الفهرس 
THE COLD WAR AND THE RISE OF THE ‘ACE OF SPIES’, JAMES BOND: AN OVERVIEWOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
During the unstable era that followed the devastating Second World War, known as the Cold War era, a particular genre of literature stood out as a significantly popular literary witness and commentary on the happenings of that turbulent epoch: the spy thriller. The most remarkable writer in this genre was, and interestingly remains, undisputedly Scottish author Ian Fleming, the creator of the legendary British Secret Service agent, James Bond.
The thesis aims at examining how Ian Fleming managed to project, comment on, and alter the prominent anxieties of Cold War Britain, namely the reinstatement of the notion of nationhood, the preservation of the British imperial and racial codes, and the maintenance of the codes of gender and the definition of masculinity and femininity. The thesis is, accordingly, divided into four chapters and a conclusion. Respective critical works of Michel Foucault, among other critical views, are used to examine the James Bond canon.
Chapter I: “The Cold War and the Rise of the ‘Ace of Spies’, James Bond: An Overview”, traces the beginnings and development of the spy fiction and its significance to the Cold War era. The chapter also introduces the writing career of Ian Fleming, and emphasises the rise of the iconic British agent, James Bond; along with reasons for his immense popularity and manifestation in the British society, as well as his endurance worldwide, in comparison to other fictional spy figures.
Chapter II: “License to Save Britain”, is a critical examination of the unprecedented celebration and endorsement of the notion of a ‘licence to kill’ by an entire nation. The chapter also explores Fleming’s efforts to revive the ideal of nationhood in a society that was undergoing considerable frustration after the war, even if it were by creating yet another agent of surveillance, or a cog in a power machine working on maintaining the status quo and the codes of blind loyalty to the ruler. The chapter’s novelty lies primarily in incorporating Michel Foucault’s critical theories in the mechanics of power apparatuses to vindicate and preserve their hegemony over the subjects, towards an understanding of Fleming’s celebrated ‘world picture’. Other critical views are also employed to examine the Bondian canon’s devised method of maintaining the national concepts in Great Britain at that peculiar moment in her history.
Chapter III: “Master 007 and ‘The Crime de la Crime’”, deals with Ian Fleming’s attitude towards the British imperial codes and his ethnic and racialist views as depicted in the Bondian canon. Several critics have been preoccupied with the allocation of the Bondian saga’s racial codes. This chapter, however, balances the ambivalent critical theories, in an attempt to come to a firm understanding of how such strikingly ethnic and racial imperialist dogmas as presented in the canon managed to reach the British readership and maintain their strength through the James Bond phenomenon. Michel Foucault’s critical views on creating the idea of the ‘other’ is also incorporated here to appreciate the secret agent’s methods of alienating, sentencing and punishing the ‘othered’ villain, in congruity with the British Secret Service power apparatus.
Chapter IV: “The James Bondage”, studies the features of ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ in the British society of the Cold War, and how the western institutional gender codes were propagated effectively through the character of James Bond who was, and is still, considered a prototype of British manhood; regardless of Fleming’s notorious creation of yet another ‘phenomenon’, namely the ‘Bond girl ’. Michel Foucault’s critical study in this field is utilised here for a closer examination of how Fleming managed, through popular literature, to maintain traditional sexual ideologies in Britain, at a time when the British society was shifting rapidly towards modernist conceptualisation – at least as was propagated widely through the prominent media forces of the time.
The conclusion stresses the significant role of the timeless literary figure, James Bond, and his phenomenal ability to, not only convey the demands, ailments, and sometimes solutions to the concerns of the British society of the Cold War, but also the considerable influence he had on various fields of social development and media industry, not just in Great Britain, but also worldwide.