Books about Stout/Wolfe

DiskuteraThe Black Orchid (A Nero Wolfe Group)

Bara medlemmar i LibraryThing kan skriva.

Books about Stout/Wolfe

Denna diskussion är för närvarande "vilande"—det sista inlägget är mer än 90 dagar gammalt. Du kan återstarta det genom att svara på inlägget.

1Eurydice
aug 5, 2006, 9:03 pm

Today, I spent a little while browsing other available books on Wolfe and Stout. Dartagnan seems to be the only one of us who's catalogued Stout Fellow or At Wolfe's Door: The Nero Wolfe Novels of Rex Stout. And only a couple of you seem to own Rex Stout: a biography by John McAleer. Nevertheless, my questions:

Am I correct that the biography itself won an Edgar?

Stout Fellow has a marvelous cover - but is it worth buying?

And what exactly do we learn from At Wolfe's Door?

2cogitno
aug 5, 2006, 11:30 pm

Wish I could help, but I've avoided biographies and critical studies in the past: it is damnably difficult to argue with a chapter. The British Crime writer Julian Symons has produced a curious coffee table book about seven notables of the crime genre, of which Nero Wolfe is one. It is titled 'The Great Detectives' (touchstones report the wrong book) , and the Nero Wolfe chapter is in the form of an interview with Archie some time after the Great Mans disappearance.

The other six investigators are Holmes, Marlowe, Maigret, Poirot, Miss Marple, and Ellery Queen. Published in 1981 by Orbis. I doubt it has ever been reprinted. While it is not much more than a curio, I wouldn't part with it. Symons' gall earned him an extra * in my rating ... I'm surprised Archie didn't hit him.

3Eurydice
aug 5, 2006, 11:57 pm

Sounds excellent fun. Amazon has used copies from 22 cents. :) In case anyone else is interested. Maybe I can balance my ownership of the 'wrong' Great Detectives book with the 'right' one!

I also avoided them, but am thinking about biographies of some others - Hammett, Chandler, and Ross MacDonald (here I cite the biographies) - and thought I should look into books about Stout as well. Yet with him, more than most, I am afraid of dispelling too much mystery. Is this just me? And - to those who've read more than a page of biography on him - am I wrong?

I don't think I can lose by knowing more about the others; yet Stout I would hate to reduce too far.

4Linkmeister
aug 6, 2006, 3:04 am

From the Mystery Writers Guild search page:

1978 Best Critical / Biographical Work

Rex Stout John McAleer Little, Brown

I'll be darned. I did not know that.

I read it about the time it was published (I think it was a Christmas gift), and I haven't read it since. I can, however, lay my hands on it easily. I'll have to go back to it and scan (the thing's about 600 pages, and I have enough other books on my unread plate!) for any goodies.

5cogitno
aug 6, 2006, 3:05 am

I probably paid $22.00 in '81.

6Linkmeister
aug 6, 2006, 3:06 am

Oh, one of the reviewers at Amazon calls McAleer's book a hagiography rather than biography. It does contain a ton of minutiae, but for a serious fan I don't think that's a serious problem. "How many days did it take him to write X" is a question I enjoy seeing answered. ;)

7Eurydice
aug 6, 2006, 3:16 am

Hmm... well, I look forward to seeing what you glean for us, Linkmeister. Details are fun, I agree. :)

8jest
aug 6, 2006, 11:10 pm

I really want the biography by McAleer but my local library doesn't have it. Normally I am too frugal to buy books until after I've read them and am certain that I like them but in this case I might make an exception. I've heard nothing but good things about it.

I recently borrowed a book titled "The Brownstone House of Nero Wolfe" by Ken Darby. I didn't care for it at all. It had lots of detail on how Stout's descriptions got shifted about over the years which was interesting but the parts that were entirely Darby's invention really put me off.

9eeminy Första inlägget
aug 10, 2006, 7:29 pm

I'd agree that the McAleer book takes a hagiographic tone, but that wasn't the problem for me. I found it serendipitously in a box filled with old books from a former roommate, and I enjoyed thumbing through it and reading random passages. I did learn a great deal about Stout's life -- you're right, Linkmeister, the details about his writing process and what he was doing as the different books were percolating was fascinating.

But when I tried to read the book as a whole I found that in between the interesting bits are pages and pages of McAleer going off on random tangents of psychological analysis and feeble literary criticism that often don't add to the picture even when they (only sometimes) make sense intrinsically. He's completely hung up on whether Stout wrote himself autobiographically into his characters, if so which ones, what parts of Stout are which, and where they came from in his family history. That merits a few pages, sure, but McAleer gives it nearly the whole book.

It's not a terrible book, but I was disappointed, and I wouldn't want anyone to get their hopes up too high. (It's not in my LT library because 1) I haven't finished entering more than half the collection, including all the Stout, and 2) I gave it to my brother who's another big Stout fan.)

10Eurydice
aug 10, 2006, 10:58 pm

eeminy: thanks for the warning. I'm reading Norman Sherry's biography of Graham Greene - so far only in volume one - and he DID write very autobiographically. But there I don't mind. I find it fascinating. In Stout's case, I have a fan's desire not to see the whole Nero Wolfe world stripped of its magic and its uniqueness too much. Still, I'd love to see more biographical and writing-process details than I have. Whether Linkmeister posts some, or I break down and buy it, that much appeals. :) Perhaps I could read selectively.

11Linkmeister
aug 11, 2006, 2:09 am

"Whether Linkmeister posts some..."

Oh, fine. Put the pressure on. ;)

What would you like to see, Eurydice? Like I said, I can lay my hand on it easily (unlike others in my double-stacked shelves).

12Eurydice
aug 11, 2006, 5:03 pm

No idea, Linkmeister. I'm kind of tired, but anything you find interesting about his life or the work on a particular book would be great. :) Tidbits or stories or whatever. Even something on his orchid 'habit' or his interest in food...

Maybe start it on a new thread? If you have time? (Easing the pressure and sweetening the request, we hope.) It would be most appreciated. :)

13darron.shaffer
aug 24, 2006, 8:50 pm

Hello, all.

I've read somewhere (perhaps in an introduction), that Nero was mentioned in a James Bond novel. But I've never heard which one.

Does anyone here know?

14cogitno
aug 24, 2006, 11:16 pm

In On Her Majesty's Secret Service, there is a mention that both Bond and M have both read Nero Wolfe books. If I can find my copy (problematical), I'll look up the reference and let you know.

15Eurydice
aug 25, 2006, 1:04 am

If you're able, that would be wonderful, cogitno. I don't own any of them. However, I do remember hearing of it, as LisaLynne mentions. The prefaces (to the reprints) are a strong possibility.

16cogitno
aug 25, 2006, 5:05 am

Alas! Had I a fee, I would return it ): It seems that my James Bond paperbacks are no more: likely consigned to a local jumble say. Stout books of mine have never suffered that fate!

I have however located another resource confirming On Her Majesty's Secret Service as the Bond novel in question:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/8907/nero_pop.html

Warning - Rant: As LT was offline when about to make this post, I thought to call the local public library to see whether they held a copy - it is only a 5 minute walk. No copy, what about:

Rex Stout - no copies!
Chandler - 1 copy, out (I'm not surprised it's out)!!
Hammett - no copies!!!
Josephine Tey - one copy of one book!!!!
Ross or John D. Macdonald - no copies!!!!!
John Fowles - no copies!!!!!!
John Dos Passos - no copies!!!!!!!

Yes, I did ask the obvious question ... "You do lend books?". Had the librarian made a reference to Grapefruit (Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep - Chapter IV), I would have rung off happy. The reply was rather unkind ... I suppose I deserved it. But , but I found Stout, Chandler, Hammett, Fowles and Dos Passos (amongst others) at my local library when a teenager. It doesn't seem right?

17Wombat
Redigerat: aug 25, 2006, 8:32 am

I also remember reading about a Nero Wolfe and James Bond. Whatever the reference was, I recall that it said Ian Fleming approached Rex Stout about writing a collaborative novel, with James Bond, Nero Wolfe, and Archie Goodwin. Stout declined, and commented that if they did, Bond would have to get the girl, and Archie wouldn't like that.

I think that article went on to say that Fleming included Wolfe in a James Bond story anyway, having Bond pay a visit at West 35th Street in one of the short stories.

I don't think they mentioned the short story. I went out and bought (and read) one or two collections of Fleming's short stories, but didn't find Nero Wolfe in them.

I'm really stretching my memory here, since I must have read this about 20 years ago...

18cogitno
aug 25, 2006, 10:18 am

There are two sources for the Fleming / Stout collaboration story. I cannot absolutely confirm either of them, as I have neither of the books / editions referred to. The first is a quote from from William S. Baring-Gould's forward to Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street:

Stout considers the late Ian Fleming to have been a good storyteller too, but he turned down Fleming's suggestion that M, James Bond, Nero Wolfe, and Archie Goodwin should all appear together in the same novel. "Bond would have gotten all the girls," Stout admits ruefully.

The second is from the 50th Anniversary (US) edition of Fer-de-Lance. The article by John McAleer is titled 'Nero Wolfe: A Retrospective'. It states:

Ian Fleming introduced Nero Wolfe into a James Bond thriller and asserted that Stout's was 'one of the most civilized minds ever to concern itself with detective fiction.' He asked Rex to collaborate with him on a Wolfe and Bond novel. 'No,' said Rex, 'Bond would get the girl. Archie wouldn't like that.

The thriller referred to is On her Majesty's Secret Service.

Perhaps owners of either the anniversary edition or 'biography' can validate my indirect sources.

19Wombat
Redigerat: aug 25, 2006, 12:21 pm

I have the Baring-Gould book. I'll check it when I get home this evening. Linkmeister and Oroborous, who both post here, also have copies. Maybe one of them will be able to dig up the reference before I can.

I can't see a way to determine which of the 91 owners of Fer-de-lance might have the anniversary edition. Otherwise we could ask them about it.

20Wombat
Redigerat: aug 25, 2006, 9:43 pm

Cogitno,

Your quotation from Baring-Gould's introduction is accurate. It's an excerpt from a section describing Rex Stout's taste in books. This includes a variety of tid-bits, such as

In Stout's own view, "the last dozen books I've seen which deal with literature in the English language in the last century almost never mention the book that I would rather have written than any other one book in our language in the last century, Alice in Wonderland." A close second is T.E. Lawrence's The Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

When it comes to crime-mystery-detective fiction, Stout thinks Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon is "the best detective story... written in this century." When it comes to the spy thriller, he likes a couple of Graham Greene's. And The Spy Who Came in from the Cold "and at least half a dozen other spy stories are just about as good storytelling as you'll find anywhere. But they aren't detective stories."

Of course, as is well known, Stout has a boundless admiration for the late Sir Arthur Conan Doyle... and he is the author of the all-time high in Holmsian spoofery, a "slight monograph" called "Watson was a Woman." In this he used an acrostic, made up from the initial letters of eleven of the adventures to spell out IRENE WATSON. (Irene Adler was always, to Sherlock Holmes, *the* woman.) It was Stout's contention that she become Mrs. Sherlock Holmes, also known as the entirely fictitious "John Hamish Watson, M.D."

At least half of Stout's current reading material consists of books he has read before---Sherlock Holmes, of course, and Shakespeare's
sonnets, which he has committed to memory and which he considers the most nearly perfect use of words in the English language. Yeats, he feels, is the only poet of our own century to whom the word "great" may be accorded.


Since this thread is nominally about books on Stout and/or Wolfe, I guess I should also add something about Baring-Gould's book, Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street.

The avid fan of Nero Wolfe will find little new information in this book. Most of the chapters are devoted to describing the characters and the books. I find it most useful as a reference. It was originally published in 1969, while Stout was still alive and publishing, so it does not include information about the last couple novels.

Baring-Gould also includes a brief biography of Rex Stout, and several chapters that try to piece together what we know about Wolfe and Archie's lives before the books. This leads to some tenuous speculations about their parentage and possible relationship---amusing, but, to my mind, so speculative as to be fantasy.

21cogitno
aug 26, 2006, 12:50 am

Wombat,

Thanks for that, Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street seems like a worthwhile addition to my Library.

I can't help thinking that Stout had reasons other than that reported for not collaborating - perhaps there was a fair bit of Nero Wolfe in him. Archie not get the girl, come-on, maybe not the "bad girls", but that is a very, very tiny portion of the population. Had Miss Moneypenny met Archie, she would have transferred to Universal Exports New York office.

22Eurydice
aug 26, 2006, 1:09 am

Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street seems like a worthwhile addition to my Library.

And mine.

He has rather nice taste, Stout does. What I wonder is whether a) he had an inborn disinclination to collaborate, or b) didn't think Ian Fleming truly up to snuff. That Archie wouldn't have gotten a 'Bond girl' is one thing; but it has nothing to do with the main point. Whatever else Stout and Wolfe shared, a capacity for evasiveness seems to be on the list.

23Eurydice
Redigerat: aug 26, 2006, 1:16 am

Or perhaps I'm wrong. I do find it hard to imagine James Bond and Archie Goodwin walking and talking together without Archie skewering Bond's supposed perfections, pretensions, and so forth. This would not go down well with Fleming, I'm thinking.

24Linkmeister
aug 26, 2006, 6:57 pm

Not exactly a book, but this website creator has done a heckuva job drawing the brownstone and its interiors. I ran across this four or five years ago and had forgotten about it.

25Wombat
Redigerat: aug 27, 2006, 1:45 am

Linkmeister: Fascinating link.

Since I've been quoting from Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street lately, I'll add this tid-bit---also from the forward---about Stout's fan mail.

He (Stout) had to make a sketch map of the ground floor of Wolfe's home because he got so many requests from people who asked exactly what that ground floor looked like.

Later, the book includes a simple floor plan of the ground floor, which I have to assume is based on Stout's sketch. The rough layout is similar to that in the website Linkmeister refers to. But proportions are different. The dining room and the kitchen are bigger, and the office and front room are smaller.

I have to admit that I've always been a bit puzzled by Wolfe's brownstone. The description of the ground floor doesn't resemble any New York brownstone I've been in. Brownstones are basically middle-class row houses. Sort of like these. As you can see in the picture, each house is only three windows wide. So, in my mind, you can't "fit" Wolfe's house in there. A brownstone isn't wide enough to have a hall running front-to-back in the house with the office on one side and the dining room across from it!

Hmmm. What did the exterior of Wolfe's house look like in the A&E series? I've really got to rent/buy that one of these days.

Oh well. It doesn't make the books any less fun!

Has anyone read The Brownstone House of Nero Wolfe by Ken Darby? I don't know anything about it except the title.

26cogitno
Redigerat: aug 27, 2006, 8:38 am

Thanks Wombat. I had always imagined Brownstones to be grander.

Stout's own sketch is reproduced in an appendix to the 1995 Readers Digest edition of Fer-De-Lance, published by permission of Bantam. My copy is one of a boxed set of 4 pb's. I had always assumed it was a standard Bantam, and only noticed the Readers Digest association recently. My immediate trepidation was relieved when I found the statement that "not one word has been omitted".

The appendix also includes a note headed "Confidential Memo from Rex Stout, September 15 1949", which gives Stout's physical description of Wolf, Archie, and the Office, in addition to the sketch. The office is nearly square. I don't suppose Rex Stout considered the microscopic examination that the office would be subjected to over future years.

I am reluctant to reproduce the descriptions here for obvious reasons. A solicitor (lawyer)acquaintance advised against it over lunch today. I am however, open to suggestions?

A third person drawn reproduction of Stout's sketch is reproduced (with great fidelity) here:

http://www.avenarius.sk/stout/

The appendix also includes three panes from a Nero Wolf (by Rex Stout) cartoon released 26 November 1956. Archie looks like Dick Tracy while Wolfe looks .... fat

27Eurydice
Redigerat: aug 27, 2006, 5:30 pm

The brownstones shown were in Harlem. I imagine Wolfe's, however narrow, was a good deal nicer... within reasonable limits.

In an early book, Archie gives clues to his own appearance: he says, with apparent scorn, that he is NOT like Clark Gable; Gary Cooper was closer. Though even there, not quite right. Personally, I'd substitute modern actors (I don't like Gary Cooper very much, anyway) and say the point is that he's not a pretty boy type, nor anyone he sees as servile in some way. Cary Grant is another comparison he probably would have rejected, ten years later. Both he and Gable had the capacity for some of Archie's spirit, but diverged considerably. Though I enjoy them, I can see why Archie would not relish the comparison.

Again, I remember the gist and not the source, except that it came in the thirties, when both men were major stars of the moment, and not yet the legends they became.

28cogitno
Redigerat: aug 27, 2006, 10:55 pm

Rose Lasher talking to in Black Orchids (chapter 6) refers to Archie as:

"... maybe it was that 10 cent Clark Gable there that thinks he's so slick he can slide uphill."

..which is just a wonderful phrase! Archie then goes on to say that say that he is more apt to look like Gary Cooper, though he doesn't really resemble any actor. Stout's and Archie's own descriptions have been unable to shift my own prejudice in seeing Archie as a 1950's William Holden.

Thanks for the Brownstone touchstone. Maybe Wolfe had a "double-width" house. I can't imagine him in one so narrow.

29Eurydice
aug 27, 2006, 10:57 pm

Maybe Wolfe had a "double-width" house. I can't imagine him in one so narrow.

My thoughts exactly.

Clearly I haven't read Black Orchids recently. :) But it is a favorite of mine. My thanks, cogitno.

I'm rolling Holden around on my mental palate a bit. I can see it. Possibly not my first choice, but a very good one. He had the smart-aleck, humorous, sometimes charming-but-also tough mix Archie needs. (And light hair, as Stout saw him.) A lot of the possibilities are simply too hardboiled: they don't have the sense of humor and lightness Archie does, even when they're deft with irony and some kinds of wit. At least that's my own take, and my own quibble with a lot of actors who imaginatively or actually are tried for the part.

I did like Timothy Hutton enormously, though. :)

30Eurydice
aug 27, 2006, 10:59 pm

And, yes - 'ten-cent Clark Gable' IS a great phrase of derision. Wow.

31Eurydice
aug 27, 2006, 10:59 pm

Det här meddelandet har tagits bort av dess författare.

32cogitno
aug 27, 2006, 11:13 pm

I should buy a lottery ticket. I had assumed Black Orchid was the likely source solely on the basis that you had named this group after it, and had previously declared it as one of your favourites; hence, therefore and thus, the incidents in it were reasonably fresh in your memory! It took maybe 3 minutes to find the reference on the basis of that "logic".

Maybe I shouldn't buy that ticket. Maybe this was my luck for the year. :(

Loved the TV series, but thought it was almost a stage rather than TV production ... overacted. The sets were superb; really gave a sense of the time and space.

33Eurydice
aug 27, 2006, 11:44 pm

Yes; but I think it was meant to give a sense of repertory theatre; so I didn't mind too much. It highlights the similarity of so many 'stock' characters in Stout, and the fact that he's not a gritty 'realist' as much as a stylist. (Rather like Wodehouse, who, as I recall, was a good friend.) Once in a while it was just too much, of course - but I liked it anyway. And the sets, by and large, were indeed superb.

Excellent guessing, even if I haven't read it lately. :) Black Orchids was one of my first five Wolfe books, and a favorite I've read more than many of the others. You can safely bet the details impressed me more strongly than average, whether from freshness, repetition, or sheer enjoyment. The title is recognizable, Wolfian and great; so I 'stole' it.

I'm not one for betting, but your 'luck' has stood you in good stead so far....

34Linkmeister
aug 28, 2006, 5:55 pm

I think the A&E production was indeed meant to give the feel of repertory. I think Hutton even said so somewhere; that's why there was a recurring cast of actors playing different parts in different stories.

35pechmerle
Redigerat: okt 12, 2006, 4:24 am

Eurydice, I don't think that Wodehouse and Stout ever met. Wodehouse read Stout, and some other mystery writers, over breakfast as relaxation before beginning his own writing day, in the 1960's. My source for that is McCrum's recent bio of Wodehouse. But that is the only reference to Stout in the bio. McCrum is truly encyclopedic in his cataloguing of who Wodehouse knew, saw, kept up with, etc., and his book is intensively indexed.

Wodehouse did contribute a foreword to John McAleer's bio of Stout. I haven't seen that, so I don't know if it was a purely literary appreciation or there was some personal relationship described.

There is some internet commentary that the two writers were mutual admirers and regular correspondents. But no sources are given for these comments.

36Eurydice
Redigerat: okt 12, 2006, 2:29 am

Interesting, pechmerle; thank you. I did read, somewhere, that they were correspondents or friends, but cannot vouch for, nor even remember, the source.

I'd love to read the Wodehouse biography, eventually. As with Stout. Perhaps they'll meet, rub shoulders, or spend the time together on my bookshelves which they didn't in person. :)

37Eurydice
okt 12, 2006, 4:30 am

As others here probably have the McAleer bio of Stout, perhaps they could enlighten us?

38cogitno
Redigerat: okt 12, 2006, 6:17 am

I don't have the John McAleer biography, but my copy of Death Times Three (Bantam, December 1985 Printing) has an introduction by him. In it McAleer quotes a letter that P. G. Wodehouse wrote to him:

"He {Rex Stout} passes the supreme test of being rereadable. I don't know how many times I've reread the Nero Wolfe stories, but plenty. I know exactly what is coming, and how it is going to end, but it doesn't matter. That's writing."

Wodehouse was nighty-four when he wrote the letter. McAleer showed it to Stout; Stout was an admirer of Wodehouse, and was pleased to with the compliment. I don't suppose that the letter constitutes proof one way or the other, but it sort of implies mutual admiration and, perhaps, occasional correspondence, rather than friendship.

I would ask the question on the Wodehouse group, but I would feel like a sneak doing so ..... I dislike the Psmith books with a passion.

Edited spelling ... almost had to edit "Edited".

39Eurydice
okt 12, 2006, 9:57 am

Thanks, cogitno. I don't, personally, need anything proved; what it does do is render both the silences and assertions explicable.

40pechmerle
okt 12, 2006, 10:52 pm

It would be interesting to actually know though. I'm really curious what Wodehouse wrote in that foreword to the bio of Stout. If I see it in a used bookstore, I'm going to have to give the foreword a quick read right there.

On a Stout-fans web site, I saw a comment suggesting some kinship between the tone of the wise-cracking Archie Goodwin and Wodehouse's characters. Certainly the Stout world is something of a cross between detective novel and comedy of manners. Wolfe's tony brownstone, hyper gourmet tastes, orchid growing -- nothing else like that (that I can recall ) in American mystery fiction. And interesting that it appealed to Wodehouse.

41Sackler
nov 18, 2006, 4:05 pm

Has anyone noticed how often Wolfe, who "never leaves his house" actually leaves his house?
Then there is the difficult question of Wolfe's birthplace: he's supposed to be, at different times, born in Serbia and a native citizen of the US.
I didn't care for the A&E productions: not fat enough, and Timothy Hutton TOO midwest: maybe he's no Gary Cooper, but there ought to be some real smoothness there.
btw, Harlem brownstones are pretty much the same as any other brownstones, with the exception of some in the side streets between 5th and Park. I haven't seen any of the floor plans mentioned above, but brownstones could have a small front room off the hall, with a larger room beyond it, and two small rooms beyond that--but access to those smaller rooms is through the larger room, I think. In a normal brownstone, the dining room is the front room of the basement, with the kitchen behind it (and a back yard beyond that). You get to the ground floor by way of the stoop (some of the Dutch words never went away); kids who lived in brownstones played stoop ball against the steps--probably still do.
It seems fairly likely that the West 35th Street address is practically in the Hudson River--remember that Macy's occupies 35th St all the way to 7th Avenue, and then 35th Street isn't very residential beyond that.

42MrsLee
nov 19, 2006, 1:56 am

Hmmm...I just typed a very long, to me, note, and when I tried to submit it, it disappeared into the ether. Why would that happen?
I'll try again. I'm new here, and trying not to break any rules, but since I don't know what they are, I might. Is it OK to talk about the A&E shows in this thread? Is that what this is called, or is it a message board? I enjoyed the TV shows for what they were. They were not movies. More like short plays. The first two or three rubbed me the wrong way, but after that they were better. At first Wolfe was to active and bombastic. Hutton wasn't exactly my ideal Archie, but I could swallow him as such. It's been a while since I've watched them, but I think I didn't care for Saul in them. It seems to me that they changed him and it got better. I enjoyed the same actors playing the various characters week after week.
I have a copy of The Nero Wolfe Cookbook, amusing to read, but I haven't tried anything except for the scrambled eggs recipe. Wolfe obviously wasn't a parent.

43Eurydice
nov 20, 2006, 9:32 am

You won't believe this. I wrote that I didn't know why messages disappear, but meant to copy mine, when long, to be on the safe side. Only I didn't copy it. And it did disappear.

I can't redo it right now, but the most urgent piece was to tell you, MrsLee, not to worry. The only rule you could break is that of courtesy. There are conventions, but I have no doubt you will pick them up, or we will help. It takes a little while to get oriented, sometimes, but you seem to be doing more than fine. No one, in any case, is going to be much upset if you do something other than what we expect, or usually would. The group members are very nice people, believe me. :) So, as I said, don't worry. We're glad to have you.

I usually do call these threads, whatever Tim would prefer.

44ostrom
mar 23, 2008, 10:17 pm

Yes, I usually call these "threads," too, but I don't know if that's correct. Messages do disappear at times, and some books simply refuse to be highlighted in blue, even when you know you have the title exactly right and when the title appears elsewhere on LT.

45AdonisGuilfoyle
mar 31, 2008, 2:54 pm

I'm just playing catch-up, and my version of this page seems to have amnesia, so I'm picking up on a two year old post! Pardon me.

Anyway - if anybody notices this post, what does 'too midwest' (Stickler's review of the A+E series, message 41) imply about Hutton's Archie? I'm from the UK. Does it mean he played him as too innocent/too rough/too funny?

Thanks if anyone can travel back in time for a moment to help me out!

46MrsLee
mar 31, 2008, 4:23 pm

Sorry Adonis, it means nothing to me, I'm from California, probably about as far away from New York as you are. Not sure though, why being a Midwest character would be a problem for Archie. He was from the Midwest and not a native New Yorker. Not sure what is meant by "smoothness". However, I do consider Archie to have smooth manners and suavity, more so than he did in the TV series, I just never related that to Midwest vs. NY.

Now that we are picking at Sackler, :) (We're not, Sackler, just talking), he mentions that Wolfe was born in Serbia (?) but a native US citizen. I don't remember Wolfe ever saying he was a native, but that he became a citizen or was a naturalized citizen, I'm not sure which.

47AdonisGuilfoyle
mar 31, 2008, 4:45 pm

Thanks! No, I wasn't picking, either - just wondered if 'Midwest' was a sort of insult ;) I think there are two strands to Archie's character - the 'ten cent Clark Gable' act, and a deeper innocence/insecurity that might fall under the Midwest category. He drinks milk, he's very home-orientated, even if 'home' is not necessarily where he was born, he has a strong moral streak (except when it comes to his job, then anything goes!), and he's a very neat and particular personality. I think that is what Hutton brought to the fore, with the obnoxious ladies' man act as a thin veneer.

As to Wolfe, is it Black Mountain where Stout had to alter his background, so as to please a wartime audience? In every other book, he was born in Montenegro, but in BM, he's an American citizen.

48MrsLee
mar 31, 2008, 4:59 pm

#47 - I'm really not sure about the whole citizenship thing. I've never paid that close attention. I just had the impression that he became a citizen and was very grateful to and admiring of America. Of course if he was a naturalized citizen, he would have had to give up his Montenegrin citizenship, but during Black Mountain, was Montenegro part of Yugoslavia? My European history knowledge is in broad strokes, I'm not so good on dates and details. :)

I don't know how Sackler meant it, but Midwest, at its worst, carries the idea of a rube with a piece of hay in his mouth. Just as California is full of surfers and potheads. :)

I like your description of Archie's character.

49DANNIELTANNA
maj 21, 2008, 12:41 pm

To MrsLee. About Montenegro.

I'll try to translate to your languaje:

1918 after WWI: Montenegro and Servia made an union and created Yugoslavia, but with Montenegro autonomy ideas the comunism was sucessfull

In WWII, Yugoslavia was invaded first by Fascist Italy and then by the Nazy German and Montenegro had a sort and blood autonomy. At january 6th., the country was liberated by the comunist partisans and was reintegrated to Yugoslavia as Socialist Republic of Montenegro with a new capital at Pogdorica which name was changed by Titogrado

50MrsLee
maj 22, 2008, 2:46 pm

Thank you DANNIELTANNA, that was pretty clear. What is your native language? I think you do very well in English if it's not your own.

51DANNIELTANNA
maj 23, 2008, 8:06 am

I am from Spain, but now i have started to read Nero Wolfe in English and then improving a lot

52MrsLee
maj 23, 2008, 2:58 pm

Thank you, I'm glad you've joined us. Have you read Stout in Spanish? I wonder, does it translate well? The Nero Wolfe books seem to me to be so American with lots of idioms, that's why I'm wondering.

53Eurydice
maj 23, 2008, 3:10 pm

And the rhythm of Archie's voice might be hard to convey; though I'd love to think a good translator could (as with books I cannot otherwise read, myself). DANNIELTANNA, you are, indeed, welcome.

Archie's from Ohio, and I think he's got the blend of that and New York toughness down. Hutton seemed very good, to me. Nice descriptions from you both, AdonisGuilfoyle and MrsLee.

Wolfe, in my memory, floundered around on the citizenship and birth angle. At some point, I believe he said he was native to the U.S., but in general the books seem to have portrayed Montenegrin birth and youth, with naturalized citizenship, and a critical admiration for the United States.

54MrsLee
maj 23, 2008, 11:49 pm

Eurydice - critical admiration

What a great phrase! I think that describes my feeling about America as well. Love it to pieces, but am not blind to its faults.

55Eurydice
maj 24, 2008, 2:53 am

Thank you. :) I'm critical enough to be more tepid on generalities than I'd like; though many ideas, ideals, and specific regions win loyalty or acclaim.

56DANNIELTANNA
maj 25, 2008, 4:30 am

Thank you for the welcome.

About read in Nero Wolfe in Spanish, yes, i have read it fisrt in Spanish ( i have Nero Wolfe books in my languaje since i was 15th, he is one my favourites detectives since them)

I am checking now if they are wel translated (because i am reading them in English :-))

There are some errors: some in the tittles: for example Mother hunt has been translated as mother hunter. Another important thing is we have different words for the female and the male, then sometimes some word is dificult to translate, for example friend (amigo: male, amiga:female) and in some books Archie says to go to the theatre or something with a friend and sometimes it'is translated as a male and sometimes as a female... believe me i can't imagine Archie going to the theatre with a man.

I am preparing an Spanish-English Nero Wolfe page... i'll write about this in it.

57pechmerle
maj 25, 2008, 4:50 am

DanielTanna, how did you discover the LibraryThing web site?

58DANNIELTANNA
maj 25, 2008, 12:51 pm

The last week i checked in the Wolfe Pack and i found a link to this group in the Home Page News

59DANNIELTANNA
maj 25, 2008, 12:52 pm

I really don't understand yet how the page is working but i understand this group, then i am in :-)

60Moovyz
maj 25, 2008, 7:16 pm

welcome!

61etrainer
maj 27, 2008, 1:42 pm

Can anyone explain this recommendation from LT?

# Delmore Schwartz : the life of an American poet by James Atlas
23 copies. 1 reviews. Average rating 4. Why? (close why) Recommendation based on:
Over My Dead Body by Rex Stout
Prisoner's Base by Rex Stout
The rubber band by Rex Stout
Too many women : a Nero Wolfe novel by Rex Stout

Obviously I know nothing about Delmore Schwartz nor James Atlas. May a little research is called for, or maybe one of you know . . .

62MrsLee
maj 27, 2008, 7:47 pm

After several Google searches, I would say that the recommendation page needs some tweaking.

Other than the fact that he was born in New York and was active writing modern poetry at the same time Stout was writing his mysteries, I see no connection!

This is a perfect example of the reason that I only listen to recommendations from people I know, and know their reading tastes as well. :)

I tried to play in the recommendations earlier, but it wouldn't let me.

63saxhorn
jul 23, 2008, 2:37 pm

I'm coming to this discussion late, even by
AdonisGuilfoyle's standards (March 2008). I, too, disagree with Stickler about Archie's character. I'm from Ohio, and know Chillicothe, Archie's birthplace. It's a small industrial city about an hour sw of Columbus.

Archie was also a highly respected Major in the US Army, I think in Intelligence. I assume that Archie's hand-to-hand combat proficiency comes form his military training. His military background would also account for his lean frame. Wikipedia has a wonderful drawing of him from one of the novels. The drawing seems to look pretty similar to Tim Hutton.

I'm surprised that someone would think of Gary Cooper as smoother than Archie (or Tim Hutton). What roles are you referring to? Certainly not Meet John Doe, The Fountainhead or High Noon.

64Eurydice
Redigerat: jul 24, 2008, 2:27 am

Without re-reading every post, if you mean my reference, it's to something read in one of the early Wolfe books. Not to my own opinion. The point seemed to be Archie's manner and attractiveness being less slick than a flashy imitation Clark Gable. And that Cooper certainly is.

Perhaps Archie wanted to be a rather dashing, capable, strong and irresistible kind of guy? One who could carry off style, without primping. And at least a touch more modest than Gable, if not in Cooper territory. (More as Cooper was cast, and seen by contemporaries, in the 1930s.) The line was published in 1938. So, we're talking anything from the readers' memories of Wings, through Morocco in 1930, with Marlene Dietrich, A Farewell to Arms, The General Died at Dawn (set in China; a film I remember liking weirdly, at 15), Lives of a Bengal Lancer, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, through a couple of early Westerns, historical films, risque comedies, romances, etc.

(At least Archie - God bless him - could Talk!)