The Unfamiliar Word
"Like all of us, Wolfe has his favorite words, phrases, and sayings," wrote William S. Baring-Gould. "Among the words, many are unusual and some are abstruse."
"Nero Wolfe talks in a way that no human being on the face of the earth has ever spoken, with the possible exception of Rex Stout after he had a gin and tonic," said Michael Jaffe, executive producer of the A&E TV series, A Nero Wolfe Mystery.
Examples of unfamiliar words — or unfamiliar uses of words that some would otherwise consider familiar — are found throughout the corpus, often in the give-and-take between Wolfe and Archie.
- Myrmidon, chapter 13. While on his way to see D.A. Anderson in White Plains, Archie remarks, "And here was I ... headed for a revelation to the District Attorney that would probably result in my having the pleasure of meeting H.R. Corbett or some other flat-footed myrmidon in the anteroom of E. D. Kimball's office — and wouldn't that have been nice?"
Read more about this topic: Fer-de-Lance (novel)
Famous quotes containing the words unfamiliar word, unfamiliar and/or word:
“Avoid an unusual and unfamiliar word just as you would a reef.”
—Julius Caesar [Gaius Julius Caesar] (100–44 B.C.)
“Nothing was ever so unfamiliar and startling to a man as his own thoughts.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“O, I am smitten with a hatchet’s jaw;
And that in deed and not in word alone.
chorus: I thought I heard a sound within the house
Unlike the voice of one that jumps for joy.
He splits my skull, not in a friendly way,
Once more: he purposes to kill me dead”
—A.E. (Alfred Edward)