Interesting facts about Thirty-Nine Steps

Did you know that in 2003, The Thirty-Nine Steps came 44th in The Observer list of the 100 greatest novels of all time, one above Ulysses and two above Mrs Dalloway, which would have afforded JB a wry smile, since Virginia Woolf was inclined to be rather snooty about the Buchans?

For many years after the Hitchcock film came out, The Thirty-Nine Steps was a Bingo call? ’39, all the steps’?

Did you know that Raymond Chandler remarked that the dedication to Tommy Nelson at the beginning of The Thirty-Nine Steps was a pretty good formula for the thriller of any kind?

How many journalists today would refer to John Buchan in the context of international stories that implicated spies?

1991 saw the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) at the centre of scandal, international intrigue, corruption, terrorism, drugs, and spies.  The Economist (3 Aug. 1991) on “The Opening-Up of BCCI” headlined their article “Send for Richard Hannay”. 

‘Diana’, ‘My Way’

Canadian singer-songwriter Paul Anka (‘Diana’, ‘My Way’) was inspired by JB’s Prester John to write his very first pop song! For the humorous details, watch the first few minutes of this interview with Anka by American talk show host Jimmy Kimmel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUeRNhMCq3M

“Who would be James Joyce if they could be John Buchan?“

When novelist, historian, literary critic and JB scholar Allan Massie died in early 2026, the Telegraph in its obituary of 4 February recorded that he told a young Ian Rankin, struggling with his first novel as it developed into crime fiction, ‘Who would be James Joyce if they could be John Buchan?’

John Buchan was the Chief Scout for Canada

I ..am deeply honoured to be Chief Scout for Canada. I have .known this movement since the very beginning. I knew Lord Baden-Powell in the old days of the South African War, before he had that inspiration of genius – one of the few real inspirations of our time – which led to the great work of his life… [the founding of the Scouting movement]