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Nom légal: McNeile, Herman Cyril
Autres noms: McNeile, H. C.
Date de naissance: 1888-09-28
Date de décès: 1937-08-14
Lieu de sépulture: Cremated
Sexe: male
Nationalité: UK
Pays (pour la carte): England, UK
Lieu de naissance: Bodmin, Cornwall, England, UK
Lieu du décès: West Chiltington, Sussex, England, UK
Professions: soldier
novelist
Notice de désambigüisation: The Bulldog Drummond series was continued after McNeile's death by Gerard Fairlie and Stephen Deas.

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Critiques

Bulldog Drummond: The Carl Peterson Quartet (Tales… par Sapper

review of
Sapper's Bulldog Drummond - The Carl Peterson Quartet
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - March 23, 2014

Yes, surprise, surprise, once again I've been verbose. Read my full review here: https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/362026-review-of-bulldog-drummond---the-car... 'cause this little bugger is truncated:

If I had any 'guilty pleasures', reading Bulldog Drummond might be one of them.. but I don't, so it isn't. Many yrs ago, but probably w/in the last decade, I read Mickey Spillane's One Lonely Night. I thought I reviewed it on Goodreads. Apparently, I haven't. IF I HAD I'd be directing the reader of this review to my pan of the Spillane bk - but I didn't even bother to pan it. Spillane wrote hard-boiled anti-Communist propaganda crime fiction in the 1940s & 1950s. No doubt they were very popular. The lurid cover of One Lonely Night has a naked 'white' woman hanging from her wrists from a rope hanging from a ceiling. In the story, she's being brutally interrogated by some commies. We all know that commies love torturing pretty 'white' women - I mean it's not like they fought against nazis or anything, they're just low criminals & all that talk of economic justice & fairness & suchlike is just a smokescreen to cover up their natural sordidness. Thank GOD for detective Mike Hammer.

Well, as the reader can no doubt tell, I don't have much respect for Mickey Spillane. I always wondered at John Zorn's choosing him to name an album after. The record's great but why Spillane? Why not Hammett? Why not Chandler? Why not Highsmith? Why not Ellroy? They're all much more interesting writers, more realistic, less politically insidious, even more 'hard-boiled'. It's hard not to conclude that Zorn isn't very literate. And if I didn't already think Spillane was a hack, now that I've read Sapper Spillane strikes me as an unoriginal hack (is it possible to be an original one?) b/c Sapper's Bulldog Drummond is a strong candidate for flagrant precursor to Spillane's Mike Hammer.

I got interested in the Drummond character b/c I picked up 3 DVDs on sale for a buck apiece or thereabouts from a local bkstore. All hail obsolescence, right?! Thanks to it, I can pick up copies of all the stuff that's beneath the purchasing habits of all those people who're being led by the noses to keep up w/ the iJoeses [sic]. I checked out Bulldog Drummond's Revenge (1937, 55 minutes), Bulldog Drummond Escapes (1937, 67 minutes), & Bulldog Drummond's Bride (1939, 57 minutes). I found them fast-moving & funny & I was entertained. What I didn't find in them was the anti-Semitism & anti-Communism of the bks.

"Jack Buchanan, the debonair song-and-dance man, played Bulldog Drummond in The Third Round (1925), but he was not the first screen Drummond. This distinction goes to English matinée idol Carlyle Blackwell who played the character in the 1922 movie, Bulldog Drummond. However, it wasn't until the advent of the talking cinema that the screen incarnation of Hugh Bulldog Drummond took off, and for about a decade from 1929 there was a spate of Drummond movies.

"In 1929 Ronald Colman, perhaps the best screen Drummond, took the role in Bulldog Drummond, based on the first novel. Colman returned in 1934 in Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back.

"During the Thirties old Bulldog was played on screen by Kenneth MacKenna, Ray Milland and John Howard, John Lodge and Ralph Richardson. In general the movies were lighter in tone than the novels and tended to use original plots, although Bulldog Drummond Escapes (1937), with Milland, was a reworking of the original novel, and Bulldog Drummond's Peril (1938), with Howard, was based on The Third Round. Arrest Bulldog Drummond (1938), again with Howard, was based on The Final Count." - p XIII

I find 22 Bulldog Drummond movies listed on Wikipedia dating from 1922 to 1969 starring 14 different actors in the lead role. This tendency for the movie studios to make multiple movies based around the same detective character over a period of decades yielded a shitload of Charlie Chan movies & witnessing the Drummond movies led to my revisiting Chan wch, in turn, led to my making a movie called "CHAN(geling)" about actor Warner Oland & yellowface.

SO, yeah, Sapper's Drummond is a 'man's man' - a boxer/ex-soldier who plunges right in & exposes the world-takeover schemes of the fiendish murderer/thief Carl Peterson. Peterson, a man of exquisite taste & no scruples, is a great organizer of both capitalists & commies alike. They work together, hand-in-hand, to bring the Brits to their knees thru sabotage & chaos. To be fair, the anti-Semitism is a side-note in contrast to the full-blown anti-Communism. Ironically, Sapper is a WWI vet whose feelings are strongly anti-"Boche" (a pejorative term for Germans) but whose politics cd've easily paved the way for nazism.

SO, when I was reading David Stuart Davies's intro I was wondering if I cd even get thru the damned thing:

"Drummond is a man's man in an era when that was what a man was supposed to be. He has all the virtues and vices of his class and time. He is scrupulously honest, trustworthy, fearless and loves a good fight; but he is also a casual and good-natured bigot. His attitude to foreigners and Jews would today have the political correctness brigade blowing a collective gasket." - p VIII

"The Bulldog Drummond stories serve not only as entertaining, racy, thud and blunder thrillers but also as an interesting, if not palatable, historical reflection of upper-class attitudes to foreigners and Jews at the time. It is interesting to note that this seam of xenophobia and anti-Semitism fades significantly after the first two books in the series as memories of the war begin to fade." - p IX

'thud and blunder"! Blood and thunder indeed.

"It is in Bulldog Drummond (1920) that our hero first encounters Carl Peterson when the villain is involved in a plot to deliver England into the hands of the evil Communists - purely for financial gain, of course, for Peterson is above politics. The story features the archetypal damsel-in-distress scenario and introduces Drummond to his future wife. / In The Black Gang (1922) the Communist revolutionaries return and receive even harsher treatment from Drummond & Co.". - p XI

Silent weapons must've been all the rage in the 20s & 30s b/c Drummond & Chan & Mr. Moto stories all have their versions:

"He lingered for an instant, peering into the darkness and recovering his breath, when with a vicious phut something buried itself into the tree beside him. Drummond lingered no more; long years of experience left no doubt in his mind as to what that something was. / 'Compressed-air rifle — or electric,' he muttered to himself" - p 42

Bulldog does have a good sense of humor, there's alotof tricksterism here, & that's one of the saving graces of the stories that help counterbalance the aristocratic taking-for-granted-of-privilege & other such socio-political naiveties. He fools arch-criminal Peterson into kidnapping a man disguised as the intended victim & then presents him w/ a bill for the trouble he's gone to. It's wonderful as poetic justice:

"'What's this —— jest?' he howled furiously. 'And this damned bandage all covered with red ink?'

"'You must ask our friend here, Mullings,' said Hugh. 'He's got a peculiar sense of humour. Anyway, he's got the bill in his hand.'

"In silence they watched Peterson open the paper and read the contents, while the girl leant over his shoulder.

"To Mr Peterson, The Elms, Godalming.
.................................................£...s...d.
"To hire of one demobilised soldier.............................................5...0...0
To making him drunk (in this item present
strength and cost of drink and said soldier's
capacity must be allowed for)................................................5...0...0
To bottle of red ink.................................................0...0...1
To shock to system..............................................10...0...1

"Total..............................................£20...0...1" - p 59

&, of course, Drummond has daring - but then it's easy to have daring when you're a fictional character - the author doesn't necessarily have to have daring in 'real' life. However, it seems to me that the author must have a sense of humor in 'real' life in order for his character to have it.

"In the days when Drummond had been a platoon commander, he had done many dangerous things. The ordinary joys of the infantry subaltern's life — such as going over the top, and carrying out raids — had not proved sufficient for his appetite. He had specialized in peculiar stunts of his own: stunts over which his men formed their own conclusions, and worshipped him accordingly." - p 65

But then we get back to his commie-demonizing:

"'I know not what this young man has done: I care less. In Russia such trifles matter not. He has the appearance of a bourgeois, therefore he must die. Did we not kill thousands — aye, tens of thousands of his kidney, before we obtained the great freedom? Are we not going to do the same in this accursed country?' His voice rose to the shrill, strident note of the typical tub-thumper. 'What is this wretched man,' he continued, waving a hand wildly at Hugh, 'that he should interrupt the great work for one brief second? Kill him now — throw him in a corner, and let us proceed.'

"He sat down again, amidst a further murmur of approval, in which Hugh joined heartily.

"'Splendid,' he murmured. 'A Magnificent peroration. Am I right, sir, in assuming that you are what is vulgarly known as a Bolshevist?'

"The man turned his sunken eyes, glowing with the burning fires of fanaticism, on Drummond.

"'I am one of those who are fighting for the freedom of the world,' he cried harshly,' for the right to live of the proletariat, The workers were the bottom dogs in Russia till they killed the rulers. Now — they rule, and the money they earn goes into their own pockets, not those of incompetent snobs.'" - p 108

Strangely, having "sunken eyes" seems to be some sort of indicator of insanity - &, of course, as a "Bolshevist" the man is a 'fanatic'. What I wonder is: why isn't Drummond also a fanatic? He certainly meets the criteria as much as any of the other characters.

"'Have you ever seen a woman skinned alive?' he howled wildly, thrusting his face forward at Hugh. 'Have you ever seen men killed with the knotted rope; burned almost to death and then set free, charred and mutilated wrecks? but what does it matter provided only freedom comes, as it has in Russia. Tomorrow it will be England; in a week the world . . . Even if we have to wade through rivers of blood up to our throats, nevertheless it will come. And in the end we shall have a new earth.'

"Hugh lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair.

"'It seems a most alluring programme,' he murmured. 'And I shall have much pleasure in recommending you as manager of a babies' crèche. I feel certain the little ones would take to you instinctively.'" - p 109

Let's keep in mind this is fiction. Is there any historical record whatsoever of a Bolshevik speech in wch the sufferings of humans are treated so cavalierly? Perhaps there are, I wdn't know, I'm certainly not enuf of an historian on the subject. &, of course, this is supposedly what Bolsheviks were saying behind-the-scenes, not necessarily for public record. If there is such an historical record, I'd be grateful if any reader were to call my attn to it in a comment here but I want specifics not some vague generalizations that 'we all know is true'. Keep in mind that there is historical record of big business's uncaring attitude for human life: take the famous Ford Pinto "Cost Benefit Analysis" in wch it was decided that it was more cost-effective to leave a dangerous gas tank in the design of the Pinto than it was to fix it:

"One of the tools that Ford used to argue for the delay [in changes to the Pinto gas tank design] was a "cost-benefit analysis" of altering the fuel tanks. According to Ford's estimates, the unsafe tanks would cause 180 burn deaths, 180 serious burn injuries, and 2,100 burned vehicles each year. It calculated that it would have to pay $200,000 per death, $67,000 per injury, and $700 per vehicle, for a total of $49.5 million. However, the cost of saving lives and injuries ran even higher: alterations would cost $11 per car or truck, which added up to $137 million per year. Essentially, Ford argued before the government that it would be cheaper just to let their customers burn!" - http://www.engineering.com/Library/ArticlesPage/tabid/85/ArticleID/166/Ford-Pint...

That's pretty fucking callous if you ask me.

My inclination is to think that "Sapper", an aristocrat/officer despite the lower-ranking implication of his pen-name, is expressing the anxiety of his class about the 'threat' of the arrival of economic justice in England. Bulldog Drummond is a man of independent means - in other words, he's rich, he can buy & command at a significantly high level in the established hierarchy, he doesn't work for a living, he goes to his club to eat, he has an expensive car (certainly not the equivalent of a Pinto), he has servants who're duly obedient & respectful, etc, etc..

In other words, he's the perfect person to be terrified of a revolution: what if he had to work? What if the work he did was low-paying, health-destroying, demeaning? What if he cdn't support his family, if his wife were an addict & a prostitute, if he were completely criminalized just for trying to survive? These are the niceties that "Sapper" completely ignores - in Drummond-world, there's no reason whatsoever, apparently, for any working class person to be disaffected - being a servant for Drummond, eg, comes natural to people of lesser abilities & intelligence & spunk & anyone rebelling against the status quo that supported the author & his alter-ego the Bulldog is obviously a naive dupe, greedy, a criminal, whatever - anything but a person w/ sincere insights into the destruction wrought in most people's lives by the established order.

The arch-criminal, Carl Peterson, is the only one who's given much respect b/c he manipulates people in much the same way the aristocratic elites do - just as a 'bad guy' instead of as the supposed 'good guys' that the aristocrats are represented as being. &, yet, what examination of British aristocratic wealth (or any other such wealth) isn't going to dig up a history of wealth built on slavery, overthrow of existing social structures, etc, etc?! There's more than a little self-delusion & hypocrisy going on in "Sapper"'s depiction of his hero. &, of course, anarchists get lumped into the enemy camp:

"[']You say he was with a crowd of revolutionaries last night. What do you mean exactly?'

"'Bolshevists, Anarchists, members of the Do-no-work-and-have-all-the-money Brigade,' answered Hugh. 'But excuse me a moment. Waiter.'

"A man who had been hovering round came up promptly." - p 139

This is where the subtext of "Sapper"'s adventures in La-La Land come to the fore for the attentive critical reader: "Anarchists, members of the Do-no-work-and-have-all-the-money Brigade"?!: here we have a 'hero' who certainly does-no-work-and-has-all-the-money but that's completely unacknowledged - & all his cronies are able to drop whatever they're doing to rush off into adventure at a moment's notice. I'm an anarchist & I think I can claim w/ substantial historical accuracy that many, if not most, anarchists are people who work, that in the 40 yrs preceding the writing of these Bulldog stories many or most of these anarchists wd've not only worked but wd've worked in factories from age 6 or so on precisely to support the completely luxurious lifestyles of the Bulldog Drummonds of the world. & if these anarchists wd've taken off work to rush off to adventure they'd know for sure that they'd lose their jobs & have to survive somehow in a way that they wdn't have to resort to if they were being pd a living wage & treated decently by their truly greedy bosses.

Somehow, tho, in the highly delusional world of these stories, the aristocrats aren't capitalists - what this means is that all the dirty work is far behind them in their PR-touched-up histories & that their nasty shit is done by armies that they control ('good) instead of insurrections that they don't ('bad'). A visiting American sums it up nicely for the aristocratic PR POV:

"[']One gigantic syndicalist strike all over your country — that's what Peterson's playing for, I'll stake my bottom dollar. How he's doing it is another matter. But he's in with the big financiers: and he's using the tub-thumping Bolshies as tools. Gad! It's a big scheme' — he puffed twice at his cigar — 'a durned big scheme. Your little old country, Captain, is, saving one, the finest on God's earth; but she's a little bit sicker than a good many people think. But I reckon Peterson's cure won't do any manner of good, excepting to himself and those blamed capitalists who are putting up the dollars.'" - pp 140-141

In Bulldog propaganda a "syndicalist strike" can only happen as a result of the machinations of a criminal mastermind - not as a result of workers actually trying to improve their debased conditions - & if there are any capitalists who stand to benefit by this destabilization they're certainly not the aristocrats AND any 'sickness' of the English socio-political conditions isn't a result of failures & greed on the part of the ruling elites!! 'Heaven' forbid that such an accusing analysis be turned toward Drummond & his ilk. Phrasing things in this way is a strategy for convincing the reader that if they're dissatisfied w/ the capitalists that're suppressing their wages or whatnot that they're actually in league w/ the Blosheviks instead of in opposition to them - as wd make the most sense.

In other words, let the aristocratic superhero, Bulldog Drummond, take care of the problem - don't be joining in solidarity w/ yr fellow workers & trying to take control - after all, Drummond's 'just like you': he speaks like the common man, he's not an intellectual, blah, blah.. This is a message that persists to this day in movies like The East, even tho that's more sympathetic to anarchist critiques, where in the end the anarchists shd leave everything well enuf alone & leave the cleaning up to the rogue superhero law enforcement types (who wdn't actually do shit or even be aware of what's going on w/o the anarchists).… (plus d'informations)

Signalé

tENTATIVELY | 2 autres critiques | Apr 3, 2022 |

The third round par Sapper

Of its time but at fun story.

Signalé

nadineeg | 3 autres critiques | Mar 17, 2022 |

Bulldog Drummond par McNeile Sapper

A fairly decent kind of detective/spy thriller about an ex-army guy fighting a foreign plot in england. Ok, but i'm not likely to read any of the follow up stories.

Signalé

wreade1872 | 6 autres critiques | Nov 28, 2021 |

The Black Gang par Sapper

Definitely dated, and often silly (not to mention occasionally offensive), still, this book has its occasional charms. Not the least of which is giving one an insight as to what the British (and American) book-buying public wanted in the mid-1920s. The blurb on the jacket of the edition I have says the book is an action-packed thriller "set in the 1920s," which is a bit misleading, when you consider when it was written.

Signalé

EricCostello | 1 autre critique | Sep 19, 2020 |

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