Sir Dominic And Mr Bond

Dominic Flandry is knighted very early in Poul Anderson's Captain Flandry series, thus becoming "Sir Dominic." It is necessary for someone to rise very high - in the appropriate kind of society - before they are referred to principally by their first name rather than by their surname. (In our Lancaster constituency, years ago, our Member of Parliament went from being "Mrs. Kellett-Bowman" to "Dame Elaine" and was subsequently referred to as such even by her political opponents.)

James Bond is offered a knighthood in the concluding chapter of Ian Fleming's posthumous novel, The Man With The Golden Gun, but declines it. If he had accepted, then he would have become "Sir James" - but there were to be no more books in any case. Unlike Flandry, Bond does not age or rise through the ranks. His last novel concludes with a perfect epitaph:

"For James Bond, the same view would always pall."

-Ian Fleming, The Man With The Golden Gun (New York, 1965), p. 158.

Sir Dominic - always referred to as "Flandry" in the texts - concludes, before settling some more personal matters, by saying that we play the game of empire or of life never seeing far ahead and not knowing what the score will be.

Those are our last sights of these two memorable characters.