How boredom begat James Bond

It is sobering to think that if Ann Rothermere had been a less enthusiastic painter, James Bond might never have existed.

In January 1952, Lady Rothermere and Bond’s creator Ian Fleming were on holiday at Goldeneye, his house in Jamaica. Tension crackled in the air. He and Ann had been lovers since 1939. Her husband, Viscount Rothermere, chairman of Associated Newspapers, had recently divorced her. The news had reached the gossip pages of the Daily Express. The scandalous couple had discussed marriage — with some urgency because Ann was pregnant — but Fleming’s expectations of marital bliss were slim. ‘I can promise you nothing,’ he told her. ‘I have not an admirable character. I have no money. I have no title. Marriage will be entirely what you can make it.’ And now the day of the wedding — 24 March — approached like a tropical storm cloud.

Fleming worried about his age (43) and the chest pains that would lead to a heart attack in 1961.