Character
Nancy Drew is a fictional amateur sleuth. In the original versions of the series she was a 16-year-old high school student, and in later versions rewritten to be an 18-year-old detective. In the series, she lives in the fictional town of River Heights with her father, attorney Carson Drew, and their housekeeper, Hannah Gruen. As a child she lost her mother (at age 10 in the original versions; at age 3 in the later versions). As a teenager she spends her time solving mysteries, some of which she stumbles upon and some of which begin as cases of her father's. Nancy is often assisted in solving mysteries by her two closest friends, Bess Marvin and George Fayne, and also occasionally by her boyfriend, Ned Nickerson, who is a college student at Emerson College.
Nancy has often been described as a supergirl: in the words of Bobbie Ann Mason, she is "as immaculate and self-possessed as a Miss America on tour. She is as cool as a Mata Hari and as sweet as Betty Crocker." Nancy is wealthy, attractive, and amazingly talented:
At sixteen she had studied psychology in school and was familiar with the power of suggestion and association.' Nancy was a fine painter, spoke French, and had frequently run motor boats. She was a skilled driver who at sixteen 'flashed into the garage with a skill born of long practice.' The prodigy was a sure shot, an excellent swimmer, skillful oarsman, expert seamstress, gourmet cook, and a fine bridge player. Nancy brilliantly played tennis and golf, and rode like a cowboy. Nancy danced like Ginger Rogers and could administer first aid like the Mayo brothers.Nancy never lacks money and in later volumes of the series often travels to far-away locations, such as Nairobi in The Spider Sapphire Mystery (1968), Austria in Captive Witness (1981), Japan in The Runaway Bride (1994), and Costa Rica in Scarlet Macaw Scandal (2004). Nancy is also able to travel freely about the United States, thanks to her car, which in most books is a blue convertible. Despite the trouble and presumed expense to which she goes to solve mysteries, Nancy never accepts monetary compensation.
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Famous quotes containing the word character:
“I have frequently gained my first real insight into the character of parents by studying their children.”
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930)
“When I think of some of the Persians, the Hindus, the Arabs I knew, when I think of the character they revealed, their grace, their tenderness, their intelligence, their holiness, I spit on the white conquerors of the world, the degenerate British, the pigheaded Germans, the smug self-satisfied French.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“The family circle has widened. The worldpool of information fathered by the electric media—movies, Telstar, flight—far surpasses any possible influence mom and dad can now bring to bear. Character no longer is shaped by only two earnest, fumbling experts. Now all the world’s a sage.”
—Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)