The Day of the Jackal: A Masterclass in Suspense
Imagine a world where a professional assassin is hired to kill one of the most powerful men in Europe, and you have The Day of the Jackal. This 1971 political thriller novel by Frederick Forsyth takes us on an edge-of-your-seat journey through the mind of a cold-blooded killer. How does it all begin? With a failed attempt on Charles de Gaulle’s life in 1962, and the subsequent plot that unfolds as the French security forces wage an underground war against the OAS (Organisation Armée Secrète).
But who is this mysterious Jackal? A man hired for $500,000 to carry out a task that could change history. He prepares meticulously, acquiring fake identities and building a special suppressed sniper rifle. Meanwhile, the French authorities are on high alert, suspicious about the OAS’s plans. They devise a plan to lure one of Rodin’s bodyguards into France, where he is caught and tortured.
As the story unfolds, we meet Roger Frey, who organizes a conference of French security authorities. But they’re at a loss until Claude Lebel volunteers to use ‘pure detective work’ to uncover the Jackal’s true identity. His journey takes him through Scotland Yard’s Special Branch, where he finds a lead on a man named Charles Calthrop.
Thomas, another key character, checks out the name of Calthrop and finds a match in London. But one of Thomas’s junior detectives realizes that the first three letters of Calthrop’s name form ‘Chacal,’ the French word for ‘Jackal.’ This is just the beginning of a cat-and-mouse game where Lebel and his team come close to apprehending the Jackal but always fall short.
The Jackal, traveling in a rented Alfa Romeo sports car with his weapon soldered to the chassis, evades capture by only an hour. He kills a woman who was helping him and flees after disguising himself as one of his emergency identities. Lebel becomes suspicious of the OAS agent and has her telephones tapped, leading him to discover her identity.
Thomas checks reports of stolen or missing passports in London and closes in on the Jackal’s remaining secondary identities. The Jackal slips into a hotel in Paris, disposes of his first emergency identity, and disguises himself as one of his other stolen passports. De Gaulle authorizes Lebel to release information about the Jackal, a foreign killer, to the public.
Believing the search is over, de Gaulle orchestrates a massive manhunt for the killer, but he eludes capture again. The Jackal passes through security checkpoints and eventually makes his way to an apartment building where de Gaulle is presenting medals to veterans. In a brief confrontation, Lebel shoots the Jackal with a submachine gun, killing him instantly.
In London, the Special Branch searches Calthrop’s apartment but finds him to be an innocent man. The true identity and motives of the Jackal remain unknown. Frederick Forsyth spent three years researching and writing The Day of the Jackal, using techniques he employed as a journalist to create a sense of realism in his work.
Initially rejected by four publishing houses due to concerns that readers would know de Gaulle had not been killed, making the plot unsuspenseful. De Gaulle died of natural causes in November 1970, after peacefully retiring. Forsyth wrote a short summary of his novel to persuade publishers, which led to its publication by Hutchinson & Co. with an initial printing of 8,000 copies.
The book’s success in Britain attracted the attention of Viking Press in New York, which acquired the US rights for $365,000. The novel was published in the US and became a bestseller, selling over two million copies worldwide by 1975. It has been translated into thirty languages and remains in print.
A film adaptation was released in 1973, followed by other adaptations including an Indian film and a television series. The book’s method for acquiring a false identity and UK passport was known as the ‘Day of the Jackal fraud’ until 2007. The novel The Day of the Jackal inspired several individuals to attempt or carry out violent acts, including a New Zealand MP creating a fake passport, a Venezuelan terrorist using it as inspiration for his crimes, and two would-be assassins referencing the book in their plans.
The novel was found with an Israeli assassin’s belongings and another was used by an attempted US President assassination suspect. The Day of the Jackal is not just a thrilling read; it’s a masterclass in suspense that continues to captivate readers decades after its initial publication. It reminds us that sometimes, reality can be stranger than fiction.
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This page is based on the article The Day of the Jackal published in Wikipedia (retrieved on November 29, 2024) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
