do tell! In the book, it's an obvious Jewish name

In Fifties/Sixties in London there was an architect named Erno Goldfinger. Goldfinger was famous for tearing down old buildings and replacing them with Brutalist style buildings. Fleming didn't like Goldfinger because he was a socialist, a modernist, and a Jew, so he named his villain Goldfinger.

Goldfinger threatened to sue and Fleming said he'd change the name of the villain to Goldprick. They settled with Fleming agreeing to pay Goldfinger's attorneys. He also gave Goldfinger six free copies of the book. He didn't change the name of the villain.

“Enjoy my racist satire. Here’s 6 copies!”

TBF, Goldfinger wasn't a very nice person. "Goldfinger was known as a humourless man given to notorious rages. He sometimes fired his assistants if they were inappropriately jocular, and once forcibly ejected two prospective clients for imposing restrictions on his design."

This thread reminded me of a Mordecai Richler essay from the ‘60s detailing Fleming’s depictions of his villains. www.commentary.org/articles/mor...

Good article, although, "Ian Fleming was such an appalling writer" was unfair. He was a mediocre writer who invented an immortal character (sort of like Conan Doyle, in that respect). I mean, who remembers Duddy Kravitz? It reminded me of Paul Johnson's review of Dr. No, "Sex, Sadism and Snobbery."

True on all points. “Sex, Sadism and Snobbery”…a prognostication of headlines of 2025. Evil oligarchs abound. Fleming was visionary.

A discussion on a golf course about Ernő with Goldfinger's cousin prompted Ian Fleming to name the James Bond adversary