The Jackal is Loose

Remembering Frederick Forsyth (1938 – 2025)

A Metaphor Equation Micro-blog

Picture credit: Big Issue

“It is cold at six-forty in the morning on a March day in Paris, and seems even colder when a man is about to be executed by firing squad.”

“Moonlight turns even the most civilised man into a primitive.”

― Frederick Forsyth, The Day of the Jackal

It's hard to think of a more quintessentially English thriller writer than Frederick Forsyth, even in an age when patriotism is sometimes frowned upon. I suspect Forsyth wouldn’t have given a damn about such disapproval. As was surely the case with Ian Fleming, it was difficult to separate Freddie from some of the characters he wrote about, and it was an overlap of fact and fiction that turned both writers into legends.

Even Freddie’s most cold blooded protagonists invited a grudging admiration if only for the single minded determination and resolve they showed –  (to some degree) we all really wanted the assassin to complete his mission in The Day of the Jackal, even though we knew it was historically impossible. Anyone who was willing to take on such odds deserved a little respect, especially in the age of the antihero. So when those bullets started bouncing off the pavement (a scene brilliantly conveyed in Fred Zinneman’s nerve-shredding movie adaptation) don’t tell me you didn’t secretly want one of them to strike home. We all did. It was the same obsessive focus that drove the protagonist in The Odessa File to hunt down a former concentration camp commandant, a war criminal who had fled retribution via an escape network set up to help Nazi’s evade justice. And it was the same focus that compelled the hero in The Dogs of War to exact such terrible and bloody retribution on his tormentors.

Freddie was a genius at coming up with scenarios no one else could devise. He’s probably in heaven right now constructing a plot with Jack Higgins for a joint best seller. The Jackal is Loose, maybe. Or The Day of the Cobra. Whatever they decide to call the book, sign me up for a copy of the first edition as soon as it comes out. I can’t wait to read it.   

Perfect casting: Edward Fox practising his lethal craft. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime job. I could never work again."