The thirty-nine steps
The thirty-nine steps ( English The Thirty-Nine Steps ) is a spy novel by the Scottish writer John Buchan from 1915. The German-language first edition was published in 1967 by Edward Gorey illustrated by Diogenes Verlag . The novel was made into a film several times, first in 1935 by Alfred Hitchcock .
action
The first-person narrator Richard Hannay has spent most of his life in Rhodesia and has been living in London for a few weeks now . Just as he was beginning to get bored in the big city, one evening in May 1914 he was visited by the American Franklin P. Scudder, a neighbor he had only known by sight. He tells him a hair-raising story: on his many trips he came across an anarchist conspiracy with the aim of murdering the Greek Prime Minister Karolides during his state visit to London and triggering a war. The conspirators for their part had tracked him down and he faked his death. He asks Hannay to hide him until June 15, the day of the planned attack. The next day a body is found in Scudder's apartment, and Hannay is willing to believe him the whole story. When he returns to his apartment four days later, he finds Scudder's body with a knife in his back.
Hannay fears, on the one hand, that the police will mistake him for Scudder's murderer, on the other hand, that the conspirators want to eliminate him as an accomplice to their plot. He feels obliged to save the Greek prime minister in Scudder's place. With the uniform of a milkman, he can escape from his house, which is already under surveillance. He decides to hide in Galloway until the attack and takes a train to Scotland.
Once there, he quickly notices that both the police and the conspirators have tracked him down. Hannay begins an escape through the sparsely populated, bare heather and moor landscape, which is made more difficult by the fact that his opponents have an airplane. In a quiet phase, he manages to crack the code in Scudder's notebook. The text does not correspond to what Scudder told him: The murder of Karolides is just a distraction and the war would be inevitable anyway. A German group of agents by the name of Schwarzer Stein wants to get hold of the British fleet plans, which are to be coordinated with France on June 15. Next several times Thirty-nine steps mentioned, a term that remains a mystery for Hannay, as well as in the context tide at 10:17 pm .
In an accident that he caused with a car that he stole from his pursuers, he met the local politician Sir Harry. He trusts him and tells him everything he has learned from Scudder or from his notebook. Sir Harry writes a letter to his godfather Sir Walter, who works at the Foreign Office and with whose help Hannay can get in touch with government officials.
Hannay wants to hide in the Scottish wasteland for a while before he makes his way back to London. But he is discovered by his pursuers and has to flee again. He is looking for protection in the house of the German spies, of all places. They lock him in a storage room, from which he can escape using a self-made bomb. He is hiding with a helpful road worker and recovering from injuries sustained in the explosion.
Two weeks later he is at Sir Walters country house in Berkshire . While they are talking about the matter, Sir Walter is called and receives the news that Karolides has been murdered. Hannay learns about the meeting of the French Royer with representatives of the British Admiralty in London, at which the British fleet plans are to be discussed.
Meanwhile in London he is convinced that the black stone will strike at this meeting. He rushes to the house of the meeting and recognizes the alleged First Sea Lord , who was the first to leave the congregation, one of the men who held him prisoner in Scotland. Thanks to the doppelganger's photographic memory, the fleet's plans are at risk if the spy escapes.
With the information from Scudder's notebook, Hannay can unravel the spies' plan. They want to leave England on a ship that can only come to the coast with the high tide at 10:17. A staircase with thirty-nine steps marks the spot. With the help of the tide table and the local knowledge of a Coast Guard officer, they found the location on the Kent coast , a house on a cliff with stairs to the beach. A yacht is already waiting at sea. Two of the three spies can be overpowered in the house, the third can still get to the yacht, but it is already in British hands. The secret of the fleet plans is kept.
background
John Buchan wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps starting in August 1914 when he was recovering from an illness. When the First World War broke out , Canada entered the war on August 4th, he was too old and sick to join the army. Instead, he worked in the War Propaganda Bureau , finished his novel and published it in installments in the summer of 1915 in Blackwood's Magazine , in October 1915 he appeared as a book.
The novel is the first in a series with the character Richard Hannay, whose model was Edmund Ironside , a British spy during the Second Boer War .
Adaptations
The novel was filmed three times for the cinema, first in 1935 by Alfred Hitchcock , who handled the original very freely, then in 1959 by Ralph Thomas , a color remake of the Hitchcock film. The 1978 film adaptation by Don Sharp is more based on the novel. In 2008 the BBC released a television adaptation .
In the 2005 theatrical adaptation , Patrick Barlow's espionage story was rewritten into a comedy.
Furthermore, several radio play versions of the novel were produced by the BBC .
Web links
proof
- ↑ a b The Thirty-Nine Steps at the John Buchan Society
- ↑ On the first edition ( Memento of the original from October 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Geoffrey Powell John Buchan's Richard Hannay on HistoryToday
- ↑ The 39 Steps in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- ↑ John Buchan - radio plays
