The birth of the James Bond myth

It is a weird feeling to read a Ian Fleming 007 novel with all the movies somewhere in the back of your mind. "Casino Royale" is the first James Bond novel I have (now finally) read. Is it possible to read without letting the pictures take over? I mean, is it possible to judge the book as the book it is, not letting your unconsciousness judge the book by the film? "Casino Royale" is the first James Bond novel written by Ian Fleming and starts off the 007 myth, a myth, which it became mainly due to the impersonations of James Bond by Sean Connery and rather differently Roger Moore. As Raymond Chandler put it, "James Bond is the man every man would like to be and the man every woman would want to have between her sheets" (or at least, something like that...). This might be, I guess, related to the possibility that men obviously never really grow up (I mean, there always is a big child somewhere in us, isn't there?) and women unconsciously wanting what they don't consciously want. (Can you imagine how dreadfully boring and grey our world would be with "serious grown up" men and women saying what they think?)
I was a teenager when the Roger Moore 007 movies came out in the cinemas and for quite some time, he was my favourite Bond. I guess, being used to something therefore makes it rather tough to acknowledge something different to what we see as being "it".
To get down to the book now...
"Casino Royale" takes place in the south of France, with Le Chiffre trying to win back lost money by gambling high stakes. Of course, the story takes place during the cold war, the main opponents are the communists and Le Chiffre is part of the SMERSH system (apart from having been subtly changed to our time, the film actually moves rather close to the books lines).
What Ian Fleming invented with James Bond is a man (at least judging by Casino Royale now), who is tough, who is soft (actually Casino Royale shows Bond to be a wee bit of a "softie" on the one side -see his breathless falling in love and marriage thoughts...), who knows what he wants, he is (at least in "Casino Royale") not the womanizer he became in the movies, who is prepared to show weakness, something which actually was first achieved by Daniel Craig's impersonation of this role (also in "Casino Royale"). This is something that I realized only while reading "Casino Royale".
Of course this book is more a myth, more a nostalgic longing, more a dream, more a wish for something which is definetely lost- than great literature. Ian Flemings writing is good though, has hard edges, there are "ups and downs", yet it's definetely fun, real good honest fun. I felt like 15 again, which I haven't for quite some time...