Eric Ambler

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Eric Clifford Ambler OBE (born June 28, 1909 in London , † October 22, 1998 ibid) was a British writer . He is considered one of the founders of the thriller .

Life

Eric Ambler was the son of Alfred Ambler and Amy Madeline Ambler, née Andrews. The father worked first as an advertising agent, then as an advertising manager at a factory in south London. He has also performed in music halls with a vocal troupe, including his wife, since the First World War . After attending Colfes' Grammar School in Lewisham / South London, Eric Ambler began studying engineering at Northampton Engineering College in North London in 1925, which he dropped out after a year to work as a technical intern in a factory. During this time, the first literary texts were written, including a manuscript for a novel. From 1928 Ambler followed his father into the advertising industry, initially in the large US advertising agency Dorland, later as a director in an independent advertising agency. In the early days of incandescent lamp production, an electrical factory had brought a new bulb onto the market that clearly emitted insufficient light. Ambler invented the name Mondscheinlicht and triggered such a rush on the faulty designs that the company was able to sell all of its stocks.

He had his first literary success in 1936 with The Dark Frontier (dt. The dark border district ). Since a publisher offered him a contract for five more novels, he gave up his job in the advertising agency in 1937 to devote himself entirely to writing, living temporarily in France and the USA. In his novel Cause for Alarm (dt. Cause for anxiety ) he described in 1938 the smuggling paths between the then fascist Italy and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia so realistic that he by the British Foreign Office was asked to provide further information. However, Ambler had only done a thorough research and studied the commercially available maps very carefully. In particular, his fifth novel The Mask of Dimitrios (Eng. The Mask of Dimitrios ) is considered one of the milestones and a classic of the thriller genre .

In 1939 he married the American fashion illustrator Louise Crombie, whom he had met in Paris .

In 1940 Ambler joined the British Royal Artillery as a driver , completed officer training and was later transferred to the Army Cinematograph Service . In this newly created department, he worked together with the young Peter Ustinov and was responsible for various military reconnaissance and feature films. From 1943 he served as a British liaison officer in Italy and shot, among others, propaganda films for the Allies with John Huston . After his retirement from the army at the end of the war, a career as a screenwriter followed, which took him to Hollywood in 1957 . By 1959 he had written over a dozen screenplays for English and American productions. His script adaptation for the film The Great Atlantic was nominated for an Oscar in 1953. Most successful is probably his script for A Night to Remember (Eng. The last night of the Titanic ), a film adaptation of the Titanic catastrophe , which can still exist today in its sharp social character. Ambler divorced his wife Louise in 1958 and married British screenwriter Joan Harrison , a close associate of British film director Alfred Hitchcock .

From 1950 to 1958 he wrote five thrillers with Charles Rodda under the pseudonym Eliot Reed , well crafted but not particularly sensational. His first novel under his own name after the Second World War was Judgment on Deltchev (Eng. The Deltschev case ), in which he settled with the show trials in communist Eastern Europe. Subsequently, a further eleven thrillers appeared on average every three years. In contrast to John le Carré , for example , Ambler did not limit himself to the classic East-West conflict , but took up issues very early on that were only discussed in public much later and very controversially: Neocolonialism in The Night-Comers (1956, Ger. Visit at night ); international arms trade in Passage of Arms (1959, German arms smuggling ); the Palestine conflict in The Levanter (1972, Der Levantiner ); or money laundering and tax avoidance in Send No More Roses (1977, Ger. Please no more roses ). His protagonists are almost always "normal people". They get into a dangerous situation that they themselves cannot understand. This constellation serves Ambler to show the current conflicts of his time and their effects on everyday life. A short, laconic, but precise language is used for this.

In 1969 Eric Ambler moved to Clarens in Switzerland. In 1985 he published his autobiography under the ambiguous title Here lies (“Here lies” or “Here lies”), followed in 1993 by the commemorative volume Who killed Blagden Cole? Life and crime stories . In 1987 he returned to London, where he died on October 22, 1998. His second wife, Joan, had died in 1994.

Awards

Works

Novels of the first period

  • 1936 The Dark Frontier - The Dark Frontier District.
  • 1937 Uncommon Danger - US title: Background to Danger .
  • 1938 Cause for Alarm - cause for unrest.
  • 1938 Epitaph for a Spy - The Hour of the Spy.
    • German by Peter Fischer; Fischer Frankfurt am Main 1963;
    • since 1979 under the title Obituary of a Spy at Diogenes Zurich;
    • New translation by Matthias Fienbork; Diogenes Zurich 2002; ISBN 978-3-257-23250-9 .
  • 1939 The Mask of Dimitrios - US title: A Coffin for Dimitrios - The Mask of Dimitrios filmed by Jean Negulesco in 1944 ( The Mask of Dimitrios )
  • 1940 Journey Into Fear - Fear travels with you.
    • German by Walter Hertenstein, Diogenes Zurich 1975;
    • New translation by Matthias Fienbork, Diogenes Zurich 1996; ISBN 978-3-257-20181-9 .

Novels of the second period

Short stories

  • Waiting for Orders (short stories from the years 1930–1940, including The Army of Shadows , The Intrusions of Dr. Czissar , The Blood Bargain )

Autobiography

  • 1985 Here Lies - Ambler by Ambler. An autobiography
  • 1993 The Story So Far - Who Killed Blagden Cole? Life and crime stories

Novels published under the pseudonym Eliot Reed with Charles Rodda

  • 1951 Skytip
  • 1951 Tender To Danger (US title); also: Tender to Moonlight (English title, 1952)
  • 1953 The Maras Affair
  • 1954 Charter to Danger
  • 1958 Passport to Panic

Filmography

Literary template
  • 1942: Journey Into Fear - Directed by Norman Foster / Orson Welles
  • 1943: Spy on the Orient Express ( Background to Danger ) - Director: Raoul Walsh - based on the novel "Uncommon Danger"
  • 1944: Hotel Reserve - directed by Victor Hanbury, Lance Comfort and Max Greene - based on the novel "Epitaph for a Spy"
  • 1944: The Mask of Dimitrios - Directed by Jean Negulesco
  • 1950: Highly Dangerous - Director: Roy Baker, also screenplay by Ambler - based on the novel "The Dark Frontier"
  • 1953: Epitaph for a Spy - GB / TV series in 6 parts, directed by Patrick Harvey
  • 1963: Epitaph for a Spy - GB / TV series in 4 parts, directed by Colin Jeavons
  • 1963: Topkapi
  • 1976: Journey Into Fear - Director: Daniel Mann
  • 1978: Ricatto Internazionale - TV series, directed by Dante Guardamagna - based on the novel The Intercom Conspiracy
  • 1984: Eine Kind von Zorn - TV film, directed by Uli Edel
  • 1989: The Care of Time - Movie made for TV, directed by John Davies
script
  • 1943: The New Lot - British propaganda film, screenplay with Peter Ustinov , directed by Carol Reed . (Ambler can also be seen here in a small role as a weapons instructor)
  • 1944: The Way Ahead - screenplay with Peter Ustinov, directed by Carol Reed
  • 1947: Twilight ( The October Man ) - Director: Roy Baker
  • 1949: The Passionate Friends - directed by David Lean - based on a novel by HG Wells
  • 1950: On the wrong track ( The Clouded Yellow ) - Director: Ralph Thomas
  • 1951: The Magic Box ( The Magic Box ) - Director: John Boulting - a novel by Ray Allister
  • 1951: Dakapo ( Encore ) - directed by Harold French , Pat Jackson and Anthony Pelissier - based on stories by William Somerset Maugham
  • 1952: The Cruel Sea ( The Cruel Sea ) - Director: Charles Frend - a novel by Nicholas Monsarrat
  • 1952: Der Irreserstehliche (The Card) - directed by Ronald Neame - based on a novel by Arnold Bennett
  • 1953: Rough Shoot - directed by Robert Parrish - based on a novel by Geoffrey Household
  • 1954: Flames over the Far East ( The Purple Plain )
  • 1954: Lease of Life - Director: Charles Frend
  • 1956: Yangtse Incident ( Yangtse Incident: The Story of HMS Amethyst ) - Director: Michael Anderson - a novel by Lawrence Earl
  • 1957: The Eye of the Truth - episode of the television series "Suspicion", directed by Robert Stevens
  • 1958: The Last Night of the Titanic ( A Night to Remember )
  • 1959: The death not fear ( The Wreck of the Mary Deare ) - Director: Michael Anderson - a novel by Hammond Innes
  • 1961: Mutiny on the Bounty ( Mutiny on the Bounty ) - (Ambler worked on the script with unnamed)
  • 1962: Act of Faith - TV film, directed by Bernard Girard - based on a story by Nicholas Montsarrat
  • 1971: Love Hate Love - Movie made for TV, directed by George McCowan

literature

  • Film critic cooperative (ed.): Eric Ambler (= film critic; vol. 26, 1982, no.12 = complete series; 312). Publisher Filmkritik, Munich 1982.
  • Gerd Haffmans (Ed.): About Eric Ambler. Testimonials from Alfred Hitchcock to Helmut Heissenbüttel (= Diogenes-TB; 20607). Diogenes, Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-257-20607-0 .
  • Ronald J. Ambrosetti: Eric Ambler (= Twayne's English authors series; 507). Twayne Publ. U. a., New York 1994, ISBN 0-8057-8369-5 .
  • Stefan Howald : Eric Ambler. A biography. Diogenes, Zurich 2002, ISBN 3-257-06325-3 .
  • Peter Lewis: Eric Ambler. Continuum, New York 1990, ISBN 0-8264-0444-8 .
  • Chapter: The Ambler Lesson. In: Jörg Fauser : Reading material. From Joseph Roth to Eric Ambler. New Critique Publishing House, Frankfurt a. M. 2003, ISBN 3-8015-0366-6 , pp. 201-207.

Documentation

  • Dangerous business. The world of Eric Ambler , TV-BRD 1987, director: Jutta Szostak.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Ambler, Eric
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ambler, Eric Clifford (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British writer
DATE OF BIRTH June 28, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH October 22, 1998
Place of death London