, less emotional (and traditionally

masculine) stance. Finally, Eve Moneypenny is the one who actually shoots Bond

showing a dominance over him that leaves her in the more traditionally masculine role.

She, too, is following the orders of M, but is the one who ultimately pulls the trigger. As

such, the character is depicted with the agency to make her own decision revealing her

own masculinity.

As a result, the gender roles constructed and performed by these individuals are

something that is both part of and determined by an ongoing discourse which continually

reinvents and reinterprets itself. Arguably, all are heightening their performance of

masculinity in an effort to disguise the feminine aspects of their being. Butler postulates

that the repetitive nature of performance never fully achieves an original and whole view

of masculinity (or femininity for that matter) but is more of a pastiche or a parody of that

traditionally understood performance. Rather, the “phantasmatic ideal” is one that cannot

be successfully and accurately copied.100 The reason for this is obvious. The ideal can

never be achieved. One can be nearly ideal, but never actually ideal. Additionally,

Butler puts forth that by considering the uncertainty and vagueness that exists in the

queer spectrum and how those practices are stifled and reevaluated within the

masculine/feminine binary, one can determine that said uncertainties create

“configurations of gender confusion” which in turn intervene, expose, and displace the

reifications of the binary.101 If, as Butler notes and I previously mentioned, a

homosexual male takes on/performs masculinity to hide from everyone (including

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himself) an “obstensible femininity,” it stands to reason that the blurring of gender roles

in the relationships depicted and described feeds into that logic.

Still, blurred gender roles, while interesting and obviously a complication of the

character’s identity, do not necessarily confirm a hidden or latent sexuality. Butler

argues that a homosexual male would not present an image that merely replicates that of

a heterosexual male. Given gender’s discursive and ever changing nature within the

confines of society, Butler postulates, “Gay is to straight not as copy is to original, but

rather, as copy is to copy.”102 In Bodies That Matter, Butler offers a discussion, then, of

sexuality. She states, “Sexuality is as much motivated by the fantasy of retrieving

prohibited objects as by the desire to remain protected from the threat of punishment that

such a retrieval might bring on.”103 Invoking Lacan’s work, she notes that the threat is

usually the “father’s law” which determines appropriate kinship relations delineating

“appropriate and mutually exclusive lines of identification and desire.”104 Bond, as a

government agent, certainly works within (and admittedly sometimes outside) the

“father’s law” or in his case the “queen’s law.” In every aspect of his life, Bond has to be

motivated to retrieve “prohibited objects.” It is true in A View to a Kill when he retrieves

the microchip containing data which would create death, destruction, and mayhem in the

world and it would be true in his pursuit to achieve a “forbidden” libidinal conquest of

another man.

Butler expands on her theorization of sexual motivation by the fantasy of the

acquisition of forbidden objects. She states,

When the threat of punishment wielded by that prohibition is too great, it

may be that we desire someone who will keep us from ever seeing the

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desire for which we are punishable, and in attaching ourselves to that

person, it may be that we effectively punish ourselves in advance and,

indeed, generate desire in and through and for that self-punishment.105

Her argument is an interesting one especially considering Bond and the manner in which

he allows himself to be tortured in his films. In both Casino Royale and Goldfinger (as

well as others), Bond faces castration at the hands of his respective enemy. In effect, it is

self-punishment as he always shows himself capable of escape (demonstrating his

superior masculinity once again) and does not depend on anyone to come to his rescue.

In Goldfinger, Sean Connery’s Bond finds himself strapped to a metal table with a laser

slicing the table between his legs as it makes its way to his “manhood.”

However, the film of Casino Royale offers the more interesting and far more

graphic scene to consider. In an effort to gain the personal identification number for an

account holding millions of dollars that have been stolen, the villainous Le Chiffre

instructs his henchmen to strip Bond of his clothes and bind him to a seatless cane chair.

Le Chiffre then uses a knotted rope to strike Bond in a whip-like fashion on the underside

of the chair. He taunts Bond, “You know, I never understood all these elaborate tortures.

It’s the simplest thing…to cause more pain than a man can possibly endure. And of

course, it’s not only the immediate agony, but the knowledge that if you do not yield soon

enough, there will be little left to identify you as a man.”106 Even with the threat of his

own castration, Bond will not allow himself to freely give over the information to Le

Chiffre. While he certainly shouts and yells to express his pain, he also returns the taunts

of Le Chiffre by saying things such as “I’ve got a little itch down there. Would you

mind?” and continues with, “To the right! To the right! To the right!” Finally, after the

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fifth strike, Bond sneers, “Now the whole world is going to know that you died

scratching my balls.”107 Bond is clearly not yielding to the considerable pain or letting

his captor get the best of him. In fact, he is performing masculinity at an extreme level to

demonstrate how much pain and torture he can actually take before he turns the tables

and shows his dominance over Le Chiffre.108 As Le Chiffre becomes more frustrated

with the situation, he knocks over the chair, pulls a knife and declares, “I think I’ll feed

you what you seem not to value.”109 In other words, Bond would in fact be performing

oral sex on himself—whether his sex organ remained attached to his body or not.

Clearly, these actions play into the queer subtext of the film and of the film canon.110

Figure 1 Daniel Craig’s Bond being tortured by Le Chiffre in Casino Royale

Additionally, Bond’s hypermasculine performativity also plays into his

relationships with women. To a large degree, Bond is depicted as a man gallivanting

around the world with the proverbial woman in every port. As Butler points out, though,

said women and ports can ultimately contribute to Bond’s repression rather than detract

from the theorization. Butler posits, “The homosexual man is said to exaggerate his

“heterosexuality” (meaning a masculinity that allows him to pass as heterosexual) as a

“defense,” unknowingly, because he cannot acknowledge his own homosexuality (or is it

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that the analyst would now acknowledge it, if it were his?)”111 As a result, Bond’s

dalliances with the so-called Bond Girls actually plays into this psyche. The women are

abundant and disposable with rare exception.

Two exceptions seem to emerge which could trouble that assertion: Vesper Lynd

in Casino Royale and Teresa “Tracy” Draco Bond (Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo) in On

Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Vesper, in many ways, simply emasculates Bond in both

the film and the novel. In the film, Vesper and Bond engage in a simple tit for tat

exchange upon first meeting. He thinks he has bested her by pointing out the boxiness?

of her clothing and her insecurity over her intellectual abilities being overshadowed by

her good looks. As previously discussed, Vesper has no trouble offering insight to

Bond’s past as a loner with rather cocky ways. She then adds, “And since your first

thought about me ran to ‘orphan,’ that’s what I’d say you are.” Based on what we know

of Bond from the novels, from other films and descriptions, Vesper categorized him

perfectly.

However, she does not simply offer insight to his past, she then concludes her

analysis with an observation of his current attitude. She posits, “Now, having just met

you, I wouldn't go as far as calling you a cold-hearted bastard...”112 Bond agrees, but

then Vesper adds, “But it wouldn't be a stretch to imagine. You think of women as

disposable pleasures, rather than meaningful pursuits. So as charming as you are, Mr.

Bond, I will be keeping my eye on our government's money - and off your perfectly-

formed arse.”113 Like the lamb he had been served, Bond found himself to use his word,

“skewered.” However, to a man who constantly and consistently performs a level of

hypermasculinity, Vesper (as part of her modus operandi), simply threw down the

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gauntlet and extended the challenge. Bond must seduce her to prove to her and to

himself how much of a man he is.

In the novel, Bond tells Vesper that she makes him feel like “an expensive

gigolo” and the sexual side of their relationship remains complicated. Fleming writes,

“She (Vesper) led him into her bedroom and made passionate love to him. Bond’s body

responded, but afterwards she cried bitterly into her pillow and Bond went to his room in

grim despair.”114 The depiction is hardly that of a couple in love. Interestingly enough,

Fleming describes the scene as Vesper making “passionate love” to Bond and not the

other way around. The indication is that Bond is taking the more passive role in their

shared sex life—an image that is diametrically opposed to Bond as the lover who must

conquer any female in his path. Still, Bond gives up his career to flee with Vesper. The

question remains, why? Is it love? Or is it merely that Bond can never truly conquer

her? She outwits him. She makes love to him. She, in many ways, takes on the

dominant, more traditionally masculine role. Is that what Bond is actually seeking—to be

the more submissive one and embrace, at least ostensibly, a role that would encompass

his inner femininity that he has so desperately tried to disguise? Vesper is female, but in

showing her even subtly taking the lead in the relationship, the depiction troubles not

only Bond’s masculinity but also his heteronormativity. However, like all women Bond

encounters, Vesper ultimately proves disposable. She is in fact tied to the other side as an

enemy. In reporting her death to command, Bond shows no love or remorse by simply

declaring, “The bitch is dead now.”115 Whatever the two had shared, Bond ultimately

returned to his masculine performance in showing no emotion over the loss of a woman

with whom he had supposedly been in love.

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Bond’s other encounter with a possible attempt at a lasting relationship is with the

aforementioned Tracy Draco in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Bond ultimately

marries her before her untimely death (proving her to be disposable, as well). Still, of

Tracy, Bond laments, “And that corner of his life, of his heart, he wanted to leave

undisturbed for the time being. Their last evening together had passed quietly, almost as

if they had been old friends, old lovers.”116 However, as nicely as Fleming describes the

scene, he also troubles it with the following passage. He describes, “That night, after a

wonderful dinner at Bond’s little restaurant, they had made love, happily and this time

without desperation, without tears. Bond was satisfied that the cure had really begun.”117

The obvious question is the cure for what had really begun? Granted, it could be as

simple as the cure for a broken heart or a troubled past. However, as discussed in the

previous chapter, Fleming views “homosexual tendencies” as something that can be

cured by sleeping with a woman. Are those tendencies what is being cured in this

passage? Considering the clues and coded language used throughout the books, arguably

they are.

Additionally, in what is a metaphorical description of Bond’s heteronormativity

versus queerness, one should examine the manner in which Tracy is killed and thus taken

from Bond’s life. In both the novel and the film, much is made of Irma Blunt’s

masculine appearance and her queer existence. As a result, when she is the one who kills

Tracy immediately following Tracy’s wedding to Bond, the visual is queer existence is

literally robbing Bond of his heteronormativity. Bond has finally married a woman.

Bond is clearly seeking a heteronormative existence for whatever reason, but arguably to

prove to himself and those around him that he is in fact a straight man, only to have said

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existence destroyed by the queer character in his midst. Simply viewed, it is as if his own

queerness cannot be completely concealed.

Finally, Pussy Galore from Goldfinger and her role in Bond’s performativity

should be explored. Galore, a lesbian character is one that is in many ways a surrogate

for Bond’s own queerness. For example, Galore, though later seduced by Bond, says to

him, “You know what, Mister Bond? I got a feeling there’s something phoney about you.

I got instincts, see?”118 The coded language is barely that. The lesbian character is

calling Bond out on his false existence. She does not say that he is gay, but she points to

an aspect of his personality that was not openly discussed at the time. In fact, when the

novel was adapted to film five years later in 1964, the filmmakers chose to downplay

Galore’s lesbianism. Simply, Moore can argue Fleming did not depict Bond as gay all he

wants, I would argue that the contrary is true and Fleming merely said what was

“passable” at the time for a mainstream, commercial novel. Yes, Pussy Galore was

described as a lesbian, but she was ultimately seduced by Bond giving her a more

heterosexual demeanor. At the time, Fleming could show no heroic character—either

male of female—as homosexual119.

Further, in his work The Celluloid Closet, Vito Russo says of lesbianism, “In

celebrating maleness, the rendering invisible of all else has caused lesbianism to

disappear behind a male version of sex in general.”120 In many ways, Fleming depicts

Galore that way. Ultimately, her lesbianism largely falls by the wayside in the novel

when she meets Bond. Galore has undoubtedly had a somewhat difficult sexual

existence. She describes her upbringing in the southern United States as follows, “You

know the definition of a girl down there? Well, it’s a girl who can run faster than her

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brother. In my case, I couldn’t run as fast as my uncle. I was twelve.” Still, when Bond

kisses her and mentions that she supposedly only likes women, Galore replies, “I never

met a man before.”121 Galore, though an avowed lesbian ultimately succumbs to Bond,

supposedly because he is the quintessential “real man” but perhaps it actually is because

he is not for a “man” actually is more like a woman than normatively gauged. Arguably,

her words could be heard against the grain as her recognition in Bond of a kindred

polysexual spirit as well as another survivor of childhood sexual abuse.

The relationship between Bond and Galore proves interesting on several levels.

First, as Jaime Hovey points out, “One of the favorite themes of lesbian novels in the

twentieth century is the seduction of the heterosexual or married woman away from her

husband and lifestyle of another woman.”122 By depicting Bond and his seduction of

Galore, Fleming gives the reader the exact opposite of a common queer trope. However,

in having Bond “turn” a lesbian back to a heteronormative existence (and ignoring the

sexuality spectrum), his performativity as a male ultimately increases: rendering the

ultimate hypermasculine male. Simply, no woman is impervious to his charms, desires,

or as Vesper so memorably declared, his “perfectly-formed arse.”

As a critic, I am acutely aware that James Bond will likely never be openly

depicted as a gay or bisexual character in the patriarchal world in which he is depicted.

Critic Robin Wood argues, “Patriarchy depends upon the separation of the sexes, hence

upon the continued repression of bisexuality in order that masculinity and femininity may

continue to be constructed.”123 However, I feel the subtext certainly exists in both the

films and the original novels to justify a queer examination of the character. If as is

commonly accepted among gender scholars that gender and sexuality are not binaries, but

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rather spectrums with most individuals falling somewhere between completely male and

female and simply gay or straight, enough evidence is subtly presented to show that

James Bond exists in the respective continuums rather than at either (socially

constructed) end of them.

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CAMP BONDING: AN ANALYSIS OF CAMP ELEMENTS IN THE JAMES BOND

FILM SERIES

You can’t camp about something you don’t take seriously.

You’re not making fun of it, you are making fun out of it. You’re

expressing what’s basically serious to you in terms of fun and

artifice and elegance. –Christopher Isherwood

The World In the Evening124

Susan Sontag begins her essay “Notes on ‘Camp’” (written in 1964) by stating

that many things in the world have not been named and others that while named have

never really been described. As such she determines that “Camp” is one of those things.

She then describes it as a cult name that is “the sensibility—unmistakably modern, a

variant of sophistication but hardly identical with it.”125 Further, she notes that while a

sensibility is distinct from an idea, it is difficult to discuss. Camp, Sontag argues, is not a

“natural mode of sensibility;” rather, it is “love of the unnatural: of artifice and

exaggeration.”126 Additionally, she notes, the Camp sensibility is one that while doing

many things often converts serious subjects into frivolous ones. It also is “something of a

private code, a badge of identity even, among small urban clique.”127

Matthew Tinkcom supports this theory in his tome Working Like a Homosexual.

He posits, “One remarkable aspect of the phenomenon of queer reception should be

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noted, namely, that queer male fan discourse on popular cinema are not simply

coincidental to the forging of their own language and social circles; cinema and popular

culture have generally been vital to forming these things in the first place.”128 In short, it

is almost a conundrum of what came first: the chicken or the egg. Gay men largely

formed the language to discuss the elements comprising popular culture in an almost self-

referential way.

Sontag’s essay is still considered to be the seminal work on the subject of Camp

by critics129. In it she details 58 “notes” that she feels contribute to the Camp sensibility.

Her notes include items such as number 10, which states, “Camp sees everything in

quotation marks.”130 She points out in number 38, “Camp is the consistently aesthetic

experience of the world. It incarnates as a victory of ‘style’ over ‘content,’ ‘aesthetics’

over ‘morality’ of irony over tragedy.”131 In number 41, she notes, “The whole point of

Camp is to dethrone the serious. Camp is playful, anti-serious.”132 She follows in

number 44 stating, “Camp proposes a comic vision of the world.”133 In number 58,

Sontag’s argument culminates with, “The ultimate Camp statement: it’s good because

it’s awful.”134 While the notes picked to quote are not to be considered all-inclusive, they

do offer a glimpse into Sontag’s criteria.

Interestingly, a subset of her notes concern the depiction of a character’s sexuality

aesthetics in determining camp (which will be explored further in this paper). In note

number 9, Sontag notes that as a taste in individuals, Camp “responds particularly to the

marked attenuated and the strongly exaggerated.”135 She posits while “exaggerated he-

man-ness” and “corny flamboyant femaleness” of certain movie stars can lend

themselves to the Camp sensibility, so can their opposites: a girly man or a manly girl.

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She states simply, “The androgyne is certainly one of the great images of Camp

sensibility.”136 As such, Sontag explains,

Here, Camp taste draws on a mostly unacknowledged truth of taste: the

most refined form of sexual attractiveness (as well as the most refined

form of sexual pleasure) consists in going against the grain of one’s sex.

What is most beautiful in virile men is something feminine, what is most

beautiful in feminine women is something masculine.137

Additionally, Sontag notes a relationship between the Camp sensibility and

homosexuality. She states, “While it’s not true that Camp taste is homosexual taste, there

is no doubt a particular affinity and overlap.”138 As a point of clarification and

comparison, Sontag offers, “Not all liberals are Jews, but Jews have shown a peculiar

affinity for liberal and reformist causes. So, not all homosexuals have Camp taste. But

homosexuals, by and large, constitute the vanguard—and the most articulate audience of

Camp.”139 She then explains that her analogy is not one she chose in a frivolous

manner.140 She further posits, “Jews and homosexuals are the creative minorities in urban

culture. Creative, that is, in the truest sense: they are creators of sensibilities. The two

pioneering forces of modern sensibility are Jewish moral seriousness and homosexual

aestheticism and irony.”141 While her position can seem to some to be self-serving,

Sontag freely admits that it is to a degree (in note 52). She simply declares, “Every

sensibility is self-serving to the group that promotes it.”142 But she does acknowledge that

while parallels exist between the Camp sensibility and homosexual taste, the Camp

sensibility is much more than that. In his article “Camp and the Gay Sensibility,” Jack

Babuscio agrees, “Camp is never a thing or a person per se, but, rather, a relationship

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between activities, individuals, situations, and gayness.”143 Drawing from this, no

character in and of itself is Camp. However, the actions and situations presented with

that character can elevate it to a level of Camp. Additionally, Kathryn Bishop-Sanchez

posits, “Camp provides a rich discursive space to poke fun at contained sexual/gender

identities to articulate all sorts of ‘gender trouble’ in order to construct new formations of

desire and representation.”144 Considering this, how does Camp contribute to the

portrayal of Bond and vice versa?

Using Sontag’s essay and supporting theorists as a theoretical framework, I would

like to explore the canon of James Bond films and their use of the Camp elements. While

I have theorized in the prior chapter that the character of James Bond is a repressed

homosexual based on Sigmund Freud’s characteristics of repressed homosexuality, the

point of this chapter is to examine the Camp elements of certain films to determine how

they correlate to the homosexual or queer taste Sontag explicates and also champions.

Will these elements determine that Bond is actually a repressed homosexual? Ultimately,

they may? not. However, the use of Camp elements—something clearly in line with

queer taste—can contribute to a discussion of the queer subtext within the films. To be

explored in greater depth, elements of the James Bond films ranging from his infamous

gadgets, to the villains he encounters, the clothing he wears, to the idealized “Bond

Girls”145 he encounters, certainly present each film with a Camp sensibility whether the

filmmakers intended to do so or not.

Though pointed out elsewhere it is important to note for the consideration of

Camp that the first James Bond movie Dr. No was issued in 1962 two years prior to

Sontag’s article. It was based on the novel of the same name by Ian Fleming originally

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published in 1958.146 Arguably, each of the Bond films represents the zeitgeist of its

time. As a result, the earlier Bond films would certainly be considered part of the same

cultural complex as Sontag’s article. As the series of films has evolved, so have the

elements of Camp in each of the films. While this paper will not look at every film, I will

consider enough of them to address the evolution of Camp within the series. For

example, Skyfall, the most recent Bond film released in 2012 has relatively few campy

elements when compared to the Roger Moore-era films, which are “campier.”147 In fact,

of making Quantum of Solace in 2008, director of photography Roberto Schaefer

remarks, “We wanted to make an artistic film that feels real in a very tactile and visceral

way. When a punch is thrown, we want the audience to really feel it.”148 That is a very

different feeling than the image of Roger Moore’s Bond skiing down a mountain in the

beginning sequence of A View To a Kill where an expert skier and snowboarder’s moves

are interspersed with close-up shots of Moore’s face while the Beach Boys sing

“California Girls” in the background. The scene culminates with a boat disguised as an

iceberg pops its hatch to reveal the Union Jack. Bond climbs in to discover a lovely

female associate and reveals he managed to recover the microchip he sought along with a

tin of the “best” beluga caviar and “rather-shaken” vodka. The scene depicted is hardly

realistic.

One area that remains perpetually campy in the Bond films is the ever-present

Bond Girl with her ever-campy name. With nomenclature that is certainly not to be taken

seriously, Bond Girls’ names have included Honeychile Ryder played by Ursula Andress

in Dr. No, Pussy Galore portrayed by Honor Blackman in Goldfinger, Lana Wood’s

Plenty O’Toole in Diamonds Are Forever, and Britt Ekland’s simply, yet aptly named

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Goodnight in The Man with the Golden Gun. The names certainly represent Sontag’s

theory that everything in Camp is presented in quotation marks. Each name is its own

double entendre also signifying what Sontag describes as the “failed seriousness” of

Camp. As she describes, each of the names is playful. While some feminists have long

taken exception to the names—Octopussy, Holly Goodhead, Xenia Onatopp149 -- their

seriousness is misplaced.

Bond Girls in general, but particularly the ones with the truly campy names, are

not to be taken seriously. Is the viewer truly supposed to believe that Denise Richards is

really going to save the world as an atomic physicist named Christmas Jones in The

World is Not Enough? Clearly not, but the point is to simply to enjoy the theatricality of

the movie. Typically, the Bond Girls are not supposed to be a realistic portrayal of a

woman struggling against adversity. Politically correct or not, they are—to a degree—

meant to be objects.

While much can be said about Bond’s relationship to the various women he

encounters and the role they play in his own Freudian psychosis, to a large degree the

women serve merely as objects he encounters in his quest to accomplish the task at

hand—usually saving the world from mass destruction at the hands of an evil villain. In

their work entitled “That Fatal Kiss: Bond, Ethics, and the Objectification of Women,”

Robert Arp and Kevin S. Decker state, “Objectification is everywhere in the James Bond

film series: Bond constantly uses others to gain information, the upper hand, or sex.”150

While that may be true, they further define objectification as a form of dehumanization,

which they classify as morally problematic because the subject (in this case a woman) is

manipulated by a person’s (in this case Bond) thoughts or behaviors. They conclude that

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Bond’s treatment of women is without doubt objectification. It is a tough point to argue

against. Arp and Decker point to cases in Dr. No (Sylvia Trench) and Live and Let Die

(Miss Caruso) where Bond enjoys a brief sexual dalliance before leaving the respective

women for his resuming his activities as a secret agent. They state, “In both cases, Bond

seems to view these women as valuable only to the extent that they are capable of

bringing him sexual pleasure.” While that might be true, from a Camp standpoint, the

women provide a necessary point in the heightened reality of the story, which is never

intended to be viewed in a completely serious manner.

As an example of a woman’s image exemplifying these characteristics, one can

look at the aforementioned Honeychile “Honey” Ryder played by Ursula Andress in the

first Bond film Dr. No. When Bond and the viewer first see her, Andress is emerging

from the ocean in a white bikini with a knife strapped around her waist. Signifying a

mythical sea goddess emerging from the deep, Andress certainly exemplifies Sontag’s

“flamboyant female-ness” but with the knife strapped around her and toting two conchs

she has pulled from the sea, she also evokes a bit of masculinity.151 Clearly, the film

intends to show that while she may represent an idealized version of the female form,

“Honey” Ryder is also a woman who can take care of herself.

As previously discussed, Sontag posits “what is most beautiful in feminine

women is something masculine.” Dressing Andress to include the knife does just that.

Yes, she is beautiful. However, she can also be deadly. She could be the latest of Bond’s

conquests with whom he beds and bolts, or she could prove to be a more worthy match,

lover, or adversary. Again, playing to the masculine side of the role, it was an athletic

one for Andress. Honey was not a character who lounged in bikinis and then served as

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Bond’s arm candy in an evening gown. In an interview published in The James Bond

Archives, Andress relays, “The role for me was easy, because I used to do competition

swimming, so the sea was no problem. Running around up and down the hills, through

the mud, through this marsh was easy for me. Thank God, I was athletic.”152

Now an iconic scene, the idealization of Andress emerging from the ocean also

reflects the feminine ideal of the time and was clearly encapsulated in the film to capture

the omni-present male gaze.153 Andress, though self-described as “sporty” and “not a

normal delicate person,” is fully a female form with flowing hair and woman’s curves to

her body.154 Decades later in 2002, the creators of Die Another Day pay homage to the

scene with that film’s Bond Girl Halle Berry in the role of Jinx Johnson.155 Undeniably,

Berry is a physically beautiful woman even being named People magazine’s Most

Beautiful Woman in 2003. However, her appearance emerging from the water strikes the

same notes as that of Andress only to a slightly more androgynous degree. Clearly, in

describing her as androgynous, it should be noted that Berry’s appearance in the scene

would never be mistaken for that of a man. However, donning an orange bikini with a

white knife belt, muscular stomach and arms, and a short pixie-styled haircut, she is

certainly a new version of the feminine ideal. Jinx Johnson was indeed conceived as new

type of Bond Girl. While playing homage to the classic campy Bond Girl, Berry’s Jinx is

written to be Bond’s equal. According to Berry, “Jinx is very feisty and she’s tough. She

is Bond’s equal.”156 While some elements of Camp in the Andress scene are ignored,

others are invoked. Sontag explains in note 16 that the Camp sensibility is one where a

thing can be examined with a sort of double sense between the object signifying

something and then the thing as pure artifice. Berry’s attire and surroundings summon

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the similarities of the image of Andress; however, the campiness of her character remains

somewhat less due to the other manifestations she encumbers.

Figure 2 Halle Berry as “Jinx Johnson” in Die Another Day

Still, when considering androgyny on the part of the Bond Girls, it should be

noted that while Andress and Berry were given weapons and asked to complete tasks

with athletic prowess, there have been Bond Girls who were decidedly less feminine and

closer to being truly androgynous. Goldeneye presents Famke Janssen’s Xenia Onatopp.

Granted, there are times she appears in the film made up and looking very feminine.

However, at other times she dons a militaristic uniform and she does wield enough power

to kill her opponents by crushing them between her thighs. Further, in Tomorrow Never

Dies James Bond encounters Wai Lin (portrayed by Michelle Yeoh) who is a Chinese

agent on the same case. Producer Michael G. Wilson says, “Wai Lin is not the feminine

equivalent of James Bond; she’s the flip side of James Bond. She has a very different

style and a very different attitude. They make a good pair.”157 The character, did the

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same things Bond did. When he rappelled down a building, so did she. She rode with

him to slide the motorcycle under the blades of a helicopter. She was also a martial arts

expert. Yes, she was a woman (and even love interest), but she was also very masculine

in the way she handled herself. She did not play damsel in distress. She was just as

much the ”white knight” as Bond was; thus blurring her own gender role.

Figure 3 The militaristic Famke Janssen as Xenia Onatopp.

Figure 4 Xenia Onatopp killing the Admiral with her thighs during intercourse.

Without question, though, the most androgynous of the Bond Girls would be

Grace Jones’s May Day from A View To a Kill. If ever there were a character that

blurred the gender lines and embraced her own campiness, it would be May Day. In fact,

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it is difficult to separate Grace Jones, the actress and gay icon from May Day the

character.158 Basically, the producers took the persona of Grace Jones and transferred

this to the character. Again, producer Michael G. Wilson explains, “I think of Grace

Jones more as a performance artist than anything else. She’s done a lot of wonderful,

strange, and edgy types of modeling, and she turned out to be a great character.”159

Interestingly, he says she (Jones) turned out to be a great character; not that May Day

turned out to be a great character.

In an essay describing one of her music videos, critic Steven Shaviro notes,

In thus transgressing boundaries of gender and race, the iconic ‘Grace

Jones’ pushes beyond the human altogether. She embraces her own

extreme objectification, her packaging as a saleable commodity. And she

transforms herself (well before this became fashionable) into a posthuman

or transhuman being, a robot or a cyborg… She turns herself into a

thing—thereby forcing us to confront the ways that slavery and racism

turn black people into things, that patriarchy turns women into things, and

that capitalism turns all of us into commodities… ‘Grace Jones’ has

moved beyond identification, and beyond any sort of identity politics, into

an entirely different realm.160

Even Shaviro refers to her as Grace Jones within quotation marks. That alone shows that

to some degree her entire persona is aligned with the Camp sensibility, as evidenced by

Sontag’s position in Note 10 that everything Camp is in quotation marks.

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Figure 5 May Day (Grace Jones) in the obligatory Bond seduction scene.

The makers of the film clearly recognized the blurred lines Grace Jones the

persona creates and used them in the film. In the obligatory scene where Roger Moore’s

James Bond seduces her character, she opens the bedroom door to find Bond lying in her

bed. She disrobes and Bond remarks, “I see that you are a woman…” He takes a beat

and then adds “of few words.”161 By taking a beat in the delivery of the line, Moore’s

Bond is acknowledging that Jones plays with if not defies gender roles. Her appearance

is masculine and feminine. She truly walks the line of androgyny. Jones, though, plays

into in the scene by replying, “What’s there to say?” Had she replied, “Yes, I am,” she

would have acknowledged her own femininity. “What’s there to say?” shows that the

viewers can draw their own conclusions on the subject.

The film does play up her masculinity. While she is often cloaked in a robe-like

loose fitting garb complete with hood, hat or both, she is seen doing traditionally

masculine tasks. Early in the film, she uses a fly-fishing rod with a poisoned fishing fly

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to kill a man in the Eiffel Tower restaurant. She then climbs the stairs, uses the same fly

rod to “hogtie” Bond, reaches the top and parachutes off the tower to safety on a boat

awaiting her on the Seine. Later, at the racetrack, she (while wearing her red and black

garb), manages to calm a rearing racehorse as the men stand idly by. An onlooker

remarks, “She must take a lot of vitamins.”162 She is the ultimate masculine woman. She

single-handedly pushes a car into a lake. Finally, in her most revealing and arguably

most feminine outfit—a black leotard that can only be described as “slit down to there

and cut up to here”—May Day is seen both practicing and instructing martial arts with

her employer/lover Max Zorin (portrayed by Christopher Walken). Her outfit might

make it known she is female, but her actions are certainly masculine. The screenwriters

even seemed to exploit the gender binary a bit with her name. They called her May Day.

May clearly represents something that is uncertain. She may be female. She may be

male. She may be good. She may be bad. Whatever the case, she certainly represents

the Camp sensibility by blurring the traditional gender roles and line and almost a self-

parody of the film franchise.163

The Bond Girls are not the only area where the Camp sensibility is utilized in the

film series. To date, six actors have portrayed James Bond: Sean Connery (for seven

films), George Lazenby (for one), Roger Moore (for seven), Timothy Dalton (for two),

Pierce Brosnan (for four), and Daniel Craig (for four, though contracted for one more).

While each clearly brings his own sense of self to the role, they are also each very

different versions of the same character. In his book Stars, Richard Dyer examines stars

as “types.” Clearly, each of the men who have played Bond either were stars or became

stars as a result of the role. Dyer even mentions Bond by name as he describes the type

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of the “Tough Guy.” In his analysis, he quotes O.E. Klapp to define the type known as

the “Tough Guy.” Dyer quotes Klapp as saying how the tough guy can be viewed as a

hero,

He is like a champ (you have to hand it to him, he licks the others). So

long as this is so he has the almost universal appeal of one who can’t be

beat. Since he usually fights others as tough as himself, he has a kind of

fairness (whereas we should have little trouble rallying against a bully).

Another thing that confuses the issues is that sometimes the only one who

can beat him is another tough guy… Tough guys often display loyalty to

some limited ideal such as bravery or the ‘gang code,’ which also makes it

possible to sympathize with them. Finally, they may symbolize

fundamental status needs, such as proving oneself or the common man

struggling with bare knuckles to make good.164

In casting the role of James Bond, the producers of the movie have always gone for the

“universal appeal of one who can’t be beat.” In the James Bond Archives, Ian Fleming,

author of the Bond novels, states, “Bond is the kind of man every girl secretly dreams of

meeting, and leads the life every man would like to live if he dared.”165 In short, he is an

idealized or heightened version of masculinity. No one can actually live up to that

standard.

As previously discussed, in the initial casting process for the first Bond film Dr.

No, producer Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli sought the pinnacle of masculinity in the actor

to portray Bond. Frankly, Bond is supposed to be larger than life. He is presumed to be

both a tough guy and a ladies’ man. He should look dashing in a tuxedo and display a

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perfect beach body when the action inevitably leads there. Again, as with the Bond Girls,

the body type of Bond has evolved just as the cultural norm of the objectified male body

has evolved over the span of the series. In his series of films mostly shot during the

1960s, Sean Connery appears with a body type that (much like his co-star Ursula Andress

represented for women) shows the ideal male form of the time. While in shape, he is not

necessarily muscular. Connery’s Bond smoked (as most of them do) and drank (as they

all do) and appeared unconcerned with living a healthy lifestyle. In 2006, when Daniel

Craig resumed the role, his body reflects a more muscular physique (as Halle Berry’s had

compared to Andress’s). His abdominal muscles show definition, as do his pectoral

muscles and arms. While it could be attributed merely to the fact that Craig was more

muscular, it also should be pointed out that the ticket buyers were now accustomed to

muscular definition. While it was once left to movies featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger

(a former bodybuilder) or Sylvester Stallone, the movie-going public in 2012 regularly

saw superheroes with abs pre-defined in their costumes.

As a hero, Bond must now compete with superheroes both in his appearance and

in the action sequences in which he participates. Simply, you have to look at Bond and

think that he has the physical capability to not just fight with the bad guys, but to conquer

them and then be ready to attend a black-tie function or bed his latest conquest. Of the

action sequences in Casino Royale, Craig remarks, “I had a stunt double. I did the bits

that hurt. He did the bits that fucking hurt. But that’s the thing with this Bond. He

bleeds, goes down, and gets up again.”166 It circles back to Dyer. Bond fights someone

as tough as himself. The only person who could possibly beat him is another tough guy

or woman.

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Still, the fights themselves are always a bit unrealistic. The heightened drama of

the fights represents Sontag’s “spirit of extravagance” which she notes is the hallmark of

Camp in Note number 25. Bond does not just have fights. Every fight is a fight to the

death. He often takes on not just his equal, but an army of his equals. Bond is always

outnumbered and always comes out on top. He also seems to walk away for the most

part untouched. While it is true for the character, it is not true for the actors who play

Bond. Craig describes filming the opening sequence for Casino Royale where his Bond

makes his first kill. In the scene (shot in black and white), a fight is depicted where Bond

is beating and battering his adversary in a public restroom. Craig relays, “It was painful

and it should look painful. If you look very closely at my hand holding the gun, every

single finger’s got a Band-Aid on it. That was what that was about. You’re not doing it

right if you’re not getting hurt.”167 Bond can do the job and walk away unscathed, the

actor who portrays him cannot.

Craig is not the only actor to be hurt in playing Bond. During Die Another Day,

Pierce Brosnan suffered a knee injury that caused delays in production. Producer Barbara

Broccoli explains, “These films are very, very physically demanding on the actor playing

James Bond, and Pierce does a lot of his own stunts. He’s very athletic and, as we all

know, athletes take a real pounding.”168 Brosnan offers his take saying, “It’s a physical

film and you’re trying to put yourself in the action as much as possible. The knee

went….why? Because I didn’t stretch, it’s as simple as that. I was running away from

the Koreans, hopping onto a hovercraft, thinking I didn’t need to stretch, and pounded the

old knee out.”169 James Bond can handle the heightened feats and the tricky stunts

required for the action sequences. The actors portraying him cannot always. Craig can

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have bandaged fingers and Brosnan can have knee surgery. Bond never has to. He is not

a real man. James Bond is an idealized form of man who is in no way a real person.

That idealization—an almost impenetrable ability to not falter, to always be the

dashing hero regardless of what obstacles he encounters—shows Bond embodying what

Dyer terms “sensitivity to gender roles as roles and a refusal to take the trappings of

femininity and masculinity too seriously.”170 Simply, because Bond always manages to

come out on top with his appearance in check (often with a beautiful woman, Beluga

caviar, and vodka for martinis—his drink of choice), it is impossible to take his

tribulations too seriously. Again, Dyer theorizes in The Culture of Queers, “As soon as

we consider those expressions and representations, it is also clear that we are talking

about something more than sexuality in the most literal sense.” Dyer continues, “From

this stems the commonest form of obvious queerness: being in some way or other ‘like’ a

woman, fey, effeminate, sensitive, camp.”171 If he wound up in the hospital nursing his

wounds following an escapade, viewers would feel differently, but because he always

emerges in top form it is impossible to truly extend one’s imagination far enough actually

believe his adventures could really happen in that way—even though he is actually

hospitalized in the film version of Casino Royale. And, there is something almost

feminine—particularly in Moore’s portrayal—to the manner in which Bond regardless of

what physical acts or altercations he has just pursued, is able to remain impeccably

dressed and perfectly coiffed. As such, the filmmakers invite Camp into the world of

James Bond. As such, the character has no way to escape it; not that he wants to—he

seems to embrace it. In Goldeneye, M (his handler or boss) tells him, “I think you are a

sexist, misogynist dinosaur…a relic from the cold war.” To a degree, that is certainly

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true. However, that portrayal is exactly the point. Bond is a dinosaur. He is largely still

portrayed as he was when Dr. No was released in the 1960s. Sontag points out we

typically view objects as camp when they are out-of-date or old-fashioned in Note 31; we

view Bond in a similar fashion. While the world around him has certainly changed over

50 years, he has changed very little.

It is not just Bond’s physical prowess that contributes to his Camp factor; it is also

the weapons and gadgets he employs. Bruce Feirstein, who wrote the screenplay for

Tomorrow Never Dies says, “Bond lives in a world set 30 seconds into the future.”172 As

a result, the weapons and gadgets Bond uses are always slightly ahead of their time.

Critic William J. McKinney states that most people think of Bond’s gadgets as, “Homing

devices, ejector seats, and array of devices all the way to and including the invisibly

cloaked Aston Martin in Die Another Day.”173 As such they are the technology

equivalent of a Bond Girl (or of Bond himself) in that they are slightly better than

something an actual spy, not to mention person, would use. In essence, they, too, are a

camp element of the films. Steven Zani notes, “Bond’s ‘gadgets’ are recognized as one

of the functional characteristics of heroism, and have been duplicated by many other

films.” He continues, “Perhaps the best proof of the essential quality of technology in

Bond is that it appears in parodies such as Spy Hard and the Austin Powers series.

Bond’s use of machinery has clearly passed into cinematic function or stereotype.”174

The stereotype results in a parody where they really do not exaggerate the type of

weapons Bond would employ. Bond’s weapons do not trivialize an actual weapon; they

instead portray an actual weapon as a more fun version of itself. Tinkcom puts forth an

argument related to the objects in Kenneth Anger’s “biker” films of the 1940s to the

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1970s. He relates that there seems to be a “perfect complement between ‘masculinized’

forms of consumerism (shiny cars, thundering bikes) and male (allegedly always entirely

heterosexual) identities.175 However, he goes on to note, though, that the codes of

masculinity can be disrupted by asserting a male same-sex desire for such masculinity.176

Simply, and I feel this holds true for Bond as well, the desire for a masculine object is in

many ways a desire for masculinity itself. While complicated and I in no way mean to

oversimplify this position, the same way Bond desires to have the latest gadget to either

protect, defend, or ultimately destroy (or maybe even just look cool), Bond could also be

desiring the masculinity it represents blurring the lines as to what “masculinity” actually

is.

In basically every Bond film, there is a scene at the “home office” where Bond

meets with Q, his gadget guru, to get the latest technological advances in weaponry for

him to use. Judi Dench, who plays M in several of the later films remarks of the gadgets

and weaponry, “I don’t think there’s enough money in the British government to ever

turn MI6 into one like ours (the fictionalized film version). I think they’d be terribly

jealous. She has a point. Her MI6 which has always employed Bond has always seemed

to have an unlimited budget for his weaponry. This was particularly true in the earlier

films. Of the later films, Ben Whishaw who took over the role of Q from the late

Desmond Llewellyn in Skyfall states, “One of the running jokes of the film is that the old

technology is obsolete now, and there are hardly any gadgets for Q to give Bond.”177 As

such, technology has reached a point where a pen that will explode is no longer cutting-

edge. A physical weapon rarely causes the horrors of that so-called 30 seconds in the

future. Whishaw’s Q tells Bond in Skyfall, “I would hazard I can do more damage on my

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laptop sitting in my pajamas before my first cup of Earl Grey than you can do in a year in

the field.” Whishaw also states, “My Q represents one of the conflicts in the film,

between the old and the new, between the way the world is going now and the way that

the intelligence services have traditionally been run. He’s the new breed, really, of

intelligence” (Duncan 566). Arguably, Whishaw’s statement is true. The weapons have

in large part lost some of their inherent campiness in recent years (particularly in the

movies starring Daniel Craig).

Bond’s weapons are arguably at their most Camp in the 1979 film Moonraker.

With the claim that Bond is always that proverbial 30 seconds into the future, the plot of

the movie surrounds theft and launching of a space shuttle two years before the space

shuttle Columbia was first launched. Of course, the film takes liberty with the story.

First, Roger Moore’s Bond is able to fly the space shuttle with practically no training.

While in that training, of course the villain somehow manages to seize control of the G-

force simulator and almost kills Bond by making the simulator create a force that humans

could not survive. Bond stops the simulator by shooting the control panel in the

simulator with a dart from his watch (given to him earlier in the film by Q) causing it to

malfunction. Still, Bond along with previously mentioned Dr. Holly Goodhead (who of

course trained at NASA long before Sally Ride took her flight), still manage to pilot the

shuttle into space. Once in space, they dock shuttle at a secret space station (built by the

villainous Hugo Drax) complete with a radar-jamming device to avoid detection and a

device to simulate gravity within the station.178

Drax, plans to destroy all life back on earth using a toxin he developed from a rare

Amazonian orchid. He then plans to repopulate the earth with his eugenically engineered

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“master race” who he secretly sent to space smuggling them aboard his six shuttles. To

say the plot is unrealistic is a bit of an understatement. The entire story is basically told

with a wink and smile. Of course, Bond saves the day (again using a watch dart) and

heads back to earth on a space shuttle with Dr. Goodhead. When command center on

earth is going to beam their image to both the White House and Buckingham Palace,

Bond and Dr. Goodhead are shown floating ten feet in the air wrapped in a sheet in the

act of coitus. When an onlooker inquires as to what Bond is doing, Q replies “I think

he’s attempting re-entry.” The double entendre further contributes to the Camp nature of

the scene.

Bond’s dart shooting watch is not the only gadget in the film that pushes the

boundary of tools and weapons a spy would actually utilize. While floating on a gondola

in Venice, Bond is suddenly attacked by an assassin floating by in a coffin on another

gondola. The assassin opens the lid of the coffin, selects a knife from the rotating wheel

of knives also in the coffin, and throws it hitting and killing Bond’s gondolier. He, of

course misses, Bond picks up the knife, throws it killing the assassin (who conveniently

is already in a coffin). The coffin is then knocked off its gondola by an overhead bridge.

Bond’s gondola (or Bondola as it became known) is revealed not only to be motorized,

but it also transforms into a land vehicle that he then drives past the Doge’s Palace and

through San Marco square.

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Figure 6 “The Bondola” in front the Doge’s Palace in Venice.

Of course, all of Bond’s modes of transportation are tricked out with gadgets and

devices no actual spy would ever have. In pursuit of Hugo Drax in South America during

Moonraker, Bond is being chased down a river (presumably the Amazon but more likely

the Iguazu river). As the people pursuing him are closing in, Bond sees a waterfall ahead

and is able to activate a hang-glider hidden in the roof of his boat just before the boat

plummets over a huge waterfall (presumably the Iguazu falls). Realistically, what are the

odds that he happened to have his own boat in South America and it just happened to

have a hang-glider attached to it? Arguably, the odds are about the same as having your

own gondola in Venice that conveniently converts into a land-roving vehicle.

It should be noted, though, that Bond was not the only character in the films to

have such gadgets; he often encountered adversaries with just as many tricks as he has.

In Moonraker, Drax’s henchman Jaws (played by 7 foot 2 inch actor Richard Kiel

reprising his role from The Spy Who Loved Me) is depicted as being basically part human

and part cyborg with his metal skeleton and teeth. In one scene in the film, Jaws stops a

ski-lift type gondola with his bare hands and then bites through the metal cable to disable

it. In the movie Goldfinger, Auric Goldfinger’s right hand man Oddjob wields a hat that

when he throws it becomes deadly and its rotations take the head off a marble statue.

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Goldfinger himself straps Bond to a medical-style table and sends a laser between his

legs slowly cutting through the table and working its way to his genitals. It makes perfect

sense. Everyone has an extra cutting laser around; and of course the genitals would be

the place to aim it to kill your opponent.179 The scenes described clearly invoke Sontag’s

notes on Camp in the fact they once again reject traditional seriousness but are not

intended to be fully comedic. Simply, they succeed at neither state. Yet, the scenes do

offer that extreme state of feeling which resides with Camp.

Certainly, there are more examples of the Camp sensibility within the canon of

the 24 Bond films. As mentioned, recent films seem to have diverted to a more serious

path yet often nod to the past. In the 2012 outing Skyfall, Bond and M are fleeing

London as MI-6 is under siege. Bond takes her to his private garage where he is housing

one of the old Aston Martins. As M yammers on telling him what he should and should

not be doing and complains how the seat in the car is not that comfortable, Bond

playfully opens the console to reveal the eject button for her seat. M replies, “Oh, go on,

then, eject me. See if I care.” The scene shows that even though the creators of the new

films don’t always embrace the Camp elements of the series, they do know they exist.

Still, one has to question what is the point of the Camp elements in the series? Is

it merely entertainment? On first glance, one could argue that the series was intended to

be pure entertainment and the Camp elements simply provide a different type of

entertainment in what is supposed to be an action-packed spy thriller. However, by

examining the elements of Camp more closely and identifying the subtext they invoke,

one can adequately draw parallels to the queer sensibility. Do the Camp elements clearly

mean Bond is a repressed homosexual? Absolutely, they do not. However, they do

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contribute to a greater discussion of that area (which is the purpose of this analysis).

After all, with all Bond has been through in the series of films, his psyche is certainly ripe

for analysis. I don’t believe he would mind one bit if his personality profile was a little

shaken (but never stirred).

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GAZING AT JAMES BOND: THE SUBVERSION OF MULVEY’S MALE GAZE

In the relationship with woman, as the prey and handmaiden of communal lust, is

expressed the infinite degradation in which man exists for himself… --Karl Marx180

There are no straight men, only men who haven’t met Jack. –Jack McFarland,

Will and Grace181

In her seminal article “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Laura Mulvey

examines the image of the woman on film. She asserts, “Traditionally, the woman

displayed has functioned on two levels: as erotic object for characters within the screen

story, and as erotic object for the spectator within the auditorium, with a shifting tension

between the looks on either side of the screen.”182 Mulvey bases her work on an

argument made by Sigmund Freud where, she points out, he “associated scopophilia with

taking other people as objects, subjecting them to a controlling and curious gaze.”183 She

notes that Freud’s theory of scopophilia centers largely on children and their desire to

actively use their voyeurism to investigate things that are typically not readily discussed

with them such as genitals and bodily functions. Just as Mulvey adapts Freud’s theory

for her examination of the female form in cinema, the same argument can be adapted for

those persons existing outside the hetero-normative world, both as the viewer and the

object. For example, viewers also can turn a queer gaze on male forms.

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My theorization is not an entirely original idea. In fact, the queering of the male

gaze has taken such diverse courses as Norman Bryson positing similarly about men in

classical paintings in his work Vision and Painting: The Logic of the Gaze and critic

James Keller’s naming a “Queer Panopticon” in his dissection of the reality television

program Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.184 Both Mulvey’s adaptation and the work of

the other critics inform my hypothesis as I also incorporate an additional theoretical

framework. Just as Mulvey based her theory for the male gaze on the works of Sigmund

Freud, I, too, employ the use of one of his theories—particularly that of latent

homosexuality in my analysis of the queer subtext of the James Bond series of novels and

films. As discussed in a previous chapter, Freud sets forth three layers of jealousy, which

he feels mask a repressed homosexuality. Those three types are competitive (or normal)

jealousy, projected jealousy, and delusional jealousy.185 However, he notes that in a

delusional case, the subject will show indications of jealousy of all three types and never

just the delusional subset.186 The three types of jealousy in conjunction with paranoia

lead to Freud’s recognition of homosexuality—often repressed—and its effect on a

subject. 187

In considering his theory and that of Mulvey, this chapter will focus on the queer

subtext in the series of films and Ian Fleming novels about James Bond.188 In particular,

the films Casino Royale from 2006 and Skyfall from 2012 play heavily into my analysis

as do certain passages from the Bond novels which either show Bond gazing upon

someone or Bond being gazed upon. Additionally, I will examine some new scenes and

some scenes that have previously been discussed. These concern the purview of the gaze

and how it is utilized both in the films and books and provide an interesting examination

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of the queer undertones.189 William Brown questions why some forty years after the

publication of Mulvey’s article one should examine what has changed “in terms of the

way in which images of women are produced, circulated, and received.” Similarly, I, as a

gay critic, feel it is equally important to examine how the evolution of gay equality over

the same timeframe has affected the manner in which an image is viewed by a gay

audience. No longer confined to publications delivered in unmarked packages or peep

shows in the back of adult theatres, the gay audience has more freedom to not just

examine an image, but to claim it as a nod to their own “othered” status. As previously

discussed in queer theory, an image does not have to depict two men engaging in

intercourse for it to be considered queer. As such, the depiction of the way Bond is

viewed by other characters and the manner in which Bond views other characters --both

in the writings of Ian Fleming and on the screen in the films --leads to a queer analysis of

the work.

As such, considering Bond in a queer perspective allows for him to be viewed in

my subversion of the male gaze where the “gay male” is the object for other gay men to

gaze upon. Again, Brown proves relevant and offers a theory of how “everything” has

changed since 1975 simply because we now live in a computerized era whereby images

and other forms of information can be exchanged easily and within seconds. He

continues, “What is more, while the Lacanian framework that Laura Mulvey employed in

her “Visual Pleasure” essay might not be required in such a prominent fashion, it is clear

that various of her ideas have sunk relatively deeply into mainstream Western culture,

suggesting a redressing of sexual inequalities.”190 This observation then proves

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interesting when examining the Bond canon as the canon itself spans a period of time,

both before and after the publication of Mulvey’s seminal work.

Still, it seems that Bond, as portrayed by Daniel Craig with his toned physique has

certainly subverted the viewers’ “male gaze” and directed it to himself more than to the

female characters as compared to his predecessors in the role. Of the other 21 (Eon

Productions) films featuring James Bond, there are certainly other times when one could

argue that the male gaze could be directed at whomever is portraying Bond be it Sean

Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, or Pierce Brosnan. Bond has

always been a very sexual character and has always been known to shed his shirt for the

day’s entanglement with his damsel du jour. However, Jamie Russell in discussing

Casino Royale for the James Bond Archives declares the film “offered the producers the

chance to reboot the franchise.”191 According to Russell, this reboot was necessary

because the gadgets (such as an invisible car and an ice palace) in the previous Bond film

Die Another Day had stretched the viewer’s credibility too far. Producer Michael G.

Wilson explains, “We thought it was very important to bring it (the franchise) back down

to earth.”192 His colleague Barbara Broccoli further explains the reboot, “Casino Royale

was the first James Bond book, but Cubby Broccoli (her father) and Harry Saltzman

couldn’t acquire those rights from Ian Fleming. When the rights finally became available

to us, Michael and I decided to do it.” She continues, “It’s the definitive James Bond

story, the one that explains the most about Bond’s character.”193 As a result, in the films

featuring Daniel Craig (as will be explored in much greater detail), there seems to be a

departure from the previous portrayals of Bond and he is shown to be at times darker, at

times more uninhibited, and at times more free. The viewer also sees more of Craig’s

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physicality than any of his predecessors. As a result of this newly displayed physicality

on the part of Daniel Craig, the filmmakers clearly allow both the viewer and the other

characters within the film to subvert Mulvey’s “male gaze” and turn into not just the

“female gaze” but with other queer subtext in the films ultimately into the “gay male

gaze.”

As a gay critic myself, it is important for me to examine the way my “Othered”

status as a homosexual is being either explored or exploited by filmmakers. While it is

my contention that the filmmakers are attempting to explore more than exploit the gay

audience of the Bond franchise, certainly a fine line exists between the two. As a result,

to fully understand the subversion on the part of the filmmakers, it is important to

examine Mulvey’s criteria for her own theoretical position and observation. Mulvey

states,

In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split

between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze

projects its phantasy on to the female figure, which is styled accordingly.

In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at

and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic

impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness. Woman

displayed as sexual object is the leit-motif of erotic spectacle: from pin-

ups to strip-tease, from Ziegfeld to Busby Berkeley, she holds the look,

plays to and signifies male desire.194

Simply, the woman exists for the male viewing pleasure. Mulvey further argues that the

male character capitalizes on this scenario to emerge as the “representative of power” in

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the film. She posits that this capitalization is the result of “the bearer of the look of the

spectator, transferring it behind the screen to neutralize the extradiegetic tendencies

represented by woman as spectacle.”195 As such, the viewer then identifies with the male

protagonist making him his screen surrogate who exists simultaneously with the

utilization of the look of eroticism. (Mulvey also relates her views to Freud’s fetishistic

view of castration, which will be discussed in greater detail later in the paper.)

Such identification with Bond is intended for the heterosexual male. As far back

as 1965, critic Kingsley Amis states in his book The James Bond Dossier, “We

(presumably heterosexual men) don’t want to have Bond to dinner or to go golfing with

Bond or talk to Bond. We want to be Bond.”196 Producers have also made a distinction

in Bond’s masculinity and the often feminine image of the villain was exemplified in the

film From Russia With Love with Blofeld stroking his white Persian cat prominently

displaying a very flamboyant pinky ring.197 Consequently, as the film makes the object

of the gaze Bond himself, does the gazer not just become a female viewer, but ultimately

a gay male?

To show how the image of Bond is subverted to be the object of the gaze, one has

to simply examine two scenes from the film series. The first is from Dr. No (the first

Bond film) and the second is from the reboot of the franchise--Casino Royale. In Dr. No,

as previously noted, Honeychile Ryder portrayed by Ursula Andress is seen emerging

from the ocean in a white bikini with a knife strapped around her waist. (Clearly, as the

camera remains on her body for an extended period of time, she is meant to be viewed as

a sex object. In an interview published in the James Bond Archives, long-time Bond

producer Cubby Broccoli describes the casting breakdown. He states,

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Fleming saw her as ‘Botticelli’s Venus seen from behind.” We visualized

her as a very sexy broad who looked pretty good from the front as well.

She is virtually naked in the book, with nothing on except a hunting knife

and a leather sheath. She had to be strikingly beautiful, voluptuous, but

with a kind of childlike innocence. As Bond’s first screen heroine, she

had a key role.”198

The breakdown description confirms that the filmmakers were seeking an actress with the

physicality preferred by typical heterosexual men. She was to be beautiful, but non-

threatening. She was to be athletic, but not overpowering. Just as Botticelli depicts

Venus arriving on the seashore from a large clamshell as a fully-formed, voluptuous

woman, the producers wanted to pay a certain homage to that form. Andress certainly fit

the bill. The filmmakers make no secret of the fact that she exists to be gazed upon

either. Upon discovering Bond literally hiding in the bushes, Andress’s Honeychile

Ryder asks, “What are you doing here…looking for shells?” Bond replies, “No. I’m just

looking.” The female character--whom he has literally been lurking and watching--exists

for his viewing pleasure. Mulvey argues three ways in which a character is viewed in

cinema: from the camera as it records the event, from the audience who views the event,

and from the other characters within the scene. With the description of the casting

breakdown and Bond’s own response in the scene, two of the three ways have been

accounted. The audience is left to then follow the lead of the other two and take in

Andress as the screen goddess depicted for their own pleasurable views.

In turn, approximately thirty minutes into the 2006 version of Casino Royale,

Craig’s Bond is too shown emerging from a Caribbean sea in his own version of a

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bikini—short and tight form-fitting swim briefs. Intentional or not, the scene is clearly an

homage to the one depicted with Andress in Dr. No. The filmmakers practically recreate

the same type of shot to show Craig’s Bond in the water. Just as Andress personified

what critic Susan Sontag termed “flamboyant female-ness”, Craig, with his toned torso is

intended to show a form that is most definitely the most masculine of the male form.199

While it could be argued that turnabout should be considered fair play and Craig is

merely giving equal time to the female audience, the target audience of the James Bond

films with their gadgets, action sequences, and beautiful female counterparts is

predominantly male. Granted women see the films, but action films centered on a male

protagonist are undoubtedly made for a male audience. So, the question becomes why

show Craig in a similar fashion to Andress?

Figure 7 Side by Side comparisons of Daniel Craig and Ursula Andress emerging from the sea.

The filmmakers in shooting Craig in such a way have basically made him a “Bond

Girl.” Critics Tony Bennett and Jane Woollacott speak frankly of the use of the Bond

Girl to create a “fantastic sexual allure for male audiences.”200 They continue, “The

(Bond) films activated a voyeuristic ‘free’ male sexuality, which was constructed jointly

with the host of sub-texts focusing on the appearance of the Bond Girl.”201 They also

relate the Bond Girl to Mulvey and the system she describes by stating that the female is

depicted with sexuality, which is threatening to the male order but is the inevitable victim

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to male domination.202 Additionally, in his work Gay Fandom and Crossover Stardom,

Michael De Angelis examines the careers of James Dean, Mel Gibson, and Keanu Reeves

and how the gay audience perceives both the actors and the characters they played. In

describing Gibson as Max in the Mad Max films, De Angelis writes that the vilification

of certain versions of masculinity has been marketed successfully to mainstream culture,

but the film stereotypes depicted in the film are not necessarily gay ones. Rather, they

represent a hyper-masculinity, which is celebrated by both gay and mainstream culture

thus leading to queer readings of the films. He continues by describing both villain of the

film and Max’s reaction to the death of a character. He writes, “Curiously, the ‘villain’s’

condolences make him, in at least one way, more ‘human’ than Max who has also

exacted revenge on his aggressors but who has chosen to isolate himself in his own

suffering rather than share it with others.”203 Relating how such instances inform a

character, De Angelis also notes, “The gay press was highly attentive to such

observations.”204 The analysis De Angelis conducts on Max can arguably transfer to

Bond. In many ways, they are similar characters. As previously mentioned 2008’s

Quantum of Solace features a decidedly more brooding Bond mourning the loss of a

conquest (Vesper Lynd) and being pulled back into the business of spying. Just as

Gibson’s portrayal of Max leads to a queer analysis, so does Craig’s portrayal of Bond.

As a result, allowing Craig to be fetishized by male viewers—in addition to female

viewers--plays into a queer reading of the film.

Again, one can argue that as a queer critic I am simply seeing what I want to see.

Although, I would point out that Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick notes that it is a “paranoid

fantasy that it is gay people who can read, or project their own desires into, the minds of

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‘straight’ people.”205 In other words, by arguing the queer subtext, I am not able to then

project my hypotheses onto a character where the subtext does not exist. To illustrate my

point, I note that in the recent Bond film Skyfall (released in 2012), the filmmakers make

a very blatant reference to the possibility of Bond’s queer existence if not just his

repressed homosexuality in his exchange with former double-zero agent and current

nemesis, Raoul Silva. However, the filmmakers also create a scene where Bond is meant

to be gazed upon while donning his finest black-tie apparel. In the scene, Craig’s Bond is

shown in an approximately 40 second scene entering the casino in Macau. However, the

scene is constructed merely for Bond to be gazed upon in a manner not unlike that which

Victoria’s Secret designs their fashion shows for their “angels” to be viewed. Bond, is

shown standing in a flat-bottomed boat that is being steered by a valet across the lake to

the casino entrance betwixt floating lanterns. Bond is lit flatteringly to be viewed with

fireworks exploding in the background. Bond, enters the casino through the mouth of

illuminated dragon sculpture and then ascends the stairs in a manner more befitting a

supermodel than a superspy. The scene does not advance the plot, rather it serves as

spectacle to merely show Bond as he is meant to be seen by the audience: a masculine

force on the prowl. Craig’s Bond is to be looked upon and admired by his audience just

as Bond Girls have always been. As such, Bond’s emergence from the sea in Casino

Royale in the male equivalent of a bikini positions Craig’s Bond as one to be viewed

under the gay male gaze.

It should be noted, though, that the filmmakers are not the only ones to depict

Bond’s status as the one gazing or the one being gazed upon; Fleming did just that in his

novels. As discussed previously, Fleming did not shy away from depicting gay

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characters. However, they were usually assigned to be the villains. Again, in Goldfinger,

Fleming writes of Pussy Galore, worth revisiting here as Fleming shows Galore actually

gazing upon Bond. Fleming puts forth, “The deep violet eyes examined him carefully.

She said softly, ‘You know what Mr. Bond? I got a feeling there’s something phoney

about you. I got instincts, see?”206 In the scene, Bond is examined, or gazed upon, by

another queer character, who, then, calls him out as “phoney.” What Galore means by

“phoney,” however, remains to be seen. Certainly, a possible explanation is after taking

Bond in, Galore recognizes another queer existence. As one might say in colloquial

terms, her “gaydar” went off. Other examples exist. In the beginning of You Only Live

Twice, Bond acknowledges that Tiger Tanaka had been “observing his effort with sadistic

pleasure.”207 The use of the term sadistic proves interesting as Bond’s interest in

exploring Sado/Masochism clubs in New York in the short story “007 in New York” with

his date Solange who may or may not be transgendered has also been discussed. 208

Further, in Thunderball, Fleming depicts Mr. Wain asking/demanding Bond remove his

clothing with the exception of his trousers and then gawking at the many scars on Bond’s

body.209 Certainly, one could be fascinated by a scarred physique; however, the

fascination seems to be more of an admiration of Bond and his well-traveled torso.

However, perhaps the most interesting example occurs in Diamonds Are Forever

in a hotel known for “petty crime” in London during a time when homosexual acts would

have been considered such a crime. Fleming writes, “Bond felt the liftman watching him

as he walked down the long, quiet corridor to the end room, Room 350. Bond wasn’t

surprised.”210 It seems benign enough. The elevator operator is simply watching a man

walk down a hallway. Conversely, though, Bond is not only being “cruised” by the elevator

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operator, he is allowing himself to be cruised. He understands what is transpiring and

seems to be more than willing to participate.

And in one other encounter previously discussed, Dr. No comes into Bond’s

bedroom and observes him while he sleeping. However, Fleming’s description is certainly

homo-erotic as the villain lingers at the sleeping Bond’s bedside gazing almost lovingly at

Bond. The homoerotic subtext of the scene cannot be ignored.211 The description of the

villain sneaking into the bedroom of the hero and almost lovingly look at the sleeping Bond

almost defies a logical explanation. First, they are supposed to want the other dead. If Dr.

No really wanted such an outcome, this would be the perfect opportunity. Second, Bond

is depicted as arguably the best spy in the world, but he sleeps through someone coming

into his room, pulling the covers back, and taking in his entire form for what is clearly more

than a couple of seconds. But again, Bond is the object of a seemingly lustful gaze of

another man.

Considering the examples discussed of Bond’s interaction with men, Bennett and

Woollacott’s insight to the work of Mulvey proves interesting. The duo put forth, “The

system that Mulvey describes produces definitions of female sexuality as threatening to

the male order but the narrative is inevitably closed in favor of male domination.”212

Granted, Bond does historically show his dominance by the female conquests in each of

the films. Bennett and Woollacott offer though, “It is in this combination of a threatening

female sexuality with final subordination to the male that our pleasure as spectators is to

be found.”213 With this in mind, the aforementioned interchange between Bond and

Raoul Silva becomes even more interesting. In the interchange, the subtext is that Bond

will be forced to submit to the sexual appetite of Silva in a manner not unlike the one he

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has taken with his own conquests--be they female or the alleged and alluded to male

variety. If, as Bennett and Woollacott (along with Mulvey) argue that the subordination

to the male is the driving force behind at least part of the male gaze, the filmmakers have

clearly destabilized Bond’s image and offered to the male gaze.

The depiction of Bond also plays in to the subversion of the male gaze in the manner

in which the filmmakers play into Mulvey’s description of how the castration complex is

part of her theoretical explanation. Mulvey states clearly, “The paradox of phallocentrism

in all its manifestations is that it depends on the image of the castrated woman to give order

and meaning to its world. An idea of woman stands as lynch pin to the system: it is her

lack that produces the phallus as a symbolic presence, it is her desire to make good the lack

that the phallus signifies.”214 Noted feminist Catherine MacKinnon describes the female

role in society thusly, “Socially, femaleness means femininity, which means attractiveness

to men, which means sexual attractiveness, which means sexual availability on male

terms.”215 As such, the woman’s femininity is clearly derived from her actual, physical

lack of penis, which Mulvey reiterates “symbolizes the castration threat.”216 She puts forth,

“Ultimately the meaning of woman is sexual difference, the absence of the penis is visually

ascertainable, the material evidence on which is based the castration complex for the

organization of entrance to the symbolic order and law of the father.”217 As such a castrated

man or even a gay man who allows himself to submit to the dominance of another man

would then be viewed in a similar manner in that his sexuality is not necessarily tied to his

penis.

Bond, himself, is no stranger to the threat of castration. In fact, two scenes played

by two very different actors—Craig and the original Bond Sean Connery—come to mind.

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While other scenes with a threat of castration certainly exist in the Bond oeuvre, these two

(one from an early Bond film and one from a recent one) show how the castration complex

consistently and continually plays a role in the saga. A scene in Goldfinger which is

arguably campy by today’s standards, depicts Connery’s Bond strapped to table with a

laser beam slowly proceeding up the table between his legs to ultimately slice his genitals

leaving him castrated if not dead. As the character clearly exists in an entire franchise of

sequels, Bond of course escapes. However, the scene is very telling. Bond’s life is simply

not threatened. Rather, he faces the humiliation of being left with no physical remains of

his manhood. If he is castrated, he is no longer “male” as heterosexist society sees it.

Figure 8 Sean Connery’s Bond in the infamous laser scene.

Frankly, what makes a person male is certainly outside the scope of this paper.

However, in no way do I subscribe to a typical male/female binary and do not believe that

a penis is necessary for a person to consider himself male. Still, from a traditional sexual

perspective as many would ascribe to Bond, the lack of male genitalia would certainly

wreck the view of his masculinity. In a sexual sense, with no penis he would no longer to

be able to assert himself physically over his conquests. His lack of genitalia would leave

him powerless in an encounter with a female. His gender role would become one that did

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not fall into the typical male/female binary leaving him not as a gay man, but clearly on

the queer spectrum as the traditional physical biological indicator of his masculinity would

be taken from him. Upon castration, Bond would theoretically be no longer male, yet not

female either. The queer spectrum acknowledges what is largely ignored by a simple

gender binary. As such, the makers of the film are clearly inviting a queer interpretation

of the Bond character and are once again presenting the character as the object of a sexual

male gaze.

The scene from Casino Royale featuring Craig is a more graphic depiction than the

castration threat against Bond and along with the previous one described certainly draws

forth an analysis of Bond with Freud’s castration complex. In the previously discussed

scene, the movie’s villain Le Chiffre orders his henchmen to remove all of Bond’s clothing

and bind him to a cane chair with its seat removed. Le Chiffre then uses a whip or knotted

rope to repeatedly strike Bond’s legs and genitals on the underside of the chair. Bond does

not allow himself to be fully victimized, but by refusing to stop the torture sooner as he

demonstrates he clearly could have, he also plays into a sadistic mode as well as a

homosexual one. To some degree, by letting the torture of his nude body continue while

he could have stopped it (as he later demonstrates by escaping his captor), it can be argued

that Bond in fact enjoyed the male-to-male interplay.

In doing so, Bond now reveals a facet of Freud’s castration theory with the

manner in which Bond deals with the possibility of his own. Freud describes,

Attachment to the mother, narcissism, fear of castration, these are the

factors (which by the way have nothing specific about them) that we have

hitherto found in the psychical aetiology of homosexuality; and on them is

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superimposed the effect of any seduction bringing about a premature

fixation of the libido, as well as the influence of the organic factor

favoring the passive role in love.218

In effect, Freud is practically describing details of the psyche of the character of James

Bond. It is worth noting, though, that Freud’s reference to the “passive role” is one that

should be considered in a loving and long-term relationship and not to be mistaken for a

brief affair or sexual dalliance.

Considering his notoriety for his libidinous, sexual conquests, Bond has never

been a successful individual who can commit himself to a lasting and loving relationship.

In light of all the time Bond spends pursuing the opposite sex, the possible loss of his

sexual organ does not seem to trouble him to an inordinate degree if at all. He enjoys the

game of him and Le Chiffre taunting each other and shows no concern for the possible

loss of the most prominent physical sign of his manhood. If as Mulvey notes, the threat

of castration exists in a female to signify displeasure, Bond seems impervious to that fact.

With this interpretation and the fact that the actor is shown in the nude (although with his

genitals concealed), the gaze of the spectator is again in question.219 The filmmakers

clearly do not intend for Bond to be looked at with desire by a heterosexual male

audience. However, they still present him in all his physical glory. Granted a

heterosexual male might envy Craig’s muscle tone and females could certainly be

expected to ogle his physical condition; however, the scene’s graphic nature shows an

underlying erotic charge between Bond and his male tormentor. First, Bond is merely

struck in the area of his genitals. That sadistic act is also clearly sexual in nature. Then,

Le Chiffre then threatens to feed genitals to him invoking the image of Bond taking a

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penis in his mouth. Such a threat not only plays into the castration threat, but it also puts

Bond in the submissive sexual role. Whether Bond takes his own penis or Le Chiffre’s,

his submission to another man in a sexual manner—in which he has clearly participated

by not stopping—is depicted thus exemplifying Freud’s position. The filmmakers place

Bond clearly on the spectrum of queerness by showing his willing and some might argue

exuberant participation in a male-to-male sexual situation.

As previously discussed, Judith Butler attributes actions such as Bond’s

interchange with Le Chiffre as a repressed or latent homosexual man’s attempt to hide his

“ostensible femininity” by exaggerating his own masculinity and in turn his heterosexual

conquests. The exaggeration to which Butler refers does not mean telling the sexual

version of the proverbial fishing story whereby the size of the fish caught is the

exaggeration. Rather, she refers to the actions of the male taking multiple short-term

female lovers to prove his hyper-masculinity (similar to the hyper-masculinity shown by

Max and the villains of the Mad Max series). With his numerous female conquests, Bond

certainly falls into that category. Additionally, both villains—Le Chiffre and Silva—are

very much to be considered Bond’s equals in their deeds. However, Butler contends that

such an action relates to their fear of castration. She states, “The homosexual man is said

to exaggerate his ‘heterosexuality’ (meaning a masculinity that allows him to pass as

heterosexual?) as a ‘defense,’ unknowingly because he cannot acknowledge his own

homosexuality.”220 Bond seemingly does not recognize his own sexuality (the scene

where he acknowledges its possibility appears in a later film) and therefore continues to

follow the pattern Butler ascribes. Butler continues, “In other words, the homosexual

man takes unconscious retribution on himself, both desiring and fearing the consequences

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of castration.”221 Butler’s observation certainly adds to the explanation of Bond’s actions

in his accepting of the torture issued by Le Chiffre when he demonstrates moments later

that he could have prevented it altogether by simply giving up the password.

Mulvey also discusses such self-imposed sadism in her explanation. She relays,

“Voyeurism has associations with sadism: pleasure lies in ascertaining guilt

(immediately associated with castration), asserting control and subjecting the guilty

person through punishment or forgiveness.” Le Chiffre is clearly looking at Bond, but he

is not the only spectator. He, the camera, and the audience are clearly all viewing Bond.

The sadistic qualities of this instance of voyeurism exist to exacerbate a viewing of

Bond’s homosexuality—latent or otherwise. Mulvey relates, “Sadism demands a story,

depends on making something happen, forcing a change in another person, a battle of will

and strength, victory/defeat, all occurring in a linear time with a beginning and an

end.”222 As a spy, Bond’s entire life can be viewed as sadistic. He is well known to have

license to kill. He finds himself in the role of torturer as often as he finds himself in the

role of the tortured. His career demands the process of creating false identities to cover

his true self. Arguably, his homosexuality is simply masked by another of his elaborate

ruses—his cover of heterosexuality.

As Arp and Decker argue, “Objectification is everywhere in the James Bond film

series: Bond constantly uses others to gain information, the upper hand, or sex.”223 This

theory proves interesting as Bond himself—certainly in the portrayal by Daniel Craig—

has also become objectified. The other male in the scene, the camera, and ultimately the

audience view the character in the same manner in which a female has been traditionally

viewed: that of sex object. As such, Bond with other analysis of his latent

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homosexuality clearly is in fact the personification of the gay male gaze—to be idolized

and fantasized by homosexual men who view the films.

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THE ENEMY WITHIN: AN EXAMINATION OF JAMES BOND AND HOW HIS

ADVERSARIES REFLECT HIS OWN PSYCHE

You've got a secret. Something you can't tell anyone, because you don't trust anyone.

–Eve Moneypenny to James Bond in SPECTRE224

With all the villains James Bond has conquered and killed, all the women he has

seduced, all the drinks he has guzzled back, and the gadgets he has employed, arguably,

nobody has done it better. Yet, the question remains, how is it that he does it better?

There is a simple answer and a much more complicated one. The simple answer is he is

written that way—where he does whatever necessary to come out on top. The more

complicated answer is that he is written that way with a subtext that belies the

heteronormative text one views in a casual reading or viewing of the film.

Undoubtedly, Bond exists in a heteronomative world. In fact, Ian Fleming who

authored the novels and short stories upon which most of the films were based (as is the

case with Diamonds Are Forever), died in 1964 three years before homosexuality was

decriminalized in England and Wales as part of the Sexual Offences Act of 1967. As a

result, when I speak of the subtext of the novels, it should be noted that the subtext—

coded language used by the author—would have been the only possible way to

communicate such a revelation about a character who was known to serve in Her

Majesty’s secret service. In looking at the coded language of the novel (or novels), one

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should consider that Fleming was known for his use of colorful language which is readily

accepted. Consider the names of the Bond Girls: Plenty O’Toole (self-explanatory),

Tiffany Case (a character involved in solving a case of diamond smuggler and an obvious

reference to the famed jeweler), and Pussy Galore (an openly lesbian character though

she ultimately succumbs and is seduced by Bond). Each of these names blatantly points

to aspects of the character. Contemplating such an action, Fleming’s use of other coded

language seems entirely probable.

With this in mind, I feel it is appropriate to examine the character of Bond in

Diamonds Are Forever with particular interest given to his interactions with the openly

homosexual characters of Wint and Kidd. Wint and Kidd are an interesting pair for

Fleming to introduce in the novel given their sexual orientation in a time when it was

outlawed in the United Kingdom. I argue that their sexual identity provides a unique

parallel and vantage point for an examination of Bond himself.

As discussed, Fleming certainly did not shy away from the depiction of gay

characters. Pussy Galore and her band of lesbians in Goldfinger is a prominent example.

Still, Fleming seemingly shows her as a lesbian whose entire character—including her

sexuality—seems to be “redeemed” upon her encounter with Bond. Yet, arguably

Fleming uses Pussy Galore to give insight into the character of Bond in the novel version

of Goldfinger. Galore recognizes Bond as a kindred spirit with a shared sexual interest

which was not socially accepted at the time. Her “instincts” as she terms them or

“gaydar” as I do, provide a coded language is barely that. The lesbian character is calling

Bond out on his false existence. She does not say that he is gay, but she points to an

aspect of his personality that was not openly discussed at the time. In fact, when the

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novel was adapted to film five years later in 1964, the filmmakers chose to downplay

Galore’s lesbianism. In another example, Fleming depicts Bond, M, and others

discussing the possibility that the villainous Francisco Scaramanga in The Man With the

Golden Gun has “homosexual tendencies.”225 Fleming’s depiction of these characters

(and others) invites an obvious discussion about the stereotypes that exist about the

vilification of gay characters. However, as a gay critic myself, I posit that specifically

Wint and Kidd merely represent another aspect of Bond’s psychological makeup: his gay

self.

Vito Russo addresses the fairly obvious argument about the connection between

homosexuality and the Bond villain in his work The Celluloid Closet. He states plainly,

“Popular sex farces and James Bond spy thrillers used sissies and dykes to prove the

virility of cartoon heroes and to stress the sterility of homosexuality.” 226 However, that

seems to merely scratch the surface of the subject. In the film, Wint and Kidd are shown

to have an almost asexual existence together. They do hold hands as they walk off into

the sunset, but there is no kiss shared between them nor any scene of the two of them in

bed discussing their exploits or plotting their next attempt to destroy Bond. Their

relationship reflects the sterility Russo mentions. The two of them could have just as

easily been portrayed as heterosexual characters attempting to kill Bond. However, as

villains, Fleming and the filmmakers show the characters as gay to demonstrate a

perceived weakness on the part of gay individuals and how that weakness would allow

Bond to overcome them in any encounter. However, I would argue that their weakness

has nothing to do with homosexuality. In the novel, Felix Leiter (Bond’s CIA

counterpart) discusses Wint and Kidd with Bond and declares, “Some of these homos

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make the worst killers” (Fleming Diamonds 119). While that may be true and does invite

the discussion of a familiar trope of the gay man as both feminine and villainous, the two

of them are simply outmatched by the training and fortitude of one of Britain’s master

spies.

To explore this, I point to the work of Chuck Klosterman and his exploration of

villainy in I Wear The Black Hat. He begins by questioning what is the most villainous

move one can make. He overrules such things as murdering a bunch of people stating

that that “seems obvious” and notes that “rape is vile, human trafficking is disturbing, and

blowing up the planet and blotting out the sun are not for the innocent.”227 He even points

out in a sad and non-ironic fashion that “electrocuting helpless dogs for the sake of

convenience seems almost diabolical, but not diabolical enough to keep you off the NFL

Pro Bowl Roster.”228 Instead, he posits the “most villainous move on the market” as he

terms it is tying a woman to the railroad tracks thus creating a damsel in distress as an

“unadulterated expression of evil.”229 Bond presumably has not tied an actual woman to a

railroad track, he has certainly been in the position of seeing the woman with whom he

has become embroiled being then captured, bound, tortured, and ultimately used to

ensnare him into whatever exploits his adversary has decided to mastermind. However,

Klosterman puts forth, “In any situation, the villain is the person who knows the most,

but cares the least.”230 Considering his assertion, who is the real villain? Bond’s

adversary or Bond himself? Bond’s rival may be the one who has actually captured the

film’s so-called Bond Girl and is now using it against 007 himself, but how many times

has it happened in the course of the books and films? How has Bond never learned that

his romantic entanglements never work out well for the woman? Perhaps, it is he simply

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does not care due in large part to his never actually forming a true emotional attachment

to said woman.

Whether Bond is a villain or not is really a secondary argument to be considered.

Umberto Ecco questions, “The difference between good and evil—is it really something

neat, recognizable as the hagiography of counterespionage would like us to believe?”231

Klosterman also ponders the topic and points out that there are certain villains who are

not actually villains. He even provides a list of what he considers “anonymous people

who—in theory—are bad people and social pariahs.” He lists: men who hijack

airplanes, con artists, funk narcissists, drug dealers, and athletes who use race as a means

for taunting an opponent. However, Klosterman then asks us to consider charismatic

people who under what he terms “special circumstances” with a “high dose of false

emotional attachment” can never be considered villains. The lists are the same.232 This

proves interesting when looking at Bond. What have the villains he encounters done that

he has not? They have killed people. So has he. They have exploited others—especially

women—for their own gain. So has he. They have broken laws or manipulated them to

suit their own needs. So has he. Do we simply have a “high dose of false emotional

attachment” because we are told Bond is the hero? I would argue yes, we do. In many

ways, Bond is merely a mirror image of his own adversaries. They have really done

nothing worse than he has. He just happens to be able to justify his actions by the fact

that he is a government agent working to protect the interests of the Queen. Considering

this, Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd leave us with an interesting theory to ponder. If Bond in

many ways reflects his own adversaries and their deeds, does he also then serve as a

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reflection of Wint and Kidd in their deeds? If so, does that include their own homosexual

activities in not their ineptitude at murder?

Eco theorizes, “Bond represents beauty and virility as opposed to the villain, who

often appears monstrous and sexually impotent.” Admittedly, though clearly gay, Wint

and Kidd are not really portrayed as sexually active in either the novel or film. Dennis

W. Allen notes of several of their appearances by stating, “Simply put, in the film, Wint

and Kidd are literally played straight, the sole exception being that Mr. Wint tends to

over use his cologne.”233 While I do take slight exception to his notion that one could be

played “straight” or its obvious converse, “gay,” his observation that the characters are in

no way feminized is valid. Wint and Kidd are not shown overtly signifying a gay

existence in any way. There are no subtle bandanas hanging out of pockets to signal

other gay men as to their sexual identity, much less were they waving a rainbow flag.234

However, that is not to say that Fleming did not use certain symbols in his work. For

example in the short story “Risico,” Fleming writes,

Bond had been told to look for a man with a heavy mustache who would

be sitting by himself drinking an Alexandra.235 Bond had been amused by

this secret recognition signal. The creamy, feminine drink was so much

cleverer than the folded newspaper, the flower in the buttonhole, the

yellow gloves that were the hoary slipshod call-signs between agents.”236

Fleming acknowledges the inherent femininity from another male in the signal Bond is

seeking. Frankly, there is probably not a character with a drink more associated with it

than Bond and his martini—a drink comprised mostly if not entirely of vodka (or gin).

As a result, seeking a man drinking some creamy frothy concoction—alone—certainly

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gives off a vibe that is less than masculine. Also, as a spy, Bond would find it

commonplace to use such a signal, but even he, the character, finds amusement with this

one and the fact that it is outside the norm of what an agent would utilize. This signal, to

me at least, indicates a signification for other signals Bond seeks out which are not

discussed in the text.237

Signals and codes were clearly something to which Bond was accustomed. In the

short story, “The Property of a Lady,” Fleming writes, “M. said, stiffly, ‘Dr. Fanshawe, I

don’t think you’ve met Commander Bond of my Research Department.’ Bond was used

to these euphemisms.”238 Certainly, Fleming could have been referring to Bond having

experienced playing a role for a case. However, a case could also be known for the

probability that Bond was “used to” euphemisms for gay situations which would have

been spoken of in coded language as they were illegal. Three paragraphs later, Bond

gives a detailed description of Fanshawe as follows,

The stranger was middle-aged, rosy, well-fed and clothed rather foppishly

in the neo-Edwardian fashion—turned up cuffs to his dark blue, four-

buttoned coat, a pearl pin in a heavy silk cravat, spotless wing collar,

cufflinks formed of what appeared to be antique coins, prince-nez on a

thick black ribbon. Bond summed him up as something literary, a critic

perhaps, a bachelor—possibly with homosexual tendencies.239

In the scene, it was discussed how Bond was used to “these euphemisms” and then

describes the person he is meeting down to every detail of his attire—including

something as inconsequential as his cufflinks and noting that he might have--what

Fleming seemed to always use to describe a gay male—homosexual tendencies. The

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question arises, does Bond merely have the ability to observe and recognize all aspects of

another person’s personality on first meeting them, or does he recognize the

characteristics in the other man simply because on some level he is accustomed to doing

that in an effort to either recognize it in himself or—more probably—hide it about

himself from even himself?

Obviously, on the surface, Bond is not shown participating in homosexual acts,

but frankly, neither are Wint and Kidd. However, in examining the subtext of the books

and film, evidence points to a different conclusion. As I mentioned, homosexual activity

was outlawed in Great Britain at the time the novel was written. With that knowledge,

consider the passage mentioned in chapter 4 of this work from the novel Diamonds Are

Forever. As discussed in Chapter 4 pertaining to the gay male gaze, Fleming writes of

Bond being cruised by the elevator operator in a hotel known more than any other in

London for “petty crime.”240 While the gaze discussion proved necessary, it is also

interesting to examine this scene from a historical perspective. Is Fleming referring to

petty crime only—thievery and such? Or, is his description also serving as coded

language to indicate Bond is entering a place where he knows homosexual activity

regularly takes place? If one argues the latter to be the case, then many other instances in

the book and film can be viewed in a different way. The liftman (elevator operator for us

Americans) is watching him. Why is he watching him? Is Bond being cruised and

admired by the liftman in a place known for gay cruising and if so, he is clearly aware of

what “petty crime” for which the hotel is known. If he is willingly participating in that

act, is it a signal from Fleming to gay readers that Bond could be participating in other

homosexual acts? Arguably, the text can indicate that.

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Additionally, the scene provides a disruptive view of Bond as the apex of

masculinity, but it is not the only one in Diamonds Are Forever. In the film, Tiffany

Case is shown being thrown into the backseat of a car where she encounters Blofeld in

full drag stroking a white cat. While there are certainly valid distinctions to be made

between gender and sexuality and one certainly does not represent the other, Allen points

out, “The incident (Blofeld donning drag) is normally read as an indication that Blofeld

might be gay, and within the film certainly ties to anxiety about homosexuality.”241 It is

easy to see how that reading of the film could occur. At the very least, the scene

establishes a queering of the villain much in the same way Wint and Kidd have been.

Bond is wrestling externally with queerness, but it could be argued it represents his own

internal struggle. Allen posits, “By literalizing Blofeld’s inherent femininity, making it

externally visible as drag, the film implicitly insists that it is in fact possible to distinguish

real men and ersatz men and that eventually any doubts would be cleared up. In other

words, the film is able to insist that both the essence and the absence of masculinity are,

finally, visibly distinguishable, obvious on the surface.”242 However, I think to a degree

Allen has missed a point. The filmmakers have shown with Wint and Kidd that

queerness can present in numerous ways. He acknowledged they were basically

portrayed, using his word, “straight.” He does not address the difference between gender

and sexuality in his article. He posits that it is impossible to visualize that Bond would

use drag as a manner in which to disguise himself.243 Yet, cross-dressing does not

necessarily make Blofeld gay just as dressing in gender-norming clothes does not make

Wint and Kidd (or Bond for that matter) heterosexual.

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Still, in addition to the hotel scene, it is also important that Bond first encounters

Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, the encounter takes place in “Acme Mud and Sulphur Baths.”

The gay bathhouse is a now legendary part of gay culture and history where in another

time when homosexuality was less socially accepted, men who sought such things would

go to “the baths” to seek other men, among other things, to “gaze” at them. I put forth

an argument that with London having its own gay baths such as the Savoy Turkish Baths

(which was open from 1910 to 1975), Fleming was signaling readers to recognize certain

things about his character. He even goes as far as saying the sign says, “Every hour on

the hour” on the sign for the bus that transported clients to and from the bathhouse which

again would not be an uncommon phrase for men, seeking such an activity, to also seek a

place for their clandestine meetings that rented hourly rather than daily.244 Additionally,

Fleming describes inside the bathouse, “Each cubicle contained a naked man. They

peered out into the room through a veil of water, their mouths gulping for air and the hair

streaming into their eyes.”245 The description does not exactly depict a scene from the

typical heteronormative experience but instead shows how the activities inside the Acme

Mud and Sulfur baths could have taken on what was, at the time, considered to be a more

nefarious activity.

Diamonds Are Forever is not the only Bond story where Fleming depicts a villain

on the queer spectrum. In The Man with the Golden Gun, Bond encounters the villainous

Francisco (Paco) “Pistols” Scaramanga who was now a “freelance assassin” who had

once been associated with the Spangled Mob.246 In fact, in M’s report on Scaramanga

written by C.C., it is noted,

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I have also noted from a ‘profile’ in Time magazine, one fact which

supports my thesis that Scaramanga may be sexually abnormal. In listing

his accomplishments, Time notes that this man cannot whistle. Now it

may be only myth, and it is certainly not medical science, but there is a

popular theory that a man who cannot whistle has homosexual

tendencies.247

M then whistles to prove he can. (30). Also of note in C.C.’s report is his assertion of a

Freudian thesis with which C.C. agrees relating to the pistol as a symbol of virility for its

owner whereby it functions as a substitute or “extension” of the penis. C. C. also notes

that an excessive interest in guns can be viewed as a fetish for certain individuals. C.C.

states in the report, “I have doubts about his alleged sexual prowess, for the lack of which

his gun fetish would either be a substitute or a compensation” (29).248

Additionally, Scaramanga is described as being paranoid about his privacy telling

his goons to “see that when I want to be private I ‘git’ private.”249 Certainly, this would

play into the assertion that he was gay and would not want people to be privy to his

encounters behind closed doors. As this has been explained chapters earlier, consider the

following seemingly simple exchange. Fleming writes, “Scaramanga, beside the open

door to the conference room, looked pointedly at his watch and said to Bond, ‘Okay

feller. Lock the door when we’re all settled and don’t let anyone in even if the hotel

catches fire.”250 Bond knows from the profile of Scaramanga that he has “homosexual

tendencies” and that he is also very secretive and private. Again, Fleming is placing

Bond in a situation where a homosexual encounter would not be out of the realm of

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possibility. Granted, it is not actively depicted, but one can see at least an allusion to the

possibility.

Also worth considering is Bond’s relationship with Le Chiffre in both the novel

and film versions of Casino Royale. As discussed in Chapter Two in relation to the

castration complex, Le Chiffre ties Bond to a chair and tortures him particularly in

relation to the male organ. In the film, Daniel Craig is show naked in the chair as Le

Chiffre repeatedly strikes him with a knotted rope. Le Chiffre seems to be flirting with

Bond as he says, “Wow. You’ve taken good care of your body. Such…a waste.” Bond,

in turn, taunts Le Chiffre by saying, “I’ve got a little itch down there, would you mind?”

Also, Bond directs him where to hit him, but it can also be read as sexual innuendo.

Bond shouts, “To the right! To the right! To the right!” as Le Chiffre strikes him again.

Then, but shouts, “Yes! Yes! Yes!” in a manner that recalls the infamous scene where

Meg Ryan’s Sally Albright fakes an orgasm in the middle of Katz’s Deli in the 1989

romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally. But even before the torture scene, in the novel

Fleming provides the reader with sexual innuendo surrounding Le Chiffre and Bond.

Fleming writes, “Immediately, he (Bond) felt something hard press into the base of his

spine, right into the cleft between his two buttocks on the padded chair.”251 Fleming is

clearly leading the reader down a path to wonder what would one man place between the

buttocks of another. He continues, “Bond decided. It was a chance. He carefully moved

his hands to the edge of the table, gripped it, edged his buttocks right back, feeling the

sharp gun-sight grind into his coccyx.”252 Le Chiffre is not the one holding the gun,

rather one of his associates is. Still, considering the Freud’s theory of the pistol that

Fleming himself references in The Man with the Golden Gun, this interplay takes on a

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new meaning.253 Fleming has literally depicted Bond with a penis substitute between his

buttocks.

Finally, perhaps the most telling encounter between Bond and his nemesis relating

to their own “homosexual tendencies” occurs in the 2012 film Skyfall when Bond

encounters Raoul Silva—himself a former agent who had achieved double-0 status.

Earlier in the film (and as discussed in Chapter 2), Judi Dench’s M makes it clear to Bond

the psychological profile sought for agents and the similarities the agents must have.

Basically, they seek the same personality type over and over. One agent’s personality

could merely substitute for that of another. Arguably the most effective example of the

this substitution would be the previously discussed scene between Raoul Silva and James

Bond in Skyfall. After unbuttoning Bond’s shirt and caressing Bond’s chest and thighs,

Silva seems stunned when Bond suggests that if Silva were to proceed with a seduction

(or rape) that it would not be Bond’s first sexual encounter with a man. The response is

very telling. Bond is possibly just trying to play mind games with his opponent in an

effort to escape. However, as evidenced in Casino Royale, he certainly knows how to

overpower his adversary and escape being tied to a chair. The other likely scenario is

that it is not Bond’s first time. He has had sexual encounters with men. At this

proposition, Silva reacts with the same dialogue as numerous Bond Girls have in other

films. He proclaims, “Oh, Mr. Bond!” but seems genuinely taken aback at the prospect.

However, he should not be. Clearly the agents know what psychological profile is used

to recruit them. If Silva has come to terms with his own same-sex attraction, it should be

reasonable to him (and the viewer) that Bond has as well. Of course, the scene also

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merely reflects another dimension of the parallels between Bond and the villains he

pursues.

Frankly, the subtext of the novel and film is not that simple or that obvious. As

Nikki Sullivan points out, the current contemporary view of a queer relationship is not

necessarily more enlightened than the view of previous generations because no single

correct account of sexuality exists.254 But she continues with the importance of

remembering that point in the examination of texts. As the novel Diamonds Are Forever

was first published in 1956 and the film was released in 1971, this dissertation examines

sources from roughly sixty years. Each version is an arguable apt representation of its

time’s own respective zeitgeist. Also, Fleming himself states in On Her Majesty’s Secret

Service that “homosexual tendencies” were considered to be something that could be

successfully treated with hypnosis at the time.255 So, with my position on Bond being

cruised in the hotel, was this merely the only way Fleming could allude to Bond’s

behavior in a way that readers who were privy to such coded language would pick up? I

think it certainly creates an interesting point to consider. Also, in the sixty years since the

publication of the novel, the films of the Bond canon have been allowed to be “less

coded” and more frank in their descriptions and allusions as will be discussed later.

As revealed in other later Bond films (Skyfall and Casino Royale), his family life

was lacking, and like many British boys he was then educated in a boarding school

situation. Simply, this patient could be the prototype for Bond’s personality. His only

continuing relationship is with M who although later recast as a maternal figure for Bond

and the other Double-0s when portrayed by Judi Dench in more recent films culminating

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in Skyfall, is depicted as a male character within the novels with whom Bond has a

somewhat friendly, but very respectful relationship on the part of Bond.256

Still, Fleming does leave the reader with a few innuendos regarding their

relationship. For example, he begins chapter 2 of Diamonds Are Forever with M saying

to Bond, “Don’t push it in. Screw it in.” While they were in fact talking about how to

wear a jeweler’s loop on one’s eye, a more sexual reading of the sentence can certainly

be considered before the reader advances in the chapter. And, Fleming continues with

the arguably codified language in the scene. M also says in the exchange, “So don’t think

you are going to have the pleasure of shoveling that lot into my in-tray.”257 M finishes

the scene by lighting up a smoke (a pipe in his case), which has long been portrayed as

the afterglow period following a sexual encounter. Also, as Bond is leaving the office,

the secretary points out, “Your tie’s crooked.”258 While seemingly insignificant, it could

also be interpreted as a fairly common disheveled appearance following redressing after a

sex act. Finally, Fleming also alludes to what could be a deeper relationship between the

two in the scene, “There was a creak from M’s chair and Bond looked across the table at

the man who held a great deal of his affection and all his loyalty and obedience. The

grey eyes looked back at him thoughtfully.”259 While it is certainly not a frank depiction

of a sexual encounter, the codified language exists which can lead to another, deeper

interpretation in the subtext of the novel.

Additionally, one could also point to an interchange later in the novel between

Bond and Tiffany Case where they discuss the state of their love lives and romantic

entanglements. Bond himself jokes (or declares depending on your interpretation),

“Matter of fact I’m almost married already. To a man. Name begins with M. I’d have to

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divorce him before I tried marrying a woman. And, I’m not sure I’d want that.”260

Though decades before the thought of legally recognized same-sex marriage was any

where near common discourse, it is somewhat telling that Fleming would write Bond—

his hyper-masculine character—as a man who seems comfortable or even resigned to a

life with another man as his companion. Whatever the true terms of their relationship,

such an admission clearly points to Bond’s affection for M.

With this observation (or more fairly theory) of Bond’s personality, another

consideration of Wint and Kidd is in order as they are the only characters created by

Fleming with no doubt as to their gayness. As in the novel, the two are minor characters

in the film adaptation. When first introduced to the characters they kill a character with a

scorpion and plant a bomb in a box to blow up another character in a helicopter.

However, it should be noted that they each address the other as “Mr.” and following the

helicopter explosion are seen walking hand-in-hand across the desert to the mountains.

However, despite addressing each other as Mister, the filmmakers also chose to address a

feminine side of the characters by constantly showing Wint with an atomizer spritzing

himself—a more feminine trait. In fact, following the first scene showing Wint spritzing

himself, the filmmakers almost immediately show Tiffany Case spritzing an atomizer on

Bond’s drinking glass to obtain his fingerprints. The parallel is clearly there.

While the filmmaker certainly portrays Bond with other scenes, which can be

viewed under the guise of a queer interpretation that are worth mentioning, Wint and

Kidd with their expressed sexuality certainly add to the queer interpretation of those

scenes. For example, Bond encounters Peter Franks in an elevator while on his way to

visit Miss Case. Franks attacks Bond and a fight erupts between the two. However, the

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fight is more of a wrestling match within the confines of the elevator. Finally, at the

conclusion of the entanglement, Bond sprays Franks with a fire extinguisher to finish him

off. The comparison of a fire extinguisher expelling its contents and male ejaculation is

not a hard one to make.

In another scene, an associate of Wint and Kidd passes Bond in a hotel hallway.

He immediately does a double take and turns to gaze at Bond. The depiction is very

indicative of a gay male cruising scene and is easily viewed with that perception

especially considering the aforementioned passage from the novel in the hotel hallway.

Bond—being viewed or even gawked upon by the other male in the scene—one with an

identity already troubled to be outside the heteronormative world because of his

association with Wint and Kidd—is himself the object of the male gaze. That gaze

sexualizes Bond in the same way a woman would be thus placing him as the object of an

arguably homosexual contemplation.

However, perhaps the film’s strongest hints as to Bond’s personality reflecting

that of Wint and Kidd comes in the villains’ scenes together and their interactions with

Bond. First, Wint describes, “Miss Case seems quite attractive…for a lady” -- much to

his partner’s chagrin.261 However, the seeming throwaway line (as Jill St. John who

portrayed Tiffany Case is indeed quite beautiful) serves another purpose. It shows that

one can find their designated or declared object of sexual desire to be less limited than it

appears. If that is true for Wint and Kidd, it can also be true for Bond.

Yet, the most compelling and arguably most telling allusions come from the

manner in which Wint and Kidd try to kill Bond. In one scene, they place him into a

pipeline to be buried alive. An analysis considering the traditionally masculine Bond

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being inserted to an orifice (the pipeline) by another man can clearly be made. In the film

version, Bond encounters a rat in the pipeline which itself is a reference to Freud’s

analysis of the Rat Man in Notes upon a Case of Obsessional Neurosis.262 The other two

attempts on Bond’s life are more obvious, but even more troubling. Part of the troubling

derives from the use of the word “flaming” to describe a stereotypically feminine gay

male. In an early encounter, Wint and Kidd assault Bond with a cremation urn, put him

“to bed” in a coffin, and then send him into the crematorium, possibly indicating Bond’s

own “flaming” nature. Then, in their final confrontation near the end of the film, the two

are posing as waiters serving a private dinner to Bond and Miss Case. Bond recognizes

the scent of Wint’s cologne—something that traditionally would happen between lovers

rather than adversaries—before Kidd begins to attack Bond with skewers of meat which

he has set on fire. Literally, he is attacking Bond with flaming phallic-shaped meat.

Bond, of course, tosses wine on Kidd so he literally dies as a flaming homosexual and

then turns his attention to Wint whom he manages to castrate with Wint’s own arm (as

demonstrated by Wint’s high-pitched squeal) and then wraps the bomb the two had

intended for Bond around his hand giving Wint one more explosion/ejaculation in that

area—only this time resulting in Wint’s death.

Clearly, Bond shares more in common with the villains than their mutual dislike

for the other’s “team.” Fleming notes this in Casino Royale when he wrote, “The hero

kills two villains, but when the hero Le Chiffre starts to kill the villain Bond and the

villain Bond knows he isn’t a villain at all, you see the other side of the medal. The

villains and heroes get all mixed up.”263 However, by examining their similarities, it is

not difficult for one to question where said similarities begin and end. That gray area

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provides enough uncertainty of thought to justify an exploration and even presumption of

Bond’s inherent repression of his own homosexuality—if it is even repressed at all.

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THE BOND AMONG MEN: MISOGYNY, DESIRE, AND DEATH

“There is truth and then again there is truth. For all that the world is full of people who go

around believing they've got you or your neighbor figured out, there really is no bottom

to what is not known. The truth about us is endless. As are the lies.”

― Philip Roth, The Human Stain264

Just as James Chapman theorized, in his article “Bond and Britishness,” that Bond

became something Fleming could not have imagined or intended, I recognize the

sentiment. Chapman felt that Bond was a Walter Mitty-esque existence for Fleming and

that is probably true. However, I take it one step further with the position that Bond is a

Walter Mitty-esque existence for all of the Bond fans. Simply, Bond is fantasy. He is not

real. As a result, it is rather easy for one to project one’s own desires onto the character.

Alexis Albion contributes this notion: “It was not self-identification—an identification

with one that exists outside the self—but self-substitution—a desire to substitute another

for oneself that drove this fantasy. ‘We don’t want to have Bond to dinner or go golfing

with Bond, or talk to Bond. We want to BE Bond.”265 The sentiment is a rather common

one. Frankly, I think it is largely true.

In academic circles, one of the most famous (or infamous depending on your

predilection) examples of a person admitting he wants to be James Bond is noted scholar

and critic Michael Dirda. In “James Bond as Archetype (and Incredibly Cool Dude),” he

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relates the story of how when addressing a group of graduating seniors at a Catholic girls’

school, he was as asked the question, “If you could be any character in literature, who

would you choose?” Dirda relays the tale as follows,

Given that I write books for a (hardscrabble) living, I could see that she

expected me to name some obvious literary heavyweight, such as

Odysseus, Prince Gengi, or Huckleberry Finn—all of whom flashed

through my mind as good answers. Instead, I paused for a moment, put on

my most sardonic look, and huskily whispered into the microphone,

“Bond, James Bond.” It brought down the house. Of course, people

thought I was kidding. And, of course, I wasn’t.266

Personally, I feel Dirda gave a great answer. If being completely honest, my answer

would probably not be that different from his.

However, if I am going to be truly introspective on my answer, I wondered why

and how my research into this subject contributes to my answer. I am of an age where,

like most, I have always been aware of James Bond. Prior to this research project, I had

watched most of the movies (and certainly the ones released from my adolescence

onward beginning with A View to a Kill), but I would have hardly described myself as a

super-fan. I would venture to say that, like Dirda and most of my contemporaries, I

found Bond to be an “incredibly cool dude.” So much so, that while I will never own an

Aston Martin or smoke imported cigarettes, a good martini is my drink of choice—

although I am not incredibly picky whether it is shaken or stirred. It does leave me to

wonder, though, if my research was merely a way for me to project qualities about myself

onto Bond himself. As a gay man, do I really feel that Bond is repressing his own gay

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desires through some Freudian, Butlerian, Halberstamesque fashion? Or, do I just want

to make it easier for me to be more like him? Though I might be deluding myself, I feel

that my research supports the former.

Frankly, my research has led me to confront parts of Bond that I simply do not

like. First, he is without question, a first-rate misogynist. In the novel Casino Royale,

Vesper Lynd, with whom he is supposedly developing one of his deeper relationships

with a woman tells Bond, “You need a slave, not a wife.”267 And, in the short story

“Quantum of Solace,” Bond matter-of-factly says, “I’ve always thought that if I ever

married, I would marry an air hostess.”268 Arguably, that thought has nothing to do with

Bond seeking discount weekend travel. Rather, if he is going to be encumbered with a

wife, he would prefer her to be of the glamorous sort who would know how to wait on

her husband with a pleasant demeanor and a cocktail at the ready. Although, a few pages

later,” Bond does acknowledge, “Since I’m not really very interested in getting married,

I’ve never taken the trouble to investigate.”269 Perhaps, though the most telling example

of Bond’s view of women is shown in the following passage from the novel Dr. No.

Fleming depicts the following conversation between Bond and “a girl,”

The girl said, “You seem to live a very exciting life. Your wife

can’t like you being away so much. Doesn’t she worry about you getting

hurt?”

“I’m not married. The only people who worry about me getting

hurt are my insurance company.”

She probed, “But I suppose you have girls.”

“Not permanent ones.”270

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Bond’s answer is telling on several fronts. First, his acknowledgment that the females in

his life are temporary. Second, the reader knows, but the “girl” does not that women are

disposable to Bond in numerous ways: not just that their “relationship” will end, but

often that the woman’s life will end.

To me, the question must be asked: once more than one woman you have become

involved with has perished because of her relationship with you, why would you continue

to pursue a relationship with a woman? For Bond, the answer is a complicated one.

First, and most simply, often the females with whom he becomes entangled are the point

of entry for him to infiltrate the villain’s organization. As such, the female is

compromised because of whatever life decisions have gotten her there before she ever

meets Bond. Secondly, and I would argue more importantly, Butler’s theory of

performativity plays a role, as does Freud’s three stages of jealousy (competitive,

projected, and delusional). Simply, as previously discussed in Chapter 2, Bond sleeps

with numerous women in an effort to prove to himself and everyone around him how

masculine he actually is. In doing so, he is also concealing from himself and everyone

around him his own innate desire to be with another man. Considering this theory and

the “disposability factor” of most of the women with whom he sleeps, Bond is arguably

by choosing women he feels are temporary because of their links to the villain whom he

is tasked to destroy. His presumption is reasonable that they too will perish as collateral

damage with the men they associate. As a result, the women are actually a safe choice

for Bond as part of his own performativity. Ultimately, he rarely saves the woman he

beds. As a result, any emotional entanglements are resolved for him by their untimely

demise.

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In a complicated twist, though, the loss of the woman also serves as part of

Bond’s performativity. He continues with the work in spite of the loss of someone about

whom he is supposed to care. When his wife Tracy is killed in front of him, yes, he

mourns, but he carries on. When Vesper dies, his infamous and often-discussed, cold-

hearted response is, “The bitch is dead now.”271 That’s how much of a man he is. James

Bond can kill the villain, suffer the loss of his latest female dalliance, and still do his job.

Judith Roof posits, “The Bond Girl’s satisfied coos attest to Bond’s unerring instincts—

his real manhood in an age of eunuchs who pet cats or lose their girl Fridays to Bond’s

advances—rendered all the more impressive by Bond’s occasional protestations about the

arduous nature of his job.”272 I agree that Bond has unerring instincts, although not for

the reasons Roof puts forth. Yes, the Bond Girls have “satisfied coos;” however, the coos

are not how they are ultimately most useful to Bond. Bond chooses the girls he beds not

to satisfy them and certainly not himself, but because he knows they will ultimately buoy

his own agenda—workwise, relationship-wise, and psychologically—with their facility

of disposal. However, perhaps Fleming himself answers Roof in the following passage

from Moonraker where he describes Bond’s life when he is not off on assignment

elsewhere,

For the rest of the year he had the duties of an easy-going senior civil

servant—elastic office hours from around ten to six, lunch, generally in

the canteen, evening spent playing cards in the company of a few close

friends, or at Crockford’s; or making love, with rather cold passion, to one

of three similarly disposed married women; weekends playing golf for

high stakes at one of the clubs near London.273

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Basically, Bond, when not on assignment, is simply another version of Bond on

assignment. He really has little to complain about. Obviously, rather than look

introspectively to examine his seemingly lackadaisical existence, he continues to prove

his heterosexuality to himself and those around him by sleeping with women who can ask

or expect very little in return. These women are ultimately sought by him for their innate

ability to disappear back to their own commitments and lives.

Signals are certainly present that Bond knows on a conscious level that a lasting

relationship with a woman is not for him. For example, Fleming ends the novel The Man

with the Golden Gun by stating, “He knew, deep down, that love from Mary Goodnight,

or any other woman, was not enough for him. It would be like taking ‘a room with a

view.’ For James Bond, the same view would always be pall.”274 The use of the word

“pall” by Fleming proves particularly interesting as it typically is thought of as a funeral

cloth spread over a coffin or tomb. The “pall view” is compared to a relationship with a

woman, yet it is a woman who seems to always perish in a relationship with Bond. Still,

a long-term relationship with a woman would represent a death to Bond. The question

remains, in what way? The simple answer is the life of a spy who gallivants the world

hobnobbing with wealthy industrialists out to destroy mankind is hardly conducive to a

wife at home with a couple of kids and a dog. But, the deeper answer is as Fleming often

alludes, a death of part of himself he has yet to fully explore. The commitment to a

woman would in many ways prohibit Bond from being able to ever fully explore the part

of himself that allows the mere thought of “homosexual activities.”

Fleming’s allusions to Bond’s fancy of homosexual activities, as discussed, are

plentiful. Another example worth considering is found in the novel Live and Let Die.

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Fleming writes, “Bond gazed for a moment towards the northern horizon, where another

man would be in his bedroom asleep, or perhaps awake and thinking conceivably of him,

Bond, whom he had seen with Dexter on the steps of the hotel. Bond looked at the

beautiful day and smiled.”275 Interestingly, Fleming consistently shows Bond as a man to

whom women are fleeting objects who serve their need to him and are then eradicated

from his life. Yet, Fleming also shows Bond here amused if not happy at the thought of

another man lying in bed thinking of him. No matter how the scene is portrayed, there is

a strong homoerotic undertone to the depiction of the relationship between the two men.

Fleming consistently provides the reader with clues and subtext as to Bond’s

subconscious (and often not even) thoughts on relationship with men.

After all, as discussed in chapter 5, Bond does declare—albeit tongue-in-cheek—

in Diamonds Are Forever that he is part of a same-sex relationship. Bond declares,

“Matter of fact I’m almost married already. To a man. Name begins with M.”276 While

he is joking, on some level it speaks to the deeper relationship between Bond and M. In

the novels, M, who is always male, is to a large degree the only person with whom Bond

feels any true affection. While it would seem logical to argue that if Bond is repressing

sexual feelings or even romantic feelings for someone of the same gender it would be for

his CIA counterpart Felix Leiter (with whom he shares assignments in numerous novels

and meets in exotic locales to fight evil), I put forth that the true object of Bond’s same-

sex desire is M.277

Still, the relationship between M and Bond within these parameters would prove

to be an interesting dichotomy. Fleming made clear that Bond is undoubtedly loyal to M

in whatever regard one chooses to interpret said loyalty. However, it is M who gives

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Bond the assignments which test his loyalty and fidelity. Bond is constantly placed in

positions by M where he bends the rules, winds up in a dangerous situation, but

ultimately triumphs leaving M with somewhat of a mess to clean up. However, M

ultimately gives his approval.

Still, why does it matter if Bond is repressing his homosexual tendencies? Why

do I (or should anyone else care)? It is not lost on me that Bond was written in a time

where things were supposedly very different for gay people than they are today. I will be

the first to admit that is true. Still, it is not lost on me that challenges still exist to the

equality of LGBTQ community. In 1995 (over 40 years after Fleming wrote Casino

Royale), Leo Bersani questioned in his work Homos if a homosexual should be a good

citizen. His immediate answer provides some insight that still holds relevant. He wrote,

“It would be difficult to imagine a less gay-affirmative question at a time when gay men

and lesbians have been so strenuously trying to persuade straight society that they can be

good parents, good soldiers, good priests.”278 Seemingly, the gay community still finds

themselves under attack both politically and by homophobic members of society.279

Though fictional, James Bond is recognized to be the best secret agent in service. If he

were to be revealed to be a gay man, does that impact the argument that gay men cannot

be good soldiers? It should; but, it also should not matter as closeted gay men have

completed military service for probably as long as a military has existed.

It remains troubling (at least to me), however, that it was easier for Fleming to

create a hero who is a killer than it was to create one who is gay. Of the killing, Fleming

straightforwardly declares in Casino Royale, “Bond frowned. ‘It’s not difficult to get a

Double 0 number if you’re prepared to kill people,’ he said. ‘That’s all the meaning it

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has. It’s nothing to be particularly proud of. I’ve got corpses of a Japanese cipher expert

in New York and a Norwegian double agent in Stockholm to thank for being a double

0.’”280 Granted it is part of his business, but while he is admittedly not proud of his status,

Bond clearly has no issue acknowledging he has killed people. Moral ambiguity be

damned. However, it remains troubling to me that in writing the character in such a

manner, homosexuality would still be a taboo topic for him to mention. Bond sleeps with

women in the line of duty. He is ultimately asked to do things that would move anyone’s

moral compass. Though not depicted, would Flemings “homosexual tendencies” really

have been off the table if an assignment depended on them? Speculatively, I argue they

would not have been.

As noted though, it does become clear that the novels were written in another time

and it is difficult to apply today’s standards to something written in the past. Just as

scholars have long struggled with the language Mark Twain (among many others) uses in

his novels to describe race, Fleming’s word choice could easily come under fire now. For

example in The Man with the Golden Gun, he describes a character as follows, “She was

an octoroon, pretty as, in Bond’s imagination, the word octoroon suggested. She had

bold, brown eyes, slightly uptilted at the corners, beneath a fringe of silken black hair

(Bond reflected that there would be Chinese blood somewhere in her past).”281 While

said description of someone of mixed-race was acceptable at the time, the description

used by an author today would almost certainly be met with disdain. Additionally,

Fleming often uses the word “negro” to describe a person of color. A prime example

(and doubly offensive by today’s standards) occurs in Dr. No. Fleming describes people

as being, “big Chinese negroes wearing shoulder holsters across their naked sweating

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chests.”282 Additionally, one should consider the aforementioned episode (Chapter One)

that describes Bond in You Only Live Twice as darkening his skin and shaving his

eyebrows to slant upward in an effort to appear more Japanese and blend better into his

surroundings. By today’s standards, such an activity would not be considered appropriate

in real life and arguably in depiction via novel or film.283 While it is impossible to know,

arguably Fleming would not use race as a stereotype to create an “Othered” status if he

were still writing today as it would fall outstide the cultural norm.284 However, his

treatment of gay men as the Other is basically the same. In the case of Blofeld (who

dresses in drag) and Scaramanga (assumed to be homosexual in part because of an

inability to whistle) to Wint and Kidd, and even to Rosa Klebb and Pussy Galore,

“homosexual tendencies” or queerness were something that were not only noted, they

were often exploited and manipulated to help Bond in his cause.

While we are considering the views on race and the “othering” of those who were

admittedly non-heteronormative, it is also worth exploring the views on sexuality

Fleming put forth. Like the use of race, Fleming’s views on sexuality prove antiquated.

For example, in The Spy Who Loved Me, Fleming writes, “All women love semi-rape.

They love to be taken. It was his sweet brutality against my bruised body that had made

his act of love so piercingly wonderful. That and the coinciding nerves completely

relaxed after the removal of tension and danger, the warmth of gratitude, and woman’s

natural feeling for her hero.”285 Fleming has a female character (Vivienne Michel) say

this, but in the current era of the #MeToo movement, the sentiment is downright

disturbing. Fleming would have never written the same thing about a man. He also

would not have written frankly about the desires of a homosexual man. By stating that

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women love “semi-rape” and “sweet brutality” as part of their sexual proclivities, the

argument of Fleming as a misogynist can certainly be made.

Still, one would hope that he would have evolved in the decades since his death as

the filmmakers seem to have done. Matthew Tinkcom offers, “It has been a truism of

liberation politics in the past three decades that gendered identities derived from sexual

activities: that one is a queer man because he maintains an erotic interest in other

men.”286 Bond as I have demonstrated clearly does. Additionally, Richard Dyer makes a

point in The Culture of Queers that certainly should be considered. He offers, “In most

periods, we can find examples of men whom everyone knew to be habitually attracted to

other men but it is less clear that people in other periods necessarily, commonsensically,

extrapolated from that to the idea that such individuals belonged to a type of man defined

by those tastes.”287 Bond, in his initial incarnations, was a contemporary of the films

starring Rock Hudson. Hudson, like Bond, was thought to be the pinnacle of masculinity.

It was not until his death from AIDS in 1985 that his sexuality was questioned in the

mainstream. Hudson, who was married to a woman for 3 years in the 1950s, was

revealed to be a closeted homosexual. The proverbial closet had not just been a desire of

his; it had been a necessity to having a career. Hudson was far from the only gay actor in

Hollywood at the time. The same paradox can be applied to a fictional character at the

time. Homosexuality would have been the death of Bond. As a result, it was something

Fleming could signal but never blatantly disclose about the character.

Ultimately, it does not (and should not matter) if Bond is actually a repressed

homosexual. As with many things, people will simply think what they want and draw

their own conclusions. I am no exception. And frankly, that is probably the best

129

interpretation of Bond—one which remains far from definitive. George Lazenby (a Bond

portrayer) seems to agree with the theory put forth by Roger Moore that Bond should

remain male. Barbara Broccoli, current producer of the film franchise, seems to agree.

She stated in a recent interview, “Bond is male. He’s a male character. He was written as

a male and I think he’ll probably stay as a male. And that’s fine. We don’t have to turn

male characters into women. Let’s just create more female characters and make the story

fit those female characters.”288 However, I think a female Bond could exist. In the same

manner, I think a gay Bond has existed from the very beginning. I am still left to ponder,

though, why does it matter? What is its true significance—if to no one else—than to me.

My answer is ultimately a relatively simple one. Academy Award winning lyricist

Carole Bayer Sager said it best in the opening refrain and title to the song which served

as the theme to The Spy Who Loved Me, “Nobody does it better…”

130

REFERENCES

1 Seinfeld, Jerry. Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. Performed by Jerry Seinfeld and

Norm MacDonald, Netflix. 2017.

2 Bond is also tied to a chair by the villainous Le Chiffre in both the film and novel

version of Casino Royale. As such, this scene in many ways indicates this is not his first

time. As the scene in the film is quite homoerotic and discussed in great deal later, the

analysis of both scenes add greatly to the queer subtext depicted in Bond’s encounter

with Silva.

3 Roof, Judith. “Living the James Bond Lifestyle.” Ian Fleming and the Cultural

Politics of James Bond. Editors: Edward P. Commentale, Stephen Watt, and Skip

Willman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2005. Print.

4 For the purpose of this paper, I will employ the definition of “queer” that Alexander

Doty notes in his book Making Things Perfectly Queer. He states, “When I use the terms

‘queer’ or ‘queerness’ as adjectives or nouns, I do so to suggest a range of nonstraight

expression in, or in response to, mass culture. This range includes specifically gay,

lesbian, and bisexual expressions; but it also includes all other potential (and potentially

unclassifiable) non-straight positions” (xvi). Further, Doty theorizes that the queerness of

mass culture develops in three areas:

1. Influences during the production of texts (or films in the case of this paper)

131

2. Historically specific cultural readings and uses of texts by self-identified gays,

lesbians, bisexuals, and queers

3. Adopting reception positions that can be considered “queer” in some way,

regardless of a person’s declared sexual and gender allegiances (xi).

Additionally, I intersperse the use of the words “homosexual” and “homosexuality” with

similar regard and meaning. Basically, the use of the words is mean to only mean non-

heterosexual. Any of the terms falling under the “queer umbrella” are understood to be

part of the analysis

5 Problems often exist when trying to apply today’s standards to texts of the past.

However, certain codes and norms existed that should still be explored which were not

necessarily apparent at the time.

6 Pam Grier portrayed numerous “sexy but strong” female characters which many

deemed as racist and exploitive in the 1970s. The most famous of these films is often

considered Foxy Brown (1974).

7 Grace Jones is Jamaican performance artist who is largely known for her sexual yet

androgynous style. She is known to wear her hair in a crew cut and either wears clothing

to completely show her body or as is the case in A View to a Kill, often completely covers

the body. She presents herself physically in a manner that is certainly less than the

commonly accepted notion of femininity. In 1985, when the movie was released,

androgyny was receiving new attention in the mainstream with the advent of many pop

stars including Boy George, Elton John, David Bowie, and Jones herself.

8 SMERSH is the abbreviation for the Soviet agency Smyert Shpionam which literally

means "Death to Spies" (Casino Royale 14).

132

9 Movies about computers became prevalent during the mid-1980s namely War Games,

Tron, Short Circuit, Tron, and Terminator among many others.

10 Marriage equality was legalized in the United States with the U.S. Supreme Court

decision Obergefell v. Hodges in June 2015.

11 In using the term “heteronormativity,” I use the definition put forth by Lauren Berlant

and Michael Warner. They define heteronormativity as follows,

By hetronormativity we mean the institutuions, structures of

understanding, and practical orientations that make heterosexuality seem

not only coherent—that is, organized as sexuality—but also privileged. Its

coherence is always provisional, and its privilege can take several

(sometimes contradictory) forms: unmarked, as the basic idiom of the

personal and social; or marked as a natural state; or projected as an ideal

or moral accomplishment. It consists less of norms that could be

summarized as a body of doctrine than of a sense of rightness produced in

contradictory manifestations—often unconscious, immanent to practice or

to institutions (548).

12 Tinkcom, Matthew. Working Like a Homosexual: Camp, Capital, Cinema. Duke UP,

2002. 42.

13 Critic James Chapman points out in his article “Bond and Britishness” that there was

certainly an American influence on Bond’s sexual persona. He writes, “It is significant,

if entirely coincidental, that it was the same year as Bond’s first appearance in print that

Playboy magazine was launched in the United States. The Bond books embody the

133

Playboy ethos of easy, free, open sexuality, emphasizing sexual pleasure (for men) and a

lack of gilt about the sex act itself” (Commentale, et al 135).

14 Ecco, Umberto. The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1979. p.156.

15 Russo, Vito. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. New York: Harper

and Row, 1987.

Russo’s work is echoed by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick in Epistemology of the Closet.

16 Russo. The Celluloid Closet. xi. 17 Russo. The Celluloid Closet. xi. 18 Russo. The Celluloid Closet. 154. 19 Judith Halberstam since going public with a transgender identity now publishes under

the name Jack Halberstam. However, this work was first published during a time when

she was known as Judith.

20 Halberstam, Judith. Female Masculinity. Durham: Duke UP, 1998. Print. 4. 21 Dyer, Richard. The Culture of Queers. New York: Routledge, 2001. Print. 4. 22 Russo. The Celluloid Closet. 4. 23 Specific examples of “homosexual tendencies” as referenced by Fleming will be

explored in subsequent chapters. However, specific examples to be discussed in

subsequent chapters can be found in a description of Scaramanga in The Man With the

Golden Gun on page 29 and in a list of the possible cures by hypnosis in On Her

Majesty’s Secret Service on page 199.

24 Dyer. The Culture of Queers. 3.

134

25 Fleming died in 1964--three years before homosexuality was no longer considered an

illegal act in the United Kingdom and five years before the Stonewall riots in the United

States served as the unofficial turning point for the struggle for gay equality.

26 Lane, Sheldon. For Bond Lovers Only. New York: Dell P. 1965. Print. 15. 27 Fleming, Ian. You Only Live Twice. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 85. 28 Fleming, Ian. Goldfinger. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 279. 29 Fleming. Goldfinger. 279. Also depicted in the novel is Tilly Masterson, another

lesbian who is involved with Pussy Galore. Tilly, in turn, can ultimately not be saved.

30 Isherwood, Christopher. A Single Man. New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 2013.

174, 176.

31 It was not until the film adaptation of A Single Man by director Tom Ford in 2009 that

the novel achieved a relative commercial success.

32 The Sexual Offences Act of 1967 decriminalized homosexuality for men in the United

Kingdom. It had never been illegal for women to engage in lesbian behavior. It is worth

noting that this act was 3 years after Ian Fleming’s death.

33 Fleming, Ian. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer,

2012. Print. 199.

34 Fleming. You Only Live Twice. 17. 35 Fleming, Ian. Dr. No. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 154.

36 Fleming, Ian. The Man With the Golden Gun Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012.

Print. 29.

37 These scenes will be discussed in great detail in chapters where they prove most

relevant. However, they are mentioned here merely as examples to be explored.

135

38 I prefer the use of “repressed homosexuality” as I think that is a more apt description of

Bond. “Homosexual tendencies” describe someone (at least in my opinion) who

participates in homosexual acts and quite frankly acknowledges it. Repressed

homosexuality is more in-line with a closeted individual who may or may not have ever

acted upon his same-sex desires. That said, though, I do not feel that either term is

particularly incorrect.

39 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 29. 40 Bersani argues that the struggle of homosexuals is to be both invisible and recognized.

However, he notes the paradox of such a conundrum which will be explored in much

greater depth in subsequent chapters.

41 Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge, 1990. Print. 70. 42 A case could be made that Bond had deeper feelings for Vesper Lynd in Casino

Royale. However, he went from being on the verge of proposing one moment to

declaring of her, “The bitch is dead now”(178). This flippant attitude toward her death

which was arguably to save Bond casts doubt on the true nature of his feelings for her.

Their relationship is discussed in subsequent chapters.

43 The Man With the Golden Gun. Roger Moore. Dir. Guy Hamilton. United Artists,

1974.

44 Walker, Tim. “Bond Row Looms as Roger Moore Says 007 Can't Be Gay - Or a

Woman: Star, 88, Says 'Political Correctness' Should Not Be Considered.” Daily

Mail. 24 Oct 2015. Print.

45 SPECTRE. Daniel Craig. Dir. Sam Mendes. Columbia Pictures, 2015.

136

46 Williams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire. New York: New Directions Books,

2004. Print. 194.

47 Duncan, Paul ed. The James Bond Archives. Cologne: Taschen, 2012. Print. 82. 48 Critic Robin Wood employs a similar argument in her examination of the character

Jake La Motta in Martin Scorsese’s film Raging Bull.

49 The date is quoted from an article on the website of the Human Rights Campaign

written by Allison Turner entitled, “#Flashback Friday—Today in 1973, the APA

Removed Homosexuality from the List of Mental Illnesses.”

50 Homosexuality was decriminalized in the United Kingdom by the Sexual Offences Act

of 1967.

51 Freud, Sigmund. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. New York: Simon and

Schuster, 1963. Print. 150 (emphasis in text).

52 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 152. 53 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 151. 54 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 151. 55 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 152. 56 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 154. 57 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 157-8. 58 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 158. 59 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 154.

137

60 Robert Verkaik explores the effects of abuse in the public schools in the United

Kingdom in his book Posh Boys: How the Public Schools Ruin Great Britain. The book

was published by the British Publishing house OneWorld Publications in July 2018.

61 Skyfall. Daniel Craig. Dir. Sam Mendes. Columbia Pictures, 2012. 62 Skyfall. 2012. 63 Casino Royale. Daniel Craig. Dir. Martin Campbell. Columbia Pictures, 2006. 64 Derived from Jung’s analysis of “The Psychology of the Child Archetype” which

explores the theory of peur aeternus where a child does not want to grow up. The

popular name for the condition is taken from the main character of J.M. Barrie’s novel

Peter Pan and Wendy, which was first published in 1911.

65 M (and also Q) like Bond is a character that spans all of the films. As a result, M has

been portrayed by a variety of actors, or actress in the case of Judi Dench. In other films

discussed, M is not necessarily a female character.

66 In Euripides’s play, Medea is a Greek mythological character who avenges her

abandonment by her husband Jason by killing their children. Sophie’s Choice is a 1979

novel (and subsequent 1982 film) by William Styron that shows a mother basically

forced to choose which of her children will die and realizing that no matter the decision,

all outcomes are equally negative.

67 Casino Royale. 2006. Of course, the question does arise if M is indeed a good mother

to Bond and the rest of her recruits. After all in Skyfall, she does not welcome him home

after his time away and makes it clear that she has sold his flat as she would anyone else

who was presumed dead. M was the one who orders Moneypenny to take the shot

risking his life and presumably kills him. And, she revoked his license to kill in

138

Quantum of Solace. Still, as is made clear in several instances to his status as an orphan,

M is in many ways the only parental figure Bond has.

68 Skyfall. 2012. 69 Skyfall. 2012. 70 Skyfall. 2012. 71 Casino Royale. 2006. 72 Skyfall. 2012. 73 Skyfall. 2012. 74 Skyfall. 2012. 75 Fleming. Dr. No. 154. 76 Ecco. The Role of the Reader. 145. 77 Ecco. The Role of the Reader. 146. 78 Fleming, Ian. For Your Eyes Only. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 5. 79 Fleming. For Your Eyes Only. 6. 80 Fleming, Ian. “007 in New York.” Octopussy and The Living Daylights. Las Vegas:

Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 92.

81 Fleming. “007 in New York.” 92. 82 Fleming. “007 in New York.” 92. 83 Butler. Gender Trouble 70. 84 Butler. Gender Trouble 25-6. 85 Duncan. James Bond Archives. 35. 86 Sullivan, Nikki. A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory. New York: New York Y P,

2003. Print. 1.

139

87 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 3. 88 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 3. 89 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 3. 90 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 3. 91 The actors who have portrayed M are as follows according to Paul Duncan’s book The

James Bond Archives: Bernard Lee, Robert Brown, Edward Fox, Judi Dench, and

(currently) Ralph Feinnes.

92 Dench’s casting as M coincided with the appointment of Stella Rimington as the head

of MI-5 in England. The parallel of the casting and appointment is hardly coincidental.

93 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 3. 94 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 4. 95 Halberstam. Female Masculinity. 4. 96 Warner, Michael. The Trouble With Normal. Cambridge: Harvard U P, 1999. Print.

37.

97 Warner. The Trouble With Normal. 37. 98 Warner. The Trouble With Normal. 37-8. 99 Butler. Gender Trouble. 187. 100 Butler. Gender Trouble. 43, 220. 101 Butler. Gender Trouble. 43. 102 Butler. Gender Trouble. 43 (emphasis in text). 103 Butler, Judith. Bodies That Matter. New York: Routledge, 1993. Print. 64. 104 Butler. Bodies That Matter. 64. 105 Butler. Bodies That Matter. 64.

140

106 Casino Royale. 2006. 107 Casino Royale. 2006. 108 See Halberstam’s discussion of Robert DeNiro’s Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull (274-6). 109 Casino Royale. 2006. 110 The scenes in both Goldfinger and Casino Royale also both offer an interesting

examination under Freud’s castration complex. Freud theorizes,

Attachment to the mother, narcissism, fear of castration, these are the

factors (which by the way have nothing specific about them) that we have

hitherto found in the psychical aetiology of homosexuality; and on them is

superimposed the effect of any seduction bringing about a premature

fixation of the libido, as well as the influence of the organic factor

favoring the passive role in love (158).

111Butler. Gender Trouble. 70.

According to Butler, Sandor Ferenczi (a Hungarian psychoanalyst often associated with

Sigmund Freud) pointed out, “homosexual men exaggerate their heterosexuality as a

‘defence’ against their homosexuality.” She then posits,

It is unclear what the “exaggerated” form of heterosexuality the

homosexual man is alleged to display, but the phenomenon under notice

here might simply be that gay men simply may not look much different

from their heterosexual counterparts. This lack of overt differentiating

style or appearance may be diagnosed as a symptomatic “defense” only

because the gay man in question does not conform to the idea of the

141

homosexual that the analyst has drawn and sustained from cultural

stereotypes. (69)

112 Casino Royale. 2006. 113 Casino Royale. 2006. 114 Fleming. Casino Royale. 168. 115 Fleming. Casino Royale. 168. 116 Fleming. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. 53. 117 Fleming. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. 53-4.

The scene does serve in stark contrast to the description of Bond making love to Fiona

Volpe in the film Thunderball where he says to her almost immediately following sex,

“My dear girl, don’t flatter yourself. What I did this evening was for King and country.

You don’t think it gave me any pleasure, do you?” Also disturbing in this line is the fact

that the United Kingdom has not had a king since Queen Elizabeth II took the thrown in

1952.

118 Fleming. Goldfinger. 244. 119 Arguably, Fleming’s depiction falls in line with Michel Foucault’s characterization

that while there are “occasionally” the existing binaries such as gay/straight have “great

radical ruptures,” but more often they deal with mobile and transitory points of resistance

resulting in slower change (96). If Fleming had openly declared Bond to be gay or even

bisexual in any of the novels published in the 1960s, it would have been a “great radical

rupture.”

120 Russo. The Celluloid Closet. 5. 121 Fleming. Goldfinger. 279.

142

122 Hovey, Jaime. “Lesbian Bondage or Why Dykes Like 007. Ian Fleming and the

Cultural Politics of James Bond. Editors: Edward P. Commentale, Stephen Watt,

and Skip Willman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2005. Print.

Hovey specifically mentions Radclyffe Hall’s 1928 novel The Well of Loneliness, and the

1950s novels Odd Girl Out by Ann Bannon and The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith.

123 Wood, Robin. Hollywood: From Vietnam to Reagan..and Beyond. New York:

Columbia U P, 1986. Print. 199.

124 Isherwood, Christopher. The World in the Evening. New York: Farrar, Strauss, and

Giroux, 1988. Print. 110.

125 Sontag, Susan. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. New York: Picador, 1990.

Print. 275.

126 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 275. 127 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 275 128 Tinkcom. Working Like a Homosexual. 144. 129 It should be noted that in his 1983 book simply entitled Camp, theorist Marc Booth

took issue with Sontag’s “Notes” claiming she did not distinguish between what he

termed genuine camp or “camp fads” or “camp fancies.” As Camp sensibility tends to

evolve over time—something Sontag acknowledges—I disagree with his assessment.

130 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 280. 131 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 287. 132 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 288. 133 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 288. 134 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 292.

143

135 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 279. 136 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 279. 137 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 279. 138 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 290. 139 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 290. 140 It should be noted that while Sontag’s particular religious beliefs are not expressed in

this essay, she is known to have been born to Jewish parents. Additionally, while she

never publicly “came out,” it is largely presumed that she was in fact a lesbian and was

confirmed to have been “lovers” with her longtime companion, photographer Annie

Leibowitz. While the quote is largely held to be true, it also appears to be slightly self-

serving.

141 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 290. 142 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 290. 143 Babuscio, Jack. “Camp and the Gay Sensibility.” Camp Grounds: Style and

Homosexuality. Ed. David Bergman. Amherst: U of Massachusetts P, 1993.

Print. 20.

144 Bishop-Sanchez, Kathryn. Creating Carmen Miranda: Race, Camp, and

Transnational Stardom. Vanderbilt UP, 2016. Print. 133.

145 As a feminist, I would like to point out that I do have issues with using the term “Bond

Girl.” However, it is a word that has become part of the social consciousness. They are

rarely described as women or ladies. They are always described as girls. As such, it is

the term I will be using in the course of this paper.

144

146 The first novel featuring James Bond was published in 1952. In all, there are twelve

novels and two collections of short stories by Ian Fleming. To date, 24 movies have been

made. That number includes Never Say Never Again made with different producers

featuring the James Bond character and starring original Bond, Sean Connery. It does not

include the 1967 film Casino Royale, which is considered a spoof of the series.

147 However, time often plays a role in the consideration of Camp. It will prove

interesting to see if in 20 to 30 years if Skyfall then seems to be Camp. Only the passage

of time will provide the answer.

148 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 541. 149 Octopussy was played by Maud Adams in the movie Octopussy. Holly Goodhead was

played by Lois Chiles in Moonraker. Xenia Onatopp was played by Famke Jannsen in

Goldeneye.

150 Arp, Robert and Kevin S. Decker. “That Fatal Kiss: Bond, Ethics, and the

Objectification of Women.” James Bond and Philosophy. Ed. James B. South

and Jacob M Held. Chicago: Open Court, 2006. Print. 202.

151 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 279. 152 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 39, 41. 153 As discussed in great detail in Chapter 4 of this work, an explanation of the “male

gaze” see Laura Mulvey’s article referenced below:

In “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” she states, “In a world ordered by sexual

imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female.

The determining male gaze projects its phantasy on to the female figure which is styled

accordingly” (Corrigan et al 719).

145

154 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 41. 155 Fun fact: Halle Berry had to take a break from filming Die Another Day at Pinewood

Studios in England to travel to Los Angeles for the Academy Award Ceremony. Berry

was awarded Best Actress for Monster’s Ball. She became the first African American

actress in history to win the Best Actress Oscar.

156 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 501. 157 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 461. 158 Kathryn Bishop-Sanchez offers the following discourse of gay icons in her book

Creating Carmen Miranda. She writes, “A gay icon—generally considered a popular

culture entertainer and usually a woman—is most typically imbued with a camp

sensitivity that fosters queer identification and gender play and requires a significant

following among the gay community, particularly among gay men” (168).

159Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 369. 160 Shaviro, Steven. Post Cinematic Affect. Washington: Zero Books 2010. Print. 20. 161 A View to a Kill. Roger Moore. Dir. John Glen. MGM/UA, 1985. 162 A View to a Kill. 1985. 163 Christine Bold argues in her article “Under the Skirts of Brittania: Re-reading Women

in the James Bond Novels” that employing Jones in the role of May Day results in self-

parodying of the Bond series saying “May Day, played by Grace Jones, takes the upper

hand, in bed and out, from a jowly, glassy-eyed Roger Moore.” She continues, “The

descent into manifest self-parody suggests something about the exhaustibility of the Bond

formula and the resort to women and other colonized figures to revive its energy”

(Lindner 214-5).

146

164 Dyer, Richard. Stars. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1998. Print. 49. 165 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 19. 166 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 515. 167 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 516. 168 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 497. 169 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 497. 170 Dyer, Richard. Only Entertainment. New York: Routledge, 1992. Print. 168. 171 Dyer. The Culture of Queers. 4. 172 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 454. 173 McKinney, William J. “James Bond and the Philosophy of Technology.” James

Bond and Philosophy: Questions Are Forever. Ed. James B. South and Jacob M

Held. Chicago: Open Court, 2006. Print. 188.

174 South and Held. “James Bond and Q: Heidegger’s Technology, or ‘You’re Not a

Sportsman, Mr. Bond.’” 173.

175 Tinkcom. Working Like a Homosexual. 123. 176 Tinkcom. Working Like a Homosexual. 123. 177 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 572. 178 Granted, the exploits seem downright sophisticated when compared to the circus-

themed exploits shown in the film Octopussy where Moore’s bond swings from a vine as

a Tarzan yell is heard, a villain is hiding in a mechanical alligator, and Bond disguises

himself in a gorilla costume. The scenes border on kitsch rather than camp. While

related (and possibly in the eye of the beholder), kitsch is considered camp without the

irony. While Sontag’s position is that Camp is good because it is awful (292). Kitsch is

147

awful because it is bad. However, as Tinkcom points out, “it is always possible to

misread kitsch in a camp manner” (136).

179 As an homage to this scene, Jinx Johnson (played by Halle Berry) is strapped to a

table in Die Another Day. In this case, the laser was aimed at her head. While I am sure

the differences in the two scenes invite some type of Freudian analysis, said analysis is

beyond the scope of this paper.

180 Arp and Decker. “That Fatal Kiss.” 201. 181 “Girls Interrupted.” Will and Grace. NBC. 2 May 2000. Television 182 Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Critical Visions in Film

Theory. Eds: Corrigan, Timothy and Patricia White with Meta Mazaj. Boston:

Bedford/St. Martins, 2011. Print. 719.

183 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 717. 184In his book, Bryson laments the lag in the manner in which art historians have

examined paintings backed on what he terms “the tacit assumptions that guide the normal

activity

ty of the art historian.” (xi). In doing so, he reevaluates classic paintings by challenging

the way they have been traditionally viewed. Then, in his article, Keller theorizes about

the changing roles for gays and lesbians in the eye of popular media with the success of

shows such as Will & Grace, Queer as Folk, Six Feet Under, and the first iteration of

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. He puts forth the importance of its success because of

“its potentially inflammatory title” which invokes “the taboo subject of gay men’s

intrusive, unsettling, and objectifying gaze” in a time where being a gay man was in his

word, “taboo.” (50).

148

185 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 150 emphasis in text. 186 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 152. 187See Freud’s explanation in the following source:

Freud, Sigmund. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. New York: Simon and

Schuster, 1963. Print.

188 The first novel featuring James Bond was published in 1952. In all, there are twelve

novels and two collections of short stories by Ian Fleming. To date, 24 movies have been

made. That number includes Never Say Never Again made with different producers

featuring the James Bond character and starring original Bond, Sean Connery. It does not

include the 1967 film Casino Royale, which is considered a spoof of the series.

10Keller, James. “Does He Think We Are Not Watching?: Straight Guys and The Queer

Eye Panopticon.” Pop Culture Association in the South. 26:3 (April 2004), 49-60.

Print. 55.

The Lacanian framework refers to the work of French psychiatrist and psychoanalyst

Jacque Lacan’s work surrounding the mirror stage which was first theorized by Sigmund

Freud.

189 While I try to avoid repetition, some scenes discussed in previous chapters prove rich

enough to warrant examination under multiple theories.

184 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 512. 185 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 512. 186 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 512.

193 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 512.

149

194 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 719 emphasis in text. 195 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 720. 196 Amis, Kingsley. The James Bond Dossier. New York: New American Library,

1965. Print. 38.

197 From Russia With Love, 1963. 198 Duncan. The James Bond Archives. 34-5. 199 Sontag. Against Interpretation and Other Essays. 279. 200 Bennett, Tony and Janet Woollacott. Bond and Beyond. New York: Methuen Inc.,

1987. Print. 206.

201 Bennett and Woollacott. Bond and Beyond. 208. 202 Bennett and Woollacott. Bond and Beyond. 212. 203 De Angelis, Michael. Gay Fandom and Crossover Stardom. Durham: Duke U P,

2001. Print. 159.

204 De Angelis. Gay Fandom and Crossover Stardom. 159. 205 Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky. Between Men. New York: Columbia U P, 1985. Print. 7. 206 Fleming. Goldfinger. 244. 207 Fleming. You Only Live Twice. 4. 208 Fleming. “007 in New York.” 92. and “A View to a Kill.” 6. 209 Fleming, Ian. Thunderball. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 5. 210 Fleming, Ian. Diamonds Are Foreverl. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print.

32.

211 Fleming. Dr. No. 154. 212 Bennett and Woollacott. Bond and Beyond. 212.

150

213 Bennett and Woollacott. Bond and Beyond. 212. 214 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 715. 215 MacKinnon, Catherine A. “Feminism, Marxism, Method, and the State: An Agenda

for Theory.” Signs. 7:3 (Spring 1982) Print. 530-1.

216 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 715. 217 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 721. 218 Freud. Sexuality and the Psychology of Love. 151. 219 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 721. 220 Butler. Gender Trouble. 70. 221 Butler. Gender Trouble. 70. 222 Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” 721. 223 Arp and Decker. “That Fatal Kiss.” 201. 224 SPECTRE, 2015. 225 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 29. 226 Russo, Vito. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. 154-5.

227 Klosterman, Chuck. I Wear the Black Hat. New York: Scribner, 2014. Print. 9. 228 Klosterman. I Wear the Black Hat. 9. 229 Klosterman. I Wear the Black Hat. 9. 230 Klosterman. I Wear the Black Hat. 14. 231 Ecco. The Role of the Reader. 145. 232 Klosterman. I Wear the Black Hat. 39. 233 Commentale. Ian Fleming and the Cultural Politics of James Bond. 29.

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234 In times where gay men were forced to live a more closeted existence, a bandana

hanging out of a back pocket was often used to signal other gay men to their existence. It

had other meanings based on color or pocket, but my point is Wint and Kidd were not

signaling anyone to their gayness. Additionally, the rainbow flag is now used worldwide

as a signal of the gay community.

235 A far cry from Bond’s shaken but never stirred martini, the Alexandra is a drink

comprised of Navy rum, coffee liqueur, cream, a pasteurized egg white, and dusting of

nutmeg. It is, however, recommended to be served in a martini glass.

236 Fleming. For Your Eyes Only. 102. 237 It is worth noting that for decades a common signal for gay men to signal another was

to have a bandana hanging out of his back pocket with each color meaning something

about the man’s sexual desires. While not in his back pocket, Fleming does depict Bond

with one as he wrote in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, “Bond undid the red bandana

from round his neck” (65). As with the bath house in Diamonds Are Forever, the code

for the gay reader is barely coded.

238 Fleming. Octopussy. 37. 239 Fleming. Octopussy. 37. 240 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 32. 241 Commentale. Ian Fleming and the Cultural Politics of James Bond. 29. 242 Commentale. Ian Fleming and the Cultural Politics of James Bond. 29. 243 Commentale. Ian Fleming and the Cultural Politics of James Bond. 29. 244 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 106. 245 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 115.

152

246 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 23-5. 247 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 29.

For the record, as a gay man myself, I can whistle a happy tune at any time. In fact, I

know other gay men who can whistle thus disproving this theory.

248 Fleming’s citing of a Freudian theory here also lends credibility to my own application

of Freud’s theory of repressed homosexuality as discussed in Chapter Two. If Fleming

was familiar with Freud’s work surrounding the gun as a substitute for a man’s penis, it

stands to reason (though likely cannot be proven) that he was familiar with the theory of

repressed homosexuality which could have had even a small influence on the manner in

which he created Bond.

249 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 60. 250 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 83. 251 Fleming. Casino Royale. 79. 252 Fleming. Casino Royale. 80. 253 In his essay published in 1933, “The Dream-Work,” Freud theorizes,

All complicated machines and appliances are very probably the genitals—

as a rule the male genitals—in the description of which the symbolism of

dreams is as indefatigable as human wit. It is quite unmistakable that all

weapons and tools are used as symbols for the male organ: e.g.

ploughshare, hammer, gun, revolver, dagger, sword, etc. (235).

Fleming’s acknowledgment of the theory certainly offers a different reading of the scene

in The Living Daylights where Timothy Dalton’s Bond is pointing a gun at a man and

tells him to get on his knees and put his hands behind his back.

153

254 Sullivan. A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory. 1. 255 Fleming. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. 199. 256 Judith Halberstam also explores the recasting of M with Judi Dench and the effects of

said recasting on the character in Female Masculinity. She posits, “There’s something

curiously lacking in Goldeneye, namely, credible masculine power” (3). Yet, she has

other declarations for Judi Dench’s M. She states, “Bond’s boss, M, is a noticeably butch

older woman who calls Bond a dinosaur and chastises him for being a misogynist and a

sexist” (3). According to Halberstam, Bond’s masculinity is prosthetic and has little to

do with “biological maleness” but feels M is the character that most exemplifies

masculine performativity and that performance is at the expense of Bond’s “sham” of

masculinity (3-4).

257 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 13. 258 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 13. 259 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 13. 260 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 199. 261 Diamonds Are Forever. 1971. 262 Commentale. Ian Fleming and the Cultural Politics of James Bond. 30. 263 Fleming. Casino Royale. 131-2. 264 Roth, Phillip. The Human Stain. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000.

Print. 315.

265 Commentale. The Cultural Politics of James Bond. 201. 266 Dirda, Michael. “James Bond as Archetype (and Incredibly Cool Dude). The

Chronicle of Higher Education. 54.41 (20 June 2008). Web.

154

267 Fleming. Casino Royale. 157. 268 Fleming. For Your Eyes Only. 77. 269 Fleming. For Your Eyes Only. 81. 270 Fleming. Dr. No. 117. 271 Fleming. Casino Royale. 178. 272 Commentale. The Cultural Politics of James Bond. 80. 273 Fleming, Ian. Moonraker. Las Vegas: Thomas and Mercer, 2012. Print. 7. 274 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 160. 275 Fleming. Live and Let Die. 21. 276 Fleming. Diamonds Are Forever. 199. 277 Obviously, by M, I refer to the male character depicted in the novels and most of the

movies rather than the female M portrayed by Judi Dench in the films Goldeneye,

Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough, Die Another Day, Casino Royale

(2006), Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall.

278 Bersani. Homos. 113. 279 Within the past two weeks of my writing this, examples spring to mind demonstrating

this activity. For example, the United States Supreme Court allowed a military ban (at

least temporarily) on transgendered individuals who wish to serve. Additionally, actor

Jussie Smollett was attacked in Chicago in what was deemed an apparent hate crime

stemming merely from Smollett’s existence with the intersectionality of being African-

American and an out gay man. However, recent developments have put the initial report

in question as it is now theorized he staged his own attack and has been indicted on

charges related to that theory.

155

280 Fleming. Casino Royale. 56. 281 Fleming. The Man With the Golden Gun. 47. 282 Fleming. Dr. No. 105. 283 Recent popular culture and political events involving Megyn Kelly being fired from

NBC news for a discussion of blackface on her show where she seemed to be culturally

insensitive and the ongoing scandal involving Virginia Governor Ralph Northam and

pictures from his college yearbook involving photos of him potentially dressed in either

blackface or as a member of the Ku Klux Klan come to mind. However, it should be

noted that as recently as 2000, Phillip Roth released his novel The Human Stain which

told the story of a 65 year-old Classics professor who had lived his entire life thus far

“passing” as a Caucasian male when he was in fact a light-skinned African American.

The novel was a critical and commercial success and was adapted into a film starring

Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, and Wentworth Miller in 2003. In the film, Hopkins

(a Caucasian man from Wales) portrayed the main character who passes in the present

day. Wentworth Miller (who is mixed race) portrayed him in his younger days.

284 “Othering” is a theory whereby those who are different (often by race or culture) are

set apart as inferior. The topic is explored in great detail in the works of theorists Homi

Bhabha and Edward Said.

285 Fleming. The Spy Who Loved Me. 139. 286 Tinkcom. Working Like a Homosexual. 46. 287 Dyer. Culture of Queers. 2. 288 Beal, James. “George Lazenby Says James Bond Should Never Be a Woman.” The

Sun. 9 November 2008.