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The 39 Steps by John Buchan


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Funnily enough, the only one of the 3 film versions I haven't seen is the 1959 one! Apparently it's a remake of the 1935 film starring Robert Donat, and if so it will have very little in common with the plot of the novel. The 1978 film starring Robert Powell as Richard Hannay is much closer to the John Buchan original.

 

The book itself is fun. Someone (Julian Symons, I think, but I'm not sure) once wrote an article about the different types of detective fiction, and he used The 39 Steps as an example of what he called 'Now Get Out Of That.' That's about the best description of the plot I can think of - it's excellent escapism.

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I've read the book (which I'd certainly recommend). Read it off the back of enjoying the Robert Powell film version and was curious how close it was to the book. Think I've seen all of the film adaptations (Hitchcock's 1935, the 1959 you've seen and 1978 one) - the most faithful is probably Powell's - but all of them use the basic premise of the book well and are enjoyable in their own right.

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I read this last year and enjoyed it. Here's what I wrote in my review:

 

This is an enjoyable read that requires the reader to somewhat suspend their disbelief because there are so many amazing coincidences and escapes that are so conveniently timed that it becomes a little distracting. However, because this is one of the original thrillers, I can forgive all that and enjoy it for the fun read that it was - not too heavy or taxing. Recommended.

 

I haven't seen any movie versions yet but I'm on the lookout for them, particularly Hitchcock's take, although I understand it's fairly different to the book. According to IMDB, there is a new version slated for release next year, although there doesn't appear to be many details available (it's on the 'back-burner'), so who knows when it'll come out.

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It's by John Buchan, not Richard Buchanan. I'll amend the title for you. :lol:

 

I read this several years ago and thought it was great. I've been meaning to read more of his.

 

My Mum has 'Prester John' on her bookcase, but its an old hardbacked version so I've not picked it up, but I might look at it next time I go over.

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I read it, along with almost all the other Buchan novels, and certainly all the Richard Hannay ones, as a teenager. They were fantastic teenage fodder, if slightly old fashioned.

 

As mentioned above, it depends a fair bit on coincidence, but that's pretty much par for the course on that kind of book. Great adventure drive, though, which is why it's good for kids.

 

The old-fashionedness comes in things like an obsession with, say, stag hunting. Something that was fairly standard for wealthy men in 1912 (actually, the stag hunting may be a different one of the Hannay novels, but the attitude is there through them all), but seems deeply archaic for most of us now.

Edited by Freewheeling Andy
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  • 3 months later...

I loved the 39 steps, absolutely thrilling read from the beginning to the end. The things is, given that it was written, what...? 60 years ago? It reads very much like a contemporary thriller in terms of structure and pacing, and yet of course, it obviously has the language and values of a different era.

 

I have tried reading other Buchan stuff like Prestor John, b-u-u-u-t, one finds ones self nashing teeth at some of the language and cringing at some prett un-pc values. But then, you know, you have to consider when it was written. In a similar way that accusations of rascism by Tolkein (orks being black, good guys being aryan/blond etc) is too easy a shot, I'd hesitate to level the same sort of thing at Buchan.

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Funnily enough, I almost went to see the Hitchcock version at my local cinema this afternoon. The '35 and '78 versions are both very good, but as much as I like Kenneth Moore, his version is the worst by a long way. Another book, in a seemingly endless list, that I really should read one day!

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 4 years later...

I hope it's not too late (Has this thread been put to bed?) to say something here. I was given this by my parents for my fourteenth birthday: it's great stuff. Heart throbbing, derring-do adventure, and one of the books that I will always remember as unputdownable, and one of the books that I believe gave me the thirst. I'm now an avid reader: mostly historical fiction, European History, WWI literature. When a book creates a desire in you to read more, it has to be applauded. Greenmantle and Mr. Standfast came along shortly after, followed by Kim & The Man Who Would Be King. Then came everything Peter Hopkirk has written: books that take my breath away. Later reads of Richard Hannay's exploits did allow me to see how at points the storyline can become quite fantastic, but with a young mind I was absolutely captured. So thank you Mum and thank you Dad (great readers themselves) and thank you John Buchan.

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It's where I started, Chisilbeach (it's the first in the Richard Hannay series of books). However, I tend to think you might be a little longer in the tooth than I was at that time. I still, at the ripe old age of 23, think the Hannay adventures are great fun to read (I've read them all more than twice). And, I do struggle to find contemporary work that I can even slightly believe in (once I see how a plot which we are being asked to believe has become fantasy rather than fiction I lose a great deal of interest). There is happenstance, coincidence, in life: there is a surprising amount, at times, in the exploits John Buchan penned. Who am I to question that. The brazen bluff and courage that saw many in Hannay's day win favour - walk away with the spoils - is without doubt a fact. I point you to: The Great Game. On Secret Service East of Constantinople. Shooting Leave: Spying Out Central Asia in the Great Game. And then whence those works are enjoyed, Greenmantle, another Hannay escapade. One must of course accept that bravado and bluster could win the day, at such a time: how many people in Turkey had ever met someone from Holland, from South Africa, from England, heard a person from such places speak German, heard a German from Hamburg speak German, heard a German from Munich speak German, seen a passport, seen a letter giving right of passage and stamped by the German High Command?

 

The Great Game, by Peter Hopkirk is the most heart pounding thriller I have ever read and will ever read, I'm sure. And that, of course, is far from fiction.

 

I may be a lone wolf, out there sniffing the dirt, scraping around, for a great adventure thriller that I can believe might just happen: I hope not.

 

My tuppence worth.

Edited by FelisT2
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