Quotes from Rex Stout

I understand the technique of eccentricity; it would be futile for a man to labor at establishing a reputation for oddity if he were ready at the slightest provocation to revert to normal action.

Every man alive is half idiot & half hero. Only heroes could survive in this maelstrom & only idiots would want to.

More people saying what they believe would be a great improvement. Because I often do I am unfit for common intercourse.-Nero Wolfe in "Blood Will Tell

When we turned right on Thirty-fifth Street our suffix came along. By the time we rolled to the curb in front of Wolfe's house there wasn't even hyphen between us.

Nothing is obvious in itself. Obviousness is subjective.

It strikes me, sir, that you are nearing the point where even a grateful American might tell you to go to the devil.-Nero Wolfe to an FBI Agent

Probably my conception of a widow was formed in my early boyhood in Ohio, from a character called Widow Rowley, who lived across the street. I have known others since, but the conception has not been entirely obliterated, so there is always an element of shock when I meet a female who has been labeled widow and I find that she has some teeth, does not constantly mutter to herself, and can walk without a cane.

Everything about her, the way she walked, the way she stood, her eyes and mouth and whole face, seemed to be saying, without trying or intending to, that if you happened to be hers, and she yours, life would be full of pleasant and interesting surprises.

You can't base your actions on the theory that anyone you don't keep your eye on is apt to get killed.

If your ego is in good shape you will pretend you're surprised if a National Chairman calls you to tell you his party wants to nominate you for President of the United States, but you're not really surprised.

She had been a pleasant surprise. From what her father had said I had expected an intellectual treat in a plain wrapper, but the package was attractive enough to take your attention off of the contents....she was not in any way hard to look at, and those details which had been first disclosed when she appeared in her swimming rig were completely satisfactory.

but I had long since learned from Wolfe that the corner the light doesn't reach is the one the dime rolled to.

To pronounce French properly you must have within you a deep antipathy, not to say scorn, for some of the most sacred of the Anglo-Saxon prejudices.

Mrs. Rachel Bruner: [trying to goad Wolfe] I thought you were afraid of nobody and nothing. Nero Wolfe: [unruffled] I can dodge folly without backing into fear.

I suspected the movies, considering her cheap crack about me being a ten-cent Clark Gable, which was ridiculous. He simpers, to begin with, and to end with no one can say I resemble a movie actor, and if they did it would be more apt to be Gary Cooper than Clark Gable.

The avoidance of idiocy should be the primary and constant concern of every intelligent person," - Nero Wolfe

This is the unluckiest day I've had since my rich uncle changed doctors.

Courtesy is one's own affair, but decency is a debt to life

If you collected all the good faith in this room right now you might fill a teaspoon.

if he had married Mrs. Albert Grantham for her money I freely admit that no man marries without a reason and with her it would have been next to impossible to think up another one....

If you want to be contentious wait until you learn what you have to contend with. It works better that way.

Wolfe scowled at her. I could see he was torn with conflicting emotions. A female in his kitchen was an outrage. A woman criticizing his or Fritz's cooking was an insult. But corned beef hash was one of life's toughest problems, never yet solved by anyone.

I could have told, just looking at him, that that was the tone he would use asking a question. A tone that took it for granted any question he asked was going to be answered because he asked it. I don't like it and I know of no way anybody is ever going to make me like it.

He was as indignant and irritated as if he had been served a veal cutlet with an egg perched on it.