# Rex Stout **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 23, 2001, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901 "2001-11-23T16:06:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2001, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/1 "2001-11-23T16:06:56Z")
Which is the Nero Wolfe novel in wich Arnold Zeck is killed? ---
**Author:** ![jcgmoi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a9adbd/32.png) [@jcgmoi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jcgmoi)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2001, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/2 "2001-11-23T19:11:33Z")
_In the Best Families._[See.](http://www.geocities.com/Athens/8907/nero.html#adir) ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2001, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/3 "2001-11-23T20:44:52Z")
Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2001, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/4 "2001-11-24T06:10:03Z")
If you can find it, please pick up the trilogy _Triple Zeck_. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2001, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/5 "2001-11-24T21:26:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Czarcasm \* > \*\*_Triple Zeck_. \*\* That’s what I’m reading now. I always expect the plot to whack Zeck to be much longer than it is. I also misremember the last lines as being Wolfe telling Archie to get some partridges started on blueberries, and Archie begging him not to start eating again. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2001, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/6 "2001-11-24T22:31:38Z")
As supervillians go, Zeck always seemed very disappointing. His three wicked plans are fairly tame, IIRC. And he was pretty easily bamboozled by Archie, like, how stupid can a super-villain be? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2001, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/7 "2001-11-24T23:01:32Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by C K Dexter Haven \* > \*\*His three wicked plans are fairly tame, IIRC. \*\* Having not read them all again yet, the black mail scan from \* And Be A Villian \* had beauty in it’s tamness and simplicity. It was only when someone was truly guilty of the accusation that it went awry. Nero Wolfe is like James Bond in that you shouldn’t intimidate him; whack him right away, don’t mess with the phone calls. Then you can confound Archie with a Captain Crunch Decoder Ring or an explosive inflatible floozie. BTW that’s why I started with orchids, the CPs came later. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2001, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/8 "2001-11-25T03:33:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by C K Dexter Haven \* > **As supervillians go, Zeck always seemed very disappointing.** Yeah, but it was worth putting up with him just for the unforgettable image of Lily Rowan making out with Wolfe in the backseat of a car. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/9 "2001-11-27T15:20:33Z")
Is it just me, or do the Wolfe stories seem “cold” to you? Archie, who is superficially charming, is really quite hardhearted & cynical, and of course Wolfe gave up on the human race long ago. I’ve read them all, and enjoyed them, but I don’t like Archie and Wolfe nearly as well as I like the Literary Doctor and the Great Detective… ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/10 "2001-11-27T15:52:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rocketeer \* > \*\* do the Wolfe stories seem “cold” to you? \*\* Archie is the hard boiled school, like Phillip Marlowe and Sam Spade, although the stories are written more from the Agatha Christie style than the Chandler or Hammett. There is also the cultural difference of Victorian England and WWII America. As for Wolfe, there are some who say Holmes is his Daddy, although I can’t see “The Woman” in Montenagro. Wolfe’s schtick as you said is that he is remote from people. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/11 "2001-11-27T16:06:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by carnivorousplant \* > \*\*the cultural difference of Victorian England and WWII America…As for Wolfe, there are some who say Holmes is his Daddy, although I can’t see “The Woman” in Montenagro. \*\* Was that Bernard DeVito who came up with that wacky theory? Or William Baring-Gould? As to the first point, remember that the Wolfe stories were published between 1934 and 1974, and always reflected the world in which they were written…Archie was in uniform in the early '40s and stopped wearing hats by the mid-sixties, for example. To my mind, the best of the series were written during the 1930s (THE LEAGUE OF FRIGHTENED MEN, TOO MANY COOKS, e.g.), so I tend to think of the whole Canon as '30s novels. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/12 "2001-11-27T16:09:31Z")
VOTO. Bernard De VOTO. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/13 "2001-11-27T16:21:46Z")
I think it’s writing style. Hammett wrote in the 20’s, Chandler in the 40’s; Archie is more of an observer who reports to Wolfe (and gives us ‘clues’). In the later books there is even an admission that ‘the books’ are ‘real’. Hmmm, Watson did that, too…Maybe Watson is Archie’s Grandfather. 🙂 Archie isn’t really an action guy, he’s an observer and cataloguer. There is much more description in Stout’s stuff and less action altogether than the ‘hardboiled’ school. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/14 "2001-11-27T16:57:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by carnivorousplant \* > \*\*Archie isn’t really an action guy, he’s an observer and cataloguer. \*\* Yeah, but if you try to pull any funny stuff in Wolfe’s office, Archie’ll have you slapped down and your ass back in that red leather chair quicker than shit through a goose. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2001, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rex-stout/94901/15 "2001-11-27T17:09:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ukulele Ike \* > **slapped down… in that red leather chair…** Indeed, and to violate logic: He will never shoot Canino six times in the gut, and when he does, the of the theatre will not applaud. Bogie, the Big Sleep. They clapped at at that scene when I saw it at the Arts Center.