For James Bond fans, the murder of recalcitrant SPECTRUM crime syndicate member Ernst Stavro Blofeld in a conference room is part of the 007 mythology.
It is less known that this brutal scene, as written by Ian Fleming in the novel Operation Thunder, takes place in the heart of the French capital: on the third floor of 136 Boulevard Haussmann, more precisely, a short walk from the BBC newsrooms.
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With 20 members of the secret organization gathered around a large table, Blofeld reaches for a secret button and sends the Corsican into oblivion.
Ignoring the smell of burnt flesh, his colleagues watch with emotionless expressions on their faces.
The place where he describes the victim's body "twisted in an armchair" as if "someone kicked him from behind" today is nothing more than the blasé office space of a business consulting agency in the center of Paris.
Researching many of Bond's French connections from the original books is possible due to their creator's extraordinary attention to detail. Movies are something else entirely.
Sixty years after the publication of Operation Thunder, contemporary residents of SPEKTRA headquarters were understandably surprised to learn about his dramatic literary past.
In the bare, parquet-floored room overlooking the boulevard where Blofled planned to steal the atomic bomb, there is no lingering presence of evil, just a whiteboard, projectors and markers.
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Fleming's eye for detail
Those who knew Fleming say that he was far less interested in who people were than what they did.
He collected locations, specifications, production techniques and brands, and then sprinkled these facts all over his novels.
That's part of the reason they're so readable.
The action in the James Bond books often takes place in real-life locations.
Take, for example, the murder of a NATO courier that begins the plot of his short story A View of Murder.
Until the mid-sixties, NATO's military headquarters in Europe - SHAPE - was located in the western suburbs of Paris.
You can still reconstruct the exact path taken by the man on the motorcycle from there, through the forest of Marly to Saint-Germain-en-Laye.
He is killed by a Soviet agent near Carrefour de Curie, and he is still there.
A few hundred meters before, on the D98 road, just before the bridge as described by Fleming, there is a bypass called Carrefour Royal.
There, in a clearing in the forest, Bond spies from a tree on Russian agents as they emerge from their underground bunker. Nothing has changed.
Got a leg in "Ric"
Take the final chapter of From Russia with Love - where Bond is kicked in the shin by Soviet torturer Rosa Kleb with a poison-toed boot.
That scene takes place in room number 204 of the "Ric" Hotel on Vendome Square.
Rosa Kleb's venom was extracted from the sexual organs of the Japanese goiter fish: more Fleming details.
Quite by chance, Bond sneaks into the hotel through the official entrance from Rue Cambon - the same door later made famous by Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed, when they escaped the Ric through it before the car chase that ended in their deaths in 1997.
And in Goldfinger, you can follow Bond as he follows Orik Goldfinger's Rolls Royce, traveling across France from Le Tuque to Geneva, via Rouen, Orleans, Nevers, Moulins and Macon.
Who knows?
Maybe you can find "a nice bridge over a nice stream" on the N79 where Goldfinger leaves a chest full of gold for his Soviet bosses.
The bridge is marked 79/6.
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Ian Fleming, who died in 1964, knew France well - which is why he chose it as the location for so many of his hero's adventures.
The first chapter of the first book - Casino Royale - takes us to a fictitious town on the northern French coast, Royal Le Eu.
Based on a mix of the seaside resorts of Deauville and Le Tuque, the location draws on Fleming's own memories of roaming European watering holes as a carefree youth in the XNUMXs.
We assume that among them there was no beating on the genitals with powder at the hands of a villain named Le Chiffre.
Primarily a lover of German-speaking countries, Fleming knew all of Europe in accordance with a man of his profession, connections and wealth.
Later in life he loved nothing more than to cross the English Channel in his Ford Thunderbird and follow his instincts.
In 1940, serving as an adviser to the British director of naval intelligence, he experienced the fall of France firsthand when he was sent to persuade the outgoing government of Paul Reynaud not to hand over its navy to the Germans.
After the war, he had an intriguing friendship with French underwater explorer Jacques Cousteau.
Occasionally in the books we get an impression of Bond/Fleming's feelings towards France - not always favorable.
In "A View of Murder," while sitting in the Cafe Fouquet on the Champs-Élysées, Bond reflects on how Paris is a city he "heartily disliked since the war ... He hasn't spent a happy day in Paris since 1945."
The reason, which has its echoes even to this day, is that "he lost his soul - he pawned it to tourists... who gradually completely took over the city...
You could see it in people's eyes - sullen, envious, ashamed."
In the same passage, we learn by chance that Bond lost his virginity in Paris, after visiting the famous "Harry's Bar".
In the novel On Her Majesty's Service there is a long passage about the horrors of certain French restaurants:
"Traps for the gullible among tourists who think they are gourmets...Bond ordered their 'chef's special' - usually a rich cream and wine sauce with a few mushrooms hiding the poor quality of the meat or fish."
But overall one cannot but feel the sympathy that the spy and his author have for France.
The Lora is "probably Bond's favorite river in the world".
Deuxième Bureau (Secret Service) chief Rene Mathis may not be as much of a Bond sidekick as the CIA's Felix Leiter - but he's still a friend and can be trusted.
Complaining about the disappointing cuisine, Bond phones "one of his favorite restaurants in France" across the street from Etaples train station and two hours later "drives back to the Casino with poached rye, muslin sauce and half the best roast partridge he's ever tasted." in the stomach".
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