Bulldog Drummond is a 1920 thriller novel by "Sapper" (real name Herman Cyril McNeile).
Captain Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond is finding life boring now that
the War is over. He meets an attractive young woman whose father has become entangled in an international conspiracy to overthrow the British Empire...
The novel had over a dozen sequels and inspired around two dozen films. The film series had its last gasp in the
1960s; by then, it was transparently attempting to attract the audience of the
Bond movies.
The series was popular in its time and influenced the development of the pulp thriller. It was so popular, it inspired parodies:
P. G. Wodehouse's
Leave it to Psmith includes a protracted and not un
affectionate parody of the first novel's opening. But it has aged badly because of its heroes' casual nationalist and racist bigotry. Modern references (as in
Bullshot,
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and
Kim Newman's "
Pitbull Brittan") are most often
bitingly satirical in the vein of "They don't make 'em like that any more
and the world is better for it".
Novels by Herman Cyril Mc Neile
- Bulldog Drummond (1920)
- The Black Gang (1922)
- The Third Round (1924)
- The Final Count (1926)
- The Female of the Species (1928).
- Temple Tower (1929).
- The Return of Bulldog Drummond (1932).
- Knock-Out (1933)
- Bulldog Drummond at Bay (1935)
- The Challenge (1937). Swan song for the original author, who died in 1937.
Novels by Gerard Fairlie
- Bulldog Drummond on Dartmoor (1938)
- Bulldog Drummond Attacks (1939)
- Captain Bulldog Drummond (1945)
- Bulldog Drummond Stands Fast (1947)
- Hands Off Bulldog Drummond (1949)
- Calling Bulldog Drummond (1951)
- The Return of the Black Gang (1954)
Novels by Henry Raymond
- Deadlier than the Male (1966)
- Some Girls Do (1969)
Bulldog Drummond provides examples of:
- Arch-Enemy
- Big Bad Duumvirate: In the first novel, Carl Peterson, the most dangerous man in Europe, and Henry Lakington, who was the most dangerous man in England until Peterson stepped off the Calais ferry.
- Bond Villain Stupidity: Toward the end of the first novel, Drummond is captured by the villains. Peterson points out that he has a talent for getting out of hopeless situations, and is all for killing him on the spot, but Lakington refuses to give him a quick and simple death, and insists on keeping him alive until they have time to subject him to something painful and drawn-out. Which of course gives Drummond time to escape.
- Contemplative Boss: Drummond and Peterson have a conversation in Peterson's lair where Peterson is looking out the window with his back to Drummond; Drummond considers trying to jump him, but realises in time that Peterson is only pretending to look out the window, and is actually watching Drummond's reflection in the glass.
- Dark Mistress
- Death Trap: Lakington's house has several built in.
- Dirty Communists
- Femme Fatale: Irma
- Fun with Foreign Languages: Hugh Drummond attempting, with a "microscopic" knowledge of French, to explain to a customs official how he came to be in France. Goes on for a whole page before his sidekick, who does speak French, stops laughing long enough to straighten things out.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Lakington
- In Harm's Way: Hugh Drummond
Demobilized officer, finding peace incredibly tedious, would welcome diversion. Legitimate, if possible; but crime, if of a comparatively humorous description, no objection. Excitement essential.
- In Which a Trope Is Described
- Make it Look Like an Accident
- Master of Disguise: Peterson
- No, Mr. Bond, I Expect You to Dine
- No Name Given: "Carl Peterson" is only the latest of a long string of aliases. Nobody knows his real name.
- Not My Driver: At one point, Drummond takes the place of Lakington's chauffeur/getaway driver, not to abduct Lakington but so that he can get into the villains' lair.
- Outlived Its Creator: The novel series outlasted McNeile by over a decade.
- Poisoned Weapons: At one point, Drummond is attacked by "some sort of native" with a blowpipe and poisoned darts.
- Spotting The Thread: Drummond is able to recognise the Comte de Guy as Peterson in disguise, though he looks completely different, because he has the same unconscious mannerism when he's feeling impatient.
- T-Word Euphemism
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