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85-666: The Thirty-Nine Steps is a 1915 adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan , first published by William Blackwood and Sons , Edinburgh. It was serialized in All-Story Weekly issues of 5 and 12 June 1915, and in Blackwood's Magazine (credited to "H. de V.") between July and September 1915, before being published in book form in October of that year. It is the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay , an all-action hero with

170-542: A stiff upper lip and a knack for getting himself out of tricky situations. The novel has been adapted many times, including several films and a long-running stage play. In 2003, the book was listed on the BBC's Big Read poll of Britain's "best-loved novels." The story's narrator, Richard Hannay, arrives in London from Rhodesia early in 1914, having made a modest fortune as a mining engineer. Disillusioned with his uneventful life as

255-406: A "shocker" as an adventure where the events in the story are unlikely and the reader is only just able to believe that they really happened. Buchan dedicated the novel to his friend Thomas Arthur Nelson , saying "My Dear Tommy, / You and I have long cherished an affection for that elemental type of tale which Americans call the 'dime novel' and which we know as the 'shocker' — the romance where

340-475: A German spy ring known as the "Black Stone" whose goal is to steal Britain's naval defence plans before war breaks out. Hannay meets Sir Harry, landowner and local parliamentary candidate, and takes him into his confidence. Sir Harry promises to write to his godfather, Sir Walter Bullivant, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office , to warn him of the plot. Narrowly avoiding his pursuers, Hannay stumbles into

425-643: A cast of four actors premiered in 1995 at the Georgian Theatre Royal in Richmond , North Yorkshire, before embarking on a tour of village halls across the north of England. In 2005, Patrick Barlow rewrote the script, keeping the scenes, staging and small-scale feel, and in June 2005 this re-adaptation premiered at the West Yorkshire Playhouse , The play then opened in London's Tricycle Theatre , and after

510-630: A child readership. In the years after the First World War, writers such as Arthur Ransome developed the adventure genre by setting the adventure in Britain rather than distant countries, while Geoffrey Trease , Rosemary Sutcliff and Esther Forbes brought a new sophistication to the historical adventure novel. Modern writers such as Mildred D. Taylor ( Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry ) and Philip Pullman (the Sally Lockhart novels) have continued

595-598: A higher education qualification or the equivalent, compared to 20% nationwide. The average hours worked per week by residents of Kent were 43.1 for males and 30.9 for females. Their industry of employment was 17.3% retail, 12.4% manufacturing, 11.8% real estate, 10.3% health and social work, 8.9% construction, 8.2% transport and communications, 7.9% education, 6.0% public administration and defence, 5.6% finance, 4.8% other community and personal service activities, 4.1% hotels and restaurants, 1.6% agriculture, 0.8% energy and water supply, 0.2% mining, and 0.1% private households. This

680-453: A lonely cottage and finds himself face to face with the Black Stone's leader. Hannay's lies are convincing enough to leave the spies in doubt as to his true identity, and they lock him in a storeroom rather than killing him outright. Finding a cabinet full of explosives, Hannay uses his experience as a mining engineer to escape by blowing the window from its frame. Eventually he manages to catch

765-565: A man about town, he is on the brink of resolving to leave England for good when a panicked neighbour, Franklin Scudder, knocks at the door of his flat in Portland Place . Scudder is a freelance journalist who claims to have uncovered a plot against the Premier of Greece, Constantine Karolides. According to Scudder, Karolides is to be assassinated in London in a few weeks' time, on 15 June, an event which

850-494: A popular subject for modern live productions done in a similar, old-time radio style. There have been many full cast adaptations for BBC Radio and all are based directly on Buchan's novel. There are also several BBC solo readings: Other solo readings: In 2014, BBC Radio 3 broadcast Landmark: The Thirty-Nine Steps and World War I , a 45-minute documentary on the novel's initial impact at home and abroad. A comic theatrical adaptation by Simon Corble and Nobby Dimon for

935-705: A successful run transferred to the Criterion Theatre in Piccadilly where it became the fifth longest running play until it closed in September 2015. Although drawing on Buchan's novel, it is strongly influenced by Hitchcock's 1935 film adaptation. On 15 January 2008, the show made its US Broadway premiere at the American Airlines Theatre ; it transferred to the Cort Theatre on 29 April 2008 and then moved to

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1020-530: A train south, hoping to find Sir Walter Bullivant at his home in Berkshire . Sir Walter accepts the bulk of Hannay's story, but doubts that Karolides' life is in danger. An urgent government phone call, however, informs him that Karolides is already dead. The two men travel to London, where Sir Walter is to host a high-level official meeting at his city townhouse. Hannay, now cleared of the Portland Place murder,

1105-568: A view to forming a new unified authority for East Kent, although remaining within the auspices of Kent County Council. This idea was eventually dropped. For almost nine centuries, a small part of present-day East London (the North Woolwich , London E16 area), formed part of Kent. Kent is in the southeastern corner of England. It borders the Thames Estuary and the North Sea to the north, and

1190-613: Is a rich sequence of Bronze Age , Celtic Iron Age , and Britto- Roman era occupation, as indicated by finds and features such as the Ringlemere gold cup and the Roman villas of the Darent valley . Julius Caesar described the area as Cantium , or the home of the Cantiaci , in 51 BC. The extreme west of the modern county was by the time of Roman Britain occupied by a Celtic Iron Age tribe known as

1275-412: Is generally regarded as the closest to the book, being set at the same time as the novel, pre-Great War, but still bears little resemblance to Buchan's original story. Its climax bore no relation to the novel's denouement, instead seeing Hannay hanging from the hands of Big Ben . The film was followed by a spin-off television series, Hannay , also starring Powell and featuring adventures occurring before

1360-592: Is greatly appreciated in the midst of mud and rain and shells, and all that could make trench life depressing." Hannay continued his adventures in four subsequent books. Two were set during the war, when he continued his undercover work against the Germans and their allies the Turks in Greenmantle (1916) and Mr Standfast (1919). The other two stories, The Three Hostages (1924) and The Island of Sheep (1936) were set in

1445-477: Is higher than the whole of England for construction and transport/communications and lower for manufacturing. Kent is sometimes known as the "Garden of England" for its abundance of orchards and hop gardens. In particular the county produces tree-grown fruits, strawberries and hazelnuts. Distinctive hop-drying buildings called oasts are common in the countryside, although many have been converted into dwellings. Nearer to London, market gardens also flourish. Kent

1530-474: Is left to his own devices, but a general feeling of unease prompts him to call at Sir Walter's house. He arrives just in time to see the First Sea Lord leaving; their eyes briefly meet, and Hannay recognizes him as one of the spies in disguise. Hannay breaks into the meeting, but by the time the deception is confirmed the man has long gone, taking with him the naval secrets he has just learned. Realising that

1615-496: Is not because "Pip's encounter with the convict is an adventure, but that scene is only a device to advance the main plot, which is not truly an adventure." Adventure has been a common theme since the earliest days of written fiction. Indeed, the standard plot of Heliodorus, and so durable as to be still alive in Hollywood movies , a hero would undergo a first set of adventures before he met his lady. A separation would follow, with

1700-422: Is one of the earliest examples of the '"man-on-the-run" thriller archetype subsequently adopted by film makers as a much-used plot device. In The Thirty-Nine Steps , Buchan holds up Richard Hannay as an example to his readers of an ordinary man who puts his country's interests before his own safety. The story was a great success with the men in the First World War trenches . One soldier wrote to Buchan, "The story

1785-531: Is the main area for hazelnut production in the UK. However, in recent years, there has been a significant drop in agriculture, and industry and services are increasing their utilisation of the area. This is illustrated by the following table of economic indicator gross value added (GVA) between 1995 and 2003 (figures are in £ millions): North Kent is heavily industrialised, with cement-making at Northfleet and Cuxton , brickmaking at Sittingbourne, shipbuilding on

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1870-457: Is under Liberal Democrat control (Tunbridge Wells), and six are under no overall control and are administered by coalitions (Tonbridge and Malling, Maidstone, Swale, Ashford, Canterbury, Folkestone and Hythe). Notably, Thanet is the only council in the United Kingdom to have come under UK Independence Party (UKIP) control, which it did in 2015 . At the national level, Kent is represented in

1955-497: The Brontë Sisters , Rudyard Kipling , Sir H. Rider Haggard , Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , Edgar Rice Burroughs , Victor Hugo , Emilio Salgari , Karl May , Louis Henri Boussenard , Thomas Mayne Reid , Sax Rohmer , A. Merritt , Talbot Mundy , Edgar Wallace , and Robert Louis Stevenson . Adventure novels and short stories were popular subjects for American pulp magazines , which dominated American popular fiction between

2040-506: The County of London was created and took over responsibility for local administration of parts of north-west Kent. These included the towns of Greenwich , Woolwich , Plumstead , Deptford , Lee , Eltham , Charlton , and Kidbrooke . In 1900, however, Kent absorbed the district of Penge . Some of Kent is contiguous with the Greater London sprawl, notably parts of Dartford . Originally,

2125-590: The Drama Desk Award , Unique Theatrical Experience. A 1988 prequel television series named Hannay was spawned from the 1978 feature film version. The 39 Steps is a Netflix miniseries to be directed by Edward Berger A 2013, Scottish developer The Story Mechanics used the Unity game engine to create The 39 Steps , a digital adaptation. In 2008, Penguin Books adapted the story as interactive fiction under

2210-462: The Great War seven weeks later, and Hannay is commissioned as a captain in the army. He comments, "But I had done my best service, I think, before I put on khaki ." John Buchan wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps while he was ill in bed with a duodenal ulcer , an illness which remained with him all his life. Buchan's son William later wrote that the name of the book originated when the author's daughter

2295-502: The Greensand Ridge span the length of the county and in the Vale of Holmesdale in between and to the south are most of the county's 26 castles . The county has agriculture, haulage, logistics and tourism industries. As the land between the capital and the wider continent, it is a high-income county. Agriculture of the county is a notable sector: "The Garden of England" is a nickname for

2380-495: The Helen Hayes Theatre on 21 January 2009, where it ended its run on 10 January 2010. It reopened on Stage One of New York's Off-Broadway venue New World Stages on 25 March 2010 and closed on 15 April 2010. The Broadway production received six Tony Award nominations, winning two – Best Lighting Design and Best Sound Design – with the London show winning an Olivier in 2007 and two Tony Awards in 2008. The play also won

2465-576: The House of Commons by eighteen Members of Parliament (MPs). The county has historically been dominated by the Conservative Party at general elections. Prior to 2024, the party had won a majority of Kentish seats in every election since the local government reforms of 1974, including during Labour's landslide victories of 1997 and 2001 . In both 2010 and 2015 , the Conservatives won every seat in

2550-616: The Leeds Castle peace talks of 1978 and 2004. England relied on the county's ports to provide warships through much of its history; the Cinque Ports in the 10th –14th centuries and Chatham Dockyard in the 16th–20th centuries were of particular importance. France can be seen clearly in fine weather from Folkestone and the White Cliffs of Dover . Hills in the form of the North Downs and

2635-758: The Local Government Act 1972 , Kent County Council has been under Conservative Party control; the exception was between 1993 and 1997 when the party came under no overall control with Labour Party leadership. At the most recent county council election in 2021 , the Conservatives won 62 out of 81 seats. Also elected were seven Labour councillors, six Liberal Democrats , four from the Green Party , one Swale Independent and one residents' association representative. Of Kent's thirteen districts, two are under Conservative control (Sevenoaks, Dartford), four are under Labour control (Gravesham, Medway, Thanet, Dover), one

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2720-644: The Progressive Era and the 1950s. Several pulp magazines such as Adventure , Argosy , Blue Book , Top-Notch , and Short Stories specialized in this genre. Notable pulp adventure writers included Edgar Rice Burroughs , Talbot Mundy , Theodore Roscoe , Johnston McCulley , Arthur O. Friel , Harold Lamb , Carl Jacobi , George F. Worts , Georges Surdez , H. Bedford-Jones , and J. Allan Dunn . Adventure fiction often overlaps with other genres, notably war novels , crime novels , detective novels , sea stories , Robinsonades , spy stories (as in

2805-543: The Regni . Caesar wrote that the people of Kent were 'by far the most civilised inhabitants of Britain'. Following the withdrawal of the Romans, large numbers of Germanic speakers from mainland Europe settled in Kent, bringing their language, which came to be Old English . While they expelled the native Romano-British population, some likely remained in the area, eventually assimilating with

2890-797: The River Darent , tributaries of the River Medway, and on the River Stour . Two 18th century mills were on the River Len and at Tovil on the River Loose . In the late 19th century huge modern mills were built at Dartford and Northfleet on the River Thames and at Kemsley on The Swale. In pre-industrial times, almost every village and town had its own windmill or watermill , with over 400 windmills known to have stood at some time. Twenty-eight survive within

2975-515: The River Medway in 1547. By the reign of Elizabeth I (1558–1603) a small dockyard had been established at Chatham . By 1618, storehouses, a ropewalk , a drydock , and houses for officials had been built downstream from Chatham. By the 17th century, tensions between Britain and the powers of the Netherlands and France led to increasing military build-up in the county. Forts were built all along

3060-533: The River Medway , rises near East Grinstead in Sussex and flows eastwards to Maidstone . Here it turns north and breaks through the North Downs at Rochester, then joins the estuary of the River Thames near Sheerness . The Medway is some 70 miles (112 km) long. The river is tidal as far as Allington lock, but in earlier times, cargo-carrying vessels reached as far upstream as Tonbridge . The Medway has captured

3145-796: The Straits of Dover and the English Channel to the south. France is 21 miles (34 km) across the Strait. The major geographical features of the county are based on a series of ridges and valleys running east–west across the county. These are the results of erosion of the Wealden dome, a dome across Kent and Sussex created by alpine movements 20–10 million years ago. This dome consists of an upper layer of chalk above successive layers of Upper Greensand , Gault Clay , Lower Greensand , Weald Clay , and Wealden sandstone. The ridges and valleys formed when

3230-425: The 19th and 20th centuries. Cement came to the fore in the 19th century when massive building projects were undertaken. The ready supply of chalk and huge pits between Stone and Gravesend bear testament to that industry. There were also other workings around Burham on the tidal Medway. Chalk, gravel and clay were excavated on Dartford Heath for centuries. Kent's original paper mills stood on streams like

3315-630: The Medway and Swale , engineering and aircraft design and construction at Rochester, chemicals at Dartford, papermaking at Swanley , and oil refining at Grain . There is a steel mini mill in Sheerness and a rolling mill in Queenborough . There are two nuclear power stations at Dungeness , although the older one, Dungeness A, built in 1965, was decommissioned in 2006. Cement-making, papermaking, and coal-mining were important industries in Kent during

3400-517: The New Forest (1847), and Harriet Martineau's The Peasant and the Prince (1856). The Victorian era saw the development of the genre, with W. H. G. Kingston , R. M. Ballantyne , and G. A. Henty specializing in the production of adventure fiction for boys. This inspired writers who normally catered to adult audiences to essay such works, such as Robert Louis Stevenson writing Treasure Island for

3485-735: The Richter Scale. It was centred in the Sandwich area of east Kent at about ten miles below the surface. There was little if any damage reported. The coastline of Kent is continuously changing, due to tectonic uplift and coastal erosion . Until about 960, the Isle of Thanet was an island, separated by the Wantsum channel , formed around a deposit of chalk; over time, the channels silted up with alluvium . Similarly Romney Marsh and Dungeness have been formed by accumulation of alluvium. Kent's principal river,

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3570-771: The Westphalian Sandstone are about 820–1,310 ft (250–400 m) deep, and are subject to flooding. They occur in two major troughs, which extend under the English Channel. Seismic activity has occasionally been recorded in Kent, though the epicentres were offshore. In 1382 and 1580 there were two earthquakes exceeding 6.0 on the Richter Scale . In 1776, 1950, and on 28 April 2007 there were earthquakes of around 4.3. The 2007 earthquake caused physical damage in Folkestone. A further quake on 22 May 2015 measured 4.2 on

3655-567: The area is called Cantia or Cantium , while the Anglo-Saxons referred to it as Cent , Cent lond or Centrice . The area was first occupied by early humans , intermittently due to periods of extreme cold, during the Palaeolithic (Old Stone Age), as attested by an early Neanderthal skull found in the quarries at Swanscombe . The Medway megaliths were built during the Neolithic era. There

3740-489: The area is required to achieve these objectives; it has been opposed by environmental groups. Kent is one of the warmest parts of Britain. On 10 August 2003, in the hamlet of Brogdale near Faversham the temperature reached 38.5 °C (101.3 °F), at that time the highest temperature ever officially recorded in the United Kingdom. The record still stands as the hottest August day ever recorded. Kent County Council and its twelve district councils administer most of

3825-460: The area's military importance, the first Ordnance Survey map ever drawn was a one-inch map of Kent, published in 1801. Many of the Georgian naval buildings still stand. In the early 19th century, smugglers were very active on the Kent coastline. Gangs such as The Aldington Gang brought spirits, tobacco and salt to the county, and transported goods such as wool across the sea to France. In 1889,

3910-547: The authorship of Charles Cumming calling it The 21 Steps . Adventure novel In the Introduction to the Encyclopedia of Adventure Fiction , Critic Don D'Ammassa defines the genre as follows: ..  An adventure is an event or series of events that happens outside the course of the protagonist's ordinary life, usually accompanied by danger, often by physical action. Adventure stories almost always move quickly, and

3995-406: The book, many characters being renamed, or omitted altogether. The film ends with a scene involving a submarine in a Scottish loch, rather than the original setting off the Kent coast, and the apparent death of one character. There were numerous American radio adaptations during the two decades following the release of Hitchcock's film, most of which were based on its heavily altered plot. It remains

4080-476: The book. It stars Robert Donat as Hannay and Madeleine Carroll as a woman he meets on the train. It is regarded by many critics as the best film version. This was one of several Hitchcock films based upon the idea of an "innocent man on the run", such as Saboteur and North by Northwest . In 1999, it came 4th in a BFI poll of British films and in 2004 Total Film named it the 21st greatest British film of all time. The 1959 film directed by Ralph Thomas

4165-849: The border between Kent and Sussex (later East Sussex ) ran through the towns of Tunbridge Wells and Lamberhurst . In 1894, by the Local Government Act , the parts of these towns that lay in East Sussex were absorbed by Kent. During the Second World War, much of the Battle of Britain was fought in the skies over Kent. Between June 1944 and March 1945, more than 10,000 V1 flying bombs , or "Doodlebugs", were fired towards London from bases in Northern France . Although many were destroyed by aircraft, anti-aircraft guns and barrage balloons , both London and Kent were hit by around 2,500 of these bombs. After

4250-540: The building disguised as a milkman and takes a train to Scotland, intending to find a remote area where he can lie low. He takes with him the coded notebook in which Scudder had recorded his findings. Hannay alights at a rural station in the Galloway Hills , and a cat-and-mouse chase ensues as he evades both the plotters, who attempt to spot him on the open hillside from an aeroplane, and the police. Deciphering Scudder's notes, he learns that his adversaries are members of

4335-428: The capital such as commutes and transport connections to the capital. Twenty-eight per cent of the county forms part of two Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty : the North Downs and The High Weald . Kent was one of the first British territories to be settled by Germanic tribes, most notably the Jutes , following the withdrawal of the Romans. Canterbury Cathedral in Kent, the oldest cathedral in England, has been

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4420-486: The coast following the raid on the Medway , a successful attack by the Dutch navy on the shipyards of the Medway towns in 1667. The 18th century was dominated by wars with France, during which the Medway became the primary base for a fleet that could act along the Dutch and French coasts. When the theatre of operation moved to the Atlantic , this role was assumed by Portsmouth and Plymouth , with Chatham concentrating on shipbuilding and ship repair. As an indication of

4505-418: The county (3352 km ), whilst the Medway Council administers the more densely populated Medway unitary authority (192 km ), independently of the county council. Together they have around 300 town and parish councils . Kent County Council's headquarters are in Maidstone , while Medway's offices are at Gun Wharf, Chatham . For most of its history since the local government reforms instituted by

4590-556: The county (including Tunbridge Wells, Tonbridge, and Sevenoaks) has less than 50% of the average claimant count for low incomes or worklessness as the coastal districts of Dover, Folkestone and Hythe, and Thanet (chiefly three resorts: Ramsgate, Broadstairs, and Margate). West and Central Kent have long had many City of London commuters . Kent's geographical location between the Straits of Dover and London has influenced its architecture, as has its Cretaceous geology and its good farming land and fine building clays. Kent's countryside pattern

4675-427: The county today, plus two replica mills and a further two in that part of Kent now absorbed into London. All the major rivers in the county were used to power watermills. From about 1900, several coal pits operated in East Kent. The Kent Coalfield was mined during the 20th century at several collieries, including Chislet, Tilmanstone, Betteshanger, and the Snowdown Colliery, which ran from 1908 to 1986. The west of

4760-411: The county was granted similar powers to those granted in the areas bordering Wales and Scotland . During the medieval and early modern period, Kent played a major role in several of England's most notable rebellions, including the Peasants' Revolt of 1381, led by Wat Tyler , Jack Cade 's Kent rebellion of 1450, and Wyatt's Rebellion of 1554 against Queen Mary I . The Royal Navy first used

4845-405: The county, which has multiple orchards and allotments. In north-west Kent, industries include aggregate building material extraction, printing and scientific research. Coal mining has also played its part in the county's industrial heritage. The name is of Celtic origin, and dates back to at least the 4th century BC. It is one of the earliest names recorded in Britain, known to the Greeks since

4930-441: The county. The 2024 election saw a sharp decline in support for the Conservatives, and the county is currently represented by eleven Labour MPs, six Conservatives and one Liberal Democrat. At the 2011 census , Kent, including Medway, had 1,727,665 residents (18.0% of which in Medway); had 711,847 households (17.5% of which in Medway) and had 743,436 dwellings (14.8% of which in Medway). 51.1% of Kent's population excluding Medway

5015-435: The entire estuary of the River Thames to the north; the French department of Pas-de-Calais across the Strait of Dover to the south-east; East Sussex to the south-west; Surrey to the west and Greater London to the north-west. The county town is Maidstone . It is the fifth most populous county in England, the most populous non-metropolitan county and the most populous of the Home Counties , an area influenced by

5100-444: The events in The Thirty-Nine Steps . The BBC commissioned a new television adaptation of the novel, scripted by Lizzie Mickery and produced by BBC Scotland 's drama unit. The 90-minute film stars Rupert Penry-Jones , Lydia Leonard , Patrick Malahide and Eddie Marsan , and was first broadcast on 28 December 2008 A romantic subplot was added to the story, featuring Lydia Leonard . The storyline only very tenuously follows that of

5185-404: The explorer Pytheas recorded it as Kantion during his voyage around the British Isles in about 325 BC. As such, it has been claimed as the "oldest recorded name still in use in England." The meaning has been explained as 'coastal district,' 'corner-land' or 'land on the edge' (Welsh cant 'bordering of a circle, tyre, edge;' Breton cant 'circle;' Dutch kant 'side, edge'). In Latin sources

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5270-419: The exposed clay eroded faster than the exposed chalk, greensand, or sandstone. Sevenoaks , Maidstone , Ashford , and Folkestone are built on greensand, while Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells are built on sandstone. Dartford , Gravesend , the Medway towns, Sittingbourne , Faversham , Canterbury , Deal , and Dover are built on chalk. The easterly section of the Wealden dome has been eroded away by

5355-521: The first Archbishop of Canterbury . In the previous year, Augustine successfully converted the pagan King Æthelberht of Kent to Christianity. The Diocese of Canterbury became England's first Episcopal See with first cathedral and has since remained England's centre of Christianity. The second designated English cathedral was for West Kent at Rochester Cathedral . Kent was traditionally partitioned into East and West Kent, and into lathes and hundreds . The traditional border of East and West Kent

5440-449: The head waters of other rivers such as the River Darent . Other rivers of Kent include the River Stour in the east. A 2014 study found that Kent shares significant reserves of shale oil with other neighbouring counties, totalling 4.4 billion barrels of oil , which then Business and Energy Minister Michael Fallon said "will bring jobs and business opportunities" and significantly help with UK energy self-sufficiency. Fracking in

5525-458: The hero within the setting. With a few notable exceptions (such as Baroness Orczy , Leigh Brackett and Marion Zimmer Bradley ) adventure fiction as a genre has been largely dominated by male writers, though female writers are now becoming common. Adventure stories written specifically for children began in the 19th century. Early examples include Johann David Wyss 's The Swiss Family Robinson (1812), Frederick Marryat's The Children of

5610-426: The incidents defy the probabilities, and march just inside the borders of the possible. During an illness last winter I exhausted my store of those aids to cheerfulness, and was driven to write one for myself. This little volume is the result, and I should like to put your name on it in memory of our long friendship, in the days when the wildest fictions are so much less improbable than the facts. The Thirty-Nine Steps

5695-432: The motto Invicta , meaning "undefeated" or "unconquered". The adoption of this motto followed the invasion of Britain by William of Normandy , as he was unable to subdue the county and they negotiated favourable terms. The continued resistance of the Kentish people against the Normans led to Kent's designation as a semi-autonomous county palatine in 1067. Under the nominal rule of William's half-brother Odo of Bayeux ,

5780-444: The newcomers. Of the invading tribes, the Jutes were the most prominent, and the area became a Jutish kingdom recorded as Cantia in about 730 and Cent in 835. The early medieval inhabitants of the county were referred to as the Cantwara , or Kentish people. The city of Canterbury was the largest in Kent. In 597, Pope Gregory I appointed the religious missionary (who became Saint Augustine of Canterbury after his death) as

5865-458: The number to make a better title. When the original oak steps were later replaced, one of them, complete with a brass plaque, was sent to Buchan. The concrete steps now number 108, still running from the garden to the beach. This novel was his first " shocker ", as he called it — a story combining personal and political dramas. It marked a turning point in Buchan's literary career and introduced his adventuring hero Richard Hannay . He described

5950-414: The occupants of the villa and is mortified to find what appears to be a perfectly ordinary group of English friends who have been enjoying a game of tennis in the sun. But then one of the men droops his eyelids in a characteristic gesture that Hannay recognizes — it is the owner of the cottage in Scotland. Hannay blows his whistle, and the spies are arrested before they can reach the yacht. Britain enters

6035-404: The pace of the plot is at least as important as characterization, setting, and other elements of creative work. D'Ammassa argues that adventure stories make the element of danger the focus; hence he argues that Charles Dickens 's novel A Tale of Two Cities is an adventure novel because the protagonists are in constant danger of being imprisoned or killed, whereas Dickens's Great Expectations

6120-498: The plotters hope will trigger war in Europe. Fearing for his life, Scudder has gone to the trouble of faking his own death, and needs to disappear from view. Hannay permits him to hide in his flat, and is horrified when a few days later he returns to find Scudder with a knife through his heart, now truly dead. Determined to warn the government of the plot, but unwilling to go to the police for fear of being arrested for murder, Hannay escapes

6205-520: The postwar period, when Hannay's opponents were criminal gangs. The novel has been adapted for multiple media; many of these versions depart significantly from the text – for example, by introducing a love interest absent from the original novel and inspired by Hitchcock's film. In most cases, the title is often abbreviated to The 39 Steps , but the full title is more commonly used for the book and 1978 film adaptation. The 1935 black-and-white film directed by Alfred Hitchcock deviates substantially from

6290-572: The sea, and cliffs such as the White Cliffs of Dover are present where a chalk ridge known as the North Downs meets the coast. Spanning Dover and Westerham is the Kent Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty . The Wealden dome is a Mesozoic structure lying on a Palaeozoic foundation, which can often create the right conditions for coal formation. This is found in East Kent roughly between Deal, Canterbury, and Dover. The Coal Measures within

6375-587: The seat of the Archbishops of Canterbury since the conversion of England to Christianity that began in the 6th century with Saint Augustine . Rochester Cathedral in Medway is England's second-oldest cathedral. Located between London and the Strait of Dover , which separates England from mainland Europe, Kent has been the setting for both conflict and diplomacy, including the Battle of Britain in World War II and

6460-471: The second set of adventures leading to a final reunion. Variations kept the genre alive. From the mid-19th century onwards, when mass literacy grew, adventure became a popular subgenre of fiction. Although not exploited to its fullest, adventure has seen many changes over the years – from being constrained to stories of knights in armor to stories of high-tech espionage. Examples of that period include Sir Walter Scott , Alexandre Dumas, père , Jules Verne ,

6545-536: The spies will have to cross the Channel to get their information back to Germany, Hannay and the meeting attendees comb Scudder's notebook for clues as to the planned point of departure. An entry reading "Thirty-nine steps — I counted them — High tide, 10.17 p.m." leads them to a clifftop villa in Kent with a private flight of steps — 39 in total — running down to the sea. A yacht waits offshore. Hannay confronts

6630-575: The tradition of the historical adventure. The modern children's adventure novel sometimes deals with controversial issues like terrorism ( Robert Cormier , After the First Death (1979)) and warfare in the Third World ( Peter Dickinson , AK (1990)). Kent Kent is a county in the South East England region, the closest county to continental Europe . It borders Essex across

6715-569: The war, Kent's borders changed several more times. In 1965, the London boroughs of Bromley and Bexley were created from nine towns formerly in Kent. In 1998, Rochester, Strood, Chatham, Gillingham and Rainham left the administrative county of Kent to form the Unitary Authority of Medway . Plans for another unitary authority in north-west Kent were dropped, but in 2016 consultations began between five Kent local authorities (Canterbury, Thanet, Dover, Folkestone & Hythe, and Ashford) with

6800-406: The works of John Buchan , Eric Ambler and Ian Fleming ), science fiction , fantasy , ( Robert E. Howard and J. R. R. Tolkien both combined the secondary world story with the adventure novel) and Westerns . Not all books within these genres are adventures. Adventure fiction takes the setting and premise of these other genres, but the fast-paced plot of an adventure focuses on the actions of

6885-461: Was counting the stairs at St Cuby, a private nursing home on Cliff Promenade in Broadstairs , where Buchan was convalescing. "There was a wooden staircase leading down to the beach. My sister, who was about six, and who had just learnt to count properly, went down them and gleefully announced: there are 39 steps." The tunnelled stairway through the cliff actually consisted of 78 steps, but Buchan halved

6970-625: Was determined by a gavelkind inheritance system that generated a proliferation of small settlements. There was no open-field system, and the large tracts were owned by the two great abbeys, Christ Church, Canterbury and St Augustine's Abbey , that did not pass into the hands of the king during the Reformation . Canterbury Cathedral is the United Kingdom's metropolitan cathedral ; it was founded in AD 598 and displays architecture from all periods. There are nine Anglo-Saxon churches in Kent. Rochester Cathedral

7055-590: Was female — as to Medway, this proportion was 50.4%. The tables below provide statistics for the administrative county of Kent, that is, excluding Medway. At the 2001 UK census , employment statistics for the residents in Kent, including Medway, were as follows: 41.1% in full-time employment, 12.4% in part-time employment, 9.1% self-employed, 2.9% unemployed, 2.3% students with jobs, 3.7% students without jobs, 12.3% retired, 7.3% looking after home or family, 4.3% permanently sick or disabled, and 2.7% economically inactive for other reasons. Of residents aged 16–74, 16% had

7140-572: Was the county's main river, the Medway . Men and women from east of the Medway are Men (or Maids) of Kent, those from the west are Kentishmen or Kentish Maids. The divide has been explained by some as originating in the Anglo-Saxon migrations, with Jutes mainly settling east of the Medway and Saxons settling west of it. In the 11th century, the people of Kent (or Chenth , per the Domesday Book ) adopted

7225-530: Was the first colour version, starring Kenneth More as Hannay and Taina Elg as Miss Fisher. It is closely based on Hitchcock's adaptation, including the music-hall finale with "Mr. Memory" and Hannay's escape from a train on the Forth Bridge , scenes not present in the book. It features a musical score by Clifton Parker . The 1978 version was directed by Don Sharp and starred Robert Powell as Hannay, Karen Dotrice as Alex, John Mills as Colonel Scudder. It

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