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Rex Stout and Nero Wolfe

© Linda Kinkead

Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe first appeared in 1934 in a book titled Fer-de-Lance. Wolfe is almost certainly the quirkiest of the hard-boiled detectives of the time. His career, under the guidance of Rex Stout, continued until 1975, the year of Stout's death and the publication of his final Wolfe tale, A Family Affair. Wolfe made a brief reappearance when author Robert Goldsborough took over the series in the late '80s and early '90s. The last Goldsborough book published was Silver Spire in 1994.

Nero Wolfe was born in Montenegro, which became part of Yugoslavia, but with recent territorial disputes in that area, I am not sure in exactly which country Montenegro now lies. Wolfe, himself an obsessive/compulsive person, maintains a household of unusual characters in his brownstone on West 35th Street in New York City. It was a double-width house with seven steps up from the sidewalk. The front door was fitted with one-way glass, the reason for which was never given although it is assumed that Wolfe practiced his private investigation work prior to hiring his live-in assistant, Archie Goodwin, in Fer-de-Lance

All of the tales are related in first person by Archie Goodwin. Despite the often adversarial relationship between the two, it is clear throughout the entire series that there is also a great deal of affection. Wolfe gets mad at Archie and Archie gets mad at Wolfe and life in the brownstone goes on. Archie does most of the legwork on the investigations for Wolfe because Wolfe does not like to leave his abode, nor does he like to have his schedule interupted. Archie seems to have an excellent memory because he can recite interviews back to Wolfe word for word, which allows Wolfe to sit in his chair, close his eyes, and purse his lips to concentrate and come up with the brilliant answers to all of the questions. While Wolfe seldom outwardly acknowledges Archie's accomplishments and more than just occasionally responds to Archie's theories with a "pfui," he could not solve the cases without them and Archie is not above tooting his own horn because he is telling the story. Archie remains a member of the household even when there is no investigation going on. During the idle times Archie catalogs the orchid seeds, opens the mail and generally helps out.

Comment is made in every book describing Wolfe's excessive weight. Because of his large size, he is not easily accomodated in any manner of public transportation and so, in general, he goes nowhere. He has a desk chair which has been custom-made to fit his great bulk. His specific weight is never disclosed in pounds, but he is described as being one seventh of a ton. When you do the math on this, the poundage comes out at around 286 lbs. While this is overweight for the average man, it is not so excessive as to cause all of the problems alluded to throughout this series, but it does add certain levity and begets more than one chuckle and may be caused by his demands for gourmet delights.