Horological Meandering

or maybe more strictly.......probably no; in the case of the Scarpetta series of novels, it seems unlikely that any 'cynical product placement' occured.

Probably the mention of Breguet timepieces in books by various authors is not 'cynical product placement': Stendhal, Mérimée, Pushkin, Balzac, Alexandre Dumas, Thackeray, Victor Hugo, Kuprin, Max Jacob and Patrick O'Brian, as listed in modern advertisements.

The most populist author who took great pains to include detailed descriptions of brands and specifications of cars, watches, clothes, drinks, cigarettes and weapons was Ian Fleming in the James Bond (007) novels. I remember, as a child, asking for Cooper's Oxford Cut Orange Marmalade because that's what 007 ate. I also dreamed of the day when I could have a Sea Island cotton shirt from Turnbull & Asser on Jermyn St, London.

.25 ACP Beretta automatic pistol carried in a light-weight chamois leather holster was changed to a Walther PPK in a Berns-Martin triple-draw holster made of stiff saddle leather.

Bond's cigarettes filled with a blend of Balkan and Turkish tobacco with a higher than average tar content from the tobacconists Morlands of Grosvenor Street were called "Morland Specials."

His champagne of choice was Bollinger in the books but this was carried on a product placement in the films because the Broccoli-Wilson family (film producers) became friends with the Bollinger family.

Bond films are notorious for their product placement, ostensibly because our hero had the newest gadgets and fashionable items before anybody else but recently Citroen, Renault, BMW, Aston Martin, Lotus, Jaguar cars, Rolex/Omega/Seiko watches and Church's shoes have been spotted.

Bulgari watches turn up in Iron Man and Transformers films and JLC graced Bruce Wayne's wrist (The Batman).

The list goes on.......

MTF

..purely cynical product placement, but it does smack of faux 'sophistication' and lazy writing - a way of conveying a certain degree of connoisseurship without having to establish any in the character itself.

It also ages novels, or at minimum securely locks them into a timeframe. I don't enjoy Fleming's novels and I'm unlikely to ever read any Patricia Cornwall, but the effect is the same.

As for watches in books..off the top of my head:

A passage in Carter beats the Devil, in which the author G D Gold describes (if I recall correctly) a pocket chronograph - a description straight out of an internet search, painful if you know what he's on about and inappropriately detailed if you don't (see above for faux sophistication and lazy writing/editing).

The other is Nautilus 90 North by William R Anderson. Anderson was the commander of the first nuclear submarine, USS Nautilus, on Operation Sunshine - a journey under the ice to the North Pole. In the first couple of pages Anderson receives a watch as a gift for his service prior to commanding the Nautilus.

And finally, surely the almost unreadable American Psycho would have some over blown reference to a watch brand, it mentions everything else in excruciating detail - I know that's the point, but it's still bad.

...Patrick Bateman wore the Rolex Datejust on Jubilee.

Cheers,

pplater.

...notable instances where the film is far more enjoyable than the book. I'm still convinced that if the Classification Board hadn't sealed that book in plastic, it would have sold about 8 copies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tm4zUH-Xv_o

Cheers,

pplater.

... the writing is as turgid as it comes:

"Maybe you're familiar with illumination technology? Gaseous tritium, a radioactive isotope that decays and causes the numbers and other markings on the watch to glow so they're easy to read in the dark?..."

I mean, who talks like that??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kngBtoylIVM

dont know what make is it...please enlighten if you know.

Best,

Horo

Derridian (is that a word?) and post-modernist, in which case we might consider Pulp Fiction just another text, I think MB's original post was talking books.

As for the ass watch...from what I've read/seen from screen grabs it was a Lancet.

substance on the dial, I could have made out the brand....

I've made so much reference to pul fiction of late, I'm gonna pull out the DVD tonight

spring to mind.

Jay Lake wrote an alternative-earth trilogy where horology is not only mentioned but a vital plot device: "Mainspring", "Esapement" and "Pinion". 

In "The Grand Complication" by Allen Kurzweil, Breguet's long-lost Marie Antoinette watch is central to the plot. 

Alex

...in "All Tomorrow's Parties", by scifi author William Gibson:

                Fontaine picks up the watch, affords himself a quick squint through the loupe.  Whistles in spite of himself.  “Jaeger-LeCoultre.”  He unsquints, checking; the boy hasn’t moved.  Squints again, this time at the ordnance markings on the caseback.  “Royal Australian Air Force, 1953,” he translates.  “Where’d you steal this?”

                Nothing.

                “This is near mint.” Fontaine feels, all at once, profoundly and unexpectedly lost.  “This a redial?”

                Nothing.

                Fontaine squints through the loupe.  “All original?”

                Fontaine wants this watch.

                He puts it down on the green pad, atop the worn symbol of a golden crown, noting that the black calf band is custom-made, handsewn around bars permanently fixed between the lugs.  This work itself, which he takes to be either Italian or Austrian, may have cost more than some of the watches in his tray.  The boy immediately picks it up.

                Fontaine produces the tray.  “Look here.  You want to trade?  Gruen ‘Curvex’ here.  Tudor ‘London,’ 1948; nice original dial.  Vulcain Cricket here, gold head, very clean.”