A study in Adventure Fiction

The adventure literature; (novels, novellas, sagas, ballads etc.) have been full of references to the protagonist being a brave dashing man. Have been that is; till Ian Fleming’s “Casino Royal” which brought James Bond to the picture. This change, I believe is due to 2 reasons: the cold war [of course] and a historical truth.

The First World War is a clear demarcation in the way battles are fought. Imperial nations went to war assuming that the better men; and hence the better nation, would triumph .They all realized in 1919 that machined had triumphed men on the battle front.

Sure, before the Great War, the protagonist may have had a secret identity, but when he went to work, he was anything but covert. The three musketeers do more sword fights than the number of times they charge the muskets. [Something they are actually trained to do].That of course is partly because, unlike today’s snipers guns, muskets were inaccurate and useful only in groups. Also nobody likes a hero who shoots from far like a coward when he can dispatch his enemy with his sword.

But the war ended such ideas. Cavalry rushes behind ‘my captain’and patriotic last stands were no longer useful. The writers needed a character that did something significant alone. A HERO. Where could they look at? Generals were old and thus unattractive and unromantic. Monarchs were powerless .Scientific research had already become institutionalized (so no young wiz kid developing a super weapon or super cure).One candidate was the reporter .Tintin started out as a young journalist who enters and exposes the fallacies of the Soviet Union. The other option, which proved to be more useful was the spy; the silent hero, risking everything, saving the world from its new found “W.M.D”s and most importantly, getting women to swoon to his charms. The spy and his derivative, the hit men have dominated the adventure genre of books and movies. [Indiana Jones is fantasy] till the late 90s.The kids/ teen fiction still had the old version protgonist, but then they are actually detective in nature.

Nowadays, there seems to be a transition back to the old model .The themes are: the medical man/ woman [who of course is characterized in a way highly desirable to the respective opposite sex] who stops a bio terror attack, the lone expert who fights a giant institution etc.