21. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was based on bedtime stories he told his son
In 1961 Fleming had a heart attack, and while recuperating he used the bedtime stories he told his young son as the basis for the book, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. It was not published in his lifetime. Fleming used much of the techniques he employed when writing the Bond stories in that he used names and situations he encountered in his own life. One such example is the character Caractatus Pott, a former Commander in the Royal Navy. Pott, like Fleming, was fascinated with automobiles and unusual devices. Pott advised his children in the novel as Fleming did in life, “Never say no to adventures. Always say yes, otherwise you will lead a very dull life”.
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was written in three volumes. The first two volumes were completed in the spring of 1961. The third was not completed until 1963, when Fleming was recovering from a second, and then a third heart attack. The latter required him to be convalescent. The third volume of the children’s story was the last the wrote, and it was not published until two months after his death in 1964. The Guardian was scathing in its review of the work, writing “we have the adult writer at play rather than the children’s writer at work”.