Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps

Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps PDF

Author: Ursula Buchan

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2019-04-18

Total Pages: 512

ISBN-13: 1408870835

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John Buchan's name is known across the world for The Thirty-Nine Steps. In the past one hundred years the classic thriller has never been out of print and has inspired numerous adaptations for film, television, radio and stage, beginning with the celebrated version by Alfred Hitchcock. Yet there was vastly more to 'JB'. He wrote more than a hundred books – fiction and non-fiction – and a thousand articles for newspapers and magazines. He was a scholar, antiquarian, barrister, colonial administrator, journal editor, literary critic, publisher, war correspondent, director of wartime propaganda, member of parliament and imperial proconsul – given a state funeral when he died, a deeply admired and loved Governor-General of Canada. His teenage years in Glasgow's Gorbals, where his father was the Free Church minister, contributed to his ease with shepherds and ambassadors, fur-trappers and prime ministers. His improbable marriage to a member of the aristocratic Grosvenor family means that this account of his life contains, at its heart, an enduring love story. Ursula Buchan, his granddaughter, has drawn on recently discovered family documents to write this comprehensive and illuminating biography. With perception, style, wit and a penetratingly clear eye, she brings vividly to life this remarkable man and his times.

The Thirty-Nine Steps

The Thirty-Nine Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher: Courier Dover Publications

Published: 1915

Total Pages: 264

ISBN-13:

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In this fast-paced spy thriller, a self-described "ordinary fellow" stumbles upon a plot involving not only espionage and murder but also the future of Britain itself. This classic of suspense served as the basis for one of Hitchcock's most famous films and was the first novel in the author's Greenmantle series.

The Thirty-Nine Steps

The Thirty-Nine Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher:

Published: 2014-06-29

Total Pages: 116

ISBN-13: 9781500357948

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John Buchan wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps while he was ill in bed with a duodenal ulcer, an illness which remained with him all his life. The novel was his first "shocker", as he called it a story combining personal and political dramas. The novel marked a turning point in Buchan's literary career and introduced his famous adventuring hero, Richard Hannay.

The Thirty Nine Steps

The Thirty Nine Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher:

Published: 2017-02-15

Total Pages: 184

ISBN-13: 9781520603179

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The Thirty-Nine Steps is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It first appeared as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in August and September 1915 before being published in book form in October that year by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh.[1] It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay, an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a miraculous knack for getting himself out of sticky situations. The novel is set during May and June 1914; war was evident in Europe, Richard Hannay the protagonist and narrator, an expatriate Scot, returns to his new home, a flat in London, after a long stay in Rhodesia, in order to begin a new life. One night he is buttonholed by a stranger, a well-travelled American, who claims to be in fear for his life. The man appears to know of an anarchist plot to destabilise Europe, beginning with a plan to assassinate the Greek Premier, Constantine Karolides, during his forthcoming visit to London. The man reveals his name to be Franklin P. Scudder, a freelance spy, and remarks that he is dead, which holds Hannay's attention. Scudder explains that he has faked his own death in order to avert suspicion. Scudder claims to be following a ring of German spies called the Black Stone who are trying to steal British plans for the outbreak of war. Hannay lets Scudder hide in his flat, and sure enough the next day another man is discovered having apparently committed suicide in the same building. Four days later Hannay returns home to find Scudder dead with a knife through his heart.Hannay fears that the murderers will come for him next, but cannot ask the police for help because he is the most likely suspect for the murders because he lived in the same building. Not only does he want to avoid imprisonment, but he also feels a duty to take up Scudder's cause and save Karolides from the assassination, planned in three weeks' time. He decides to go into hiding in Scotland and then to contact the authorities at the last minute. In order to escape from his flat unseen, he bribes the milkman into lending him his uniform and exits wearing it, escaping from the German spies watching the house. Carrying Scudder's pocket-book.The novel formed the basis for a number of film adaptations, notably: Alfred Hitchcock's 19I returned from the City about three o'clock on that May afternoon pretty well disgusted with life. I had been three months in the Old Country, and was fed up with it. If anyone had told me a year ago that I would have been feeling like that I should have laughed at him; but there was the fact. The weather made me liverish, the talk of the ordinary Englishman made me sick, I couldn't get enough exercise, and the amusements of London seemed as flat as sodawater that has been standing in the sun. 'Richard Hannay,' I kept telling myself, 'you have got into the wrong ditch, my friend, and you had better climb out.' It made me bite my lips to think of the plans I had been building up those last years in Bulawayo. I had got my pile not one of the big ones, but good enough for me; and I had figured out all kinds of ways of enjoying myself. My father had brought me out from Scotland at the age of six, and I had never been home since; so England was a sort of Arabian Nights to me, and I counted on stopping there for the rest of my days.But from the first I was disappointed with it. In about a week I was tired of seeing sights, and in less than a month I had had enough of restaurants and theatres and race-meetings. I had no real pal to go about with, which probably explains things. Plenty of people invited me to their houses, but they didn't seem much interested in me. They would fling me a question or two about South Africa, and then get on their own affairs. A lot of Imperialist ladies asked me to tea to meet schoolmasters from New Zealand and editors from Vancouver, and that was the dismalest business of all. Here was I, thirty-seven years old ...

The 39 Steps

The 39 Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher: DigiCat

Published: 2022-11-13

Total Pages: 101

ISBN-13:

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Major-General Sir Richard Hannay is a character created by Scottish novelist John Buchan and based on Edmund Ironside, from Edinburgh, a spy during the Second Boer War. In this adventure espionage classic Richard Hannay is buttonholed by an American stranger who knows of an anarchist plot to assassinate the Greek Premier during his forthcoming visit to London. It is now up to Hannay to save the day and stop Europe from destabilising. John Buchan (1875-1940) was a Scottish novelist and historian and also served as Canada's Governor General. His 100 works include nearly thirty novels, seven collections of short stories and biographies. But, the most famous of his books were the adventure and spy thrillers and it is for these that he is now best remembered.

The Thirty-Nine Steps

The Thirty-Nine Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher: Prabhat Prakashan

Published: 2021-01-01

Total Pages: 93

ISBN-13:

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The Thirty-Nine Steps' is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It was first published as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in 1915. It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay, an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a miraculous knack for getting himself out of sticky situations.

The Thirty-nine Steps

The Thirty-nine Steps PDF

Author: John Buchan

Publisher:

Published: 2015-08-14

Total Pages: 88

ISBN-13: 9781516896158

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The Thirty-Nine Steps is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It first appeared as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in August and September 1915 before being published in book form in October that year by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh. It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay, an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a miraculous knack for getting himself out of sticky situations.The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan - The novel formed the basis for a number of film adaptations, notably: Alfred Hitchcock's 1935 version; a 1959 colour remake; a 1978 version which is perhaps most faithful to the novel; and a 2008 version for British television.

The Thirty-Nine Steps. Adventure Novel by

The Thirty-Nine Steps. Adventure Novel by PDF

Author: John Buchan.

Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform

Published: 2016-08-10

Total Pages: 108

ISBN-13: 9781537010175

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The Thirty-Nine Steps is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It first appeared as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in August and September 1915 before being published in book form in October that year by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh. It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay, an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a miraculous knack for getting himself out of sticky situations. John Buchan wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps while he was ill in bed with a duodenal ulcer, an illness which remained with him all his life. The novel was his first "shocker," as he called it - a story combining personal and political dramas. The novel marked a turning point in Buchan's literary career and introduced his adventuring hero, Richard Hannay. He described a "shocker" as an adventure where the events in the story are unlikely and the reader is only just able to believe that they really happened. Buchan's son, William, later wrote that the name of the book originated when the author's daughter was counting the stairs at a private nursing home in Broadstairs, where Buchan was convalescing. "There was a wooden staircase leading down to the beach. My sister, who was about six, and who had just learnt to count properly, went down them and gleefully announced: there are 39 steps." Some time later the house was demolished and a section of the stairs, complete with a brass plaque, was sent to Buchan. The mysterious phrase Thirty-Nine Steps, first mentioned by the character Franklin Scudder, becomes the title of the novel and the solution to its meaning is a thread that runs through the whole story.