The murder office

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The murder office (English: The Assassination Bureau, Ltd. ) is one of Jack London begun in 1910 and by Robert L. Fish consummate thriller with satirical elements from the year 1963rd

action

The millionaire Socialist Wintershall investigated the alleged suicide of a friend. In doing so, he gets on the track of the murder bureau, which seems to be responsible for some murders in the USA recently. He gets in touch with Iwan Dragomiloff, the head of this organization, and learns the terms and conditions: Against payment in advance, the murder bureau will murder everyone within a year, otherwise the client will get his money back. The only condition: the murder victim must be proven to be a pest of society. Winter Hall mentions Ivan Dragomiloff as the name of the man he wants to have murdered.

After Hall has convinced him in a long philosophical discussion that the murders of the Murder Office itself are harmful to society, the latter accepts the murder assignment against himself on behalf of the Murder Office. In the presence of Hall, Dragomiloff gives an employee the order to murder the head of the murder bureau.

A manhunt across the United States begins. Dragomiloff almost completely liquidated the Chicago, St. Louis and Denver local groups. Winter Hall had moved out with the intention of tracking down the murder bureau and destroying it, but in the process he had fallen in love with the daughter of the organizer of the bureau, had become a temporary deputy and was now wanted by the police for the murder of one of the members killed by the chief of the bureau. In San Francisco there is a short-term truce in which Hall and Dragomiloff's daughter try to stop the bloodshed. But both Dragomiloff and the surviving Murder Bureau members oppose it on moral grounds. Dragomiloff flees to Hawaii and attracts his pursuers before O'ahu into a vortex where they drown. Shortly before the end of the year, Dragomiloff paddles a canoe into the same whirlpool.

filming

The novel was filmed in 1969 under the title The Assassination Bureau (dt. Mörder GmbH ) by Basil Dearden with Oliver Reed , Diana Rigg , Curd Jürgens and Telly Savalas . The locations of the action were moved to Europe in the film.

Remarks

  • The novel is based on a draft manuscript by Sinclair Lewis
  • According to Jack London's notes, the hunt would also lead to Central and South America and Australia.

Publications

  • The Assassination Bureau, Ltd ISBN 0140186778 , McGraw-Hill, New York, 1963 First published
  • Das Mordbüro ISBN 3-462-00797-1 , Kiepenheuer u. Witsch, Cologne / Berlin, 1971, Ger. Initial release
  • Das Mordbüro ISBN 3-499-11615-4 , Rowohlt, Hamburg, 1973, 1st German paperback edition

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jack London Das Mordbüro p. 122, Kiepenheuer u. Witsch, Cologne, 1983 ISBN 3-462-01587-7
  2. ↑ Jörg Krichbaum Jack London or the adventures of literature , epilogue to Jack London The Straitjacket p. 265, Paul Zsolnay Verlag, Vienna / Hamburg, 1977
  3. ↑ Jack London Das Mordbüro p. 247, Kiepenheuer u. Witsch, Cologne, 1983 ISBN 3-462-01587-7