Editing Archie Goodwin (character)

{{Short description|Fictional detective created by Rex Stout}}
{{other people||Archie Goodwin (disambiguation){{!}}Archie Goodwin}}
{{Infobox character
| name          = Archie Goodwin
| series        = 
| image         = Stout-MINJ-1.jpg
| image_upright = 0.85
| caption       = Archie Goodwin meets Flora Gallant in part one of Rex Stout's "[[Frame-Up for Murder]]" illustrated by [[Austin Briggs]] for ''[[The Saturday Evening Post]]'' (June 21, 1958)
| first         = ''[[Fer-de-Lance (novel)|Fer-de-Lance]]'' (1934)
| last          =
| creator       = [[Rex Stout]]
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| gender        = Male
| occupation    = Private detective
| title         =
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| nationality   = [[United States|American]]
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'''Archie Goodwin''' is a fictional character in a series of [[detective fiction|detective]] stories and novels by American author  [[Rex Stout]]. Archie is the witty narrator of the cases featuring his boss, [[Nero Wolfe]], from 1934 (''[[Fer-de-Lance (novel)|Fer-de-Lance]]'') to 1975 (''[[A Family Affair (novel)|A Family Affair]]''). Although his job title is Wolfe's secretary and chauffeur, Archie is effectively Wolfe's partner in the detective business, and the stories often contrast his middle class streetwise persona with Wolfe's aristocratic intelligence. 

==Character==
{{quotation|I know pretty well what my field is. Aside from my primary function as the thorn in the seat of Wolfe's chair to keep him from going to sleep and waking up only for meals, I'm chiefly cut out for two things: to jump and grab something before the other guy can get his paws on it, and to collect pieces of the puzzle for Wolfe to work on. — Archie Goodwin (1937)<ref>''[[The Red Box]]'', chapter&nbsp;12</ref>}}

Archie is Wolfe's live-in assistant in the private investigation business Wolfe runs out of his comfortable and luxurious New York City [[brownstone]] house on West 35th&nbsp;Street. Wolfe rarely leaves the brownstone – and makes it a special point to never leave the house for reasons concerning his work – so Archie does most of the actual investigating, followed by reporting his findings to Wolfe, who solves the mystery. Archie is a skilled observer and has trained his memory so that he can make verbatim reports, oral or typewritten, of extended conversations. He claims to be able to type 6 to 7&nbsp;pages per hour on average, or up to 10 when he needs to hurry.<ref>''[[Before Midnight (novel)|Before Midnight]]'', chapter&nbsp;11</ref> Because Wolfe is generally ignorant of the logistical details of the world outside his house (and uninterested in them) he relies on Archie for various kinds of practical information and opinions. Wolfe also turns to Archie for personal judgments regarding the character of the women connected with a case, as Wolfe is wary of women and tends to keep them at arms-length.

{{quotation|I am just under six feet and weigh a hundred and eighty and therefore could not be called little. — Archie Goodwin<ref>''[[Three Doors to Death]]''</ref>}}

Archie's bedroom is on the third floor of the brownstone, and he owns all of the furniture within it. Under his bed is a [[gong]] that is part of an alarm system designed to sound if anyone gets too close to Wolfe's bedroom door or windows at night. He typically eats his breakfast in the kitchen, and lunch and dinner in the dining room with Wolfe. However, if he must hurry to keep an appointment, he will eat in the kitchen or at a restaurant because Wolfe hates to see anyone rush through a meal.

In addition to detective work, Archie also handles Wolfe's bookkeeping and banking, types his correspondence, and keeps the [[germination]] and other records for the [[orchids]] Wolfe raises as a hobby. His salary was $200 per week,<ref>''[[Too Many Women (novel)|Too Many Women]]'', chapter&nbsp;5</ref> but later it is $400 per week.<ref>$600 per week and a half, ''[[Death of a Dude]]'', chapter&nbsp;6</ref> Archie's hobbies include dancing (usually at the Flamingo), [[poker]], and [[baseball]]. He was a fan of the [[History of the New York Giants (NL)|New York Giants]] until they relocated to San Francisco in 1957, then later became a fan of the [[New York Mets]] when that team was founded in 1962. When moving around Manhattan on business, he often prefers to walk rather than using Wolfe's car or taking taxis. Unlike his employer, Archie has only two conspicuous eccentricities: His favorite drink is milk, and he always knows the exact time.

Archie's conversations with other characters often feature his penchant for arch wit, which can serve purposes such as playing devil's advocate to "badger" Wolfe into working; stalling or goading police officers; issuing threats under the guise of ironically ingenuous observations; or charming female characters into cooperating with Wolfe's professional desiderata.

Regardless of what year the story takes place, Archie and the other principal characters in the corpus [[Floating timeline|do not age]]. Archie is in his early 30s.<ref name="McAleer">{{cite book |last=McAleer |first=John J. |date=1977 |title=Rex Stout: A Biography |location=Boston |publisher=[[Little, Brown and Company]] |isbn=9780316553407 }}</ref>{{rp|pages=383, 565}}{{efn|Rex Stout prepared a confidential memo dated 14&nbsp;September 1949, providing physical descriptions of Archie and Wolfe.{{refn|Rex Stout's confidential memo dated 15&nbsp;September 1949, describing Nero Wolfe, Archie Goodwin, and Wolfe's office, is reprinted in the back matter of the 1992 reprint of ''[[Fer-de-Lance (novel)|Fer-de-Lance]]''.<ref name=Fer-de-Lance>{{cite book |first=Rex |last=Stout |author-link=Rex Stout |year=1992 |orig-year=November 1934 |title=Fer-de-Lance |title-link=Fer-de-Lance (novel) |edition=reprint |publisher=Bantam Crimeline |ISBN=0-553-27819-3}}</ref>}} Under the heading <u>Description of Archie Goodwin</u>, Stout begins: ''Height 6&nbsp;feet. Weight 180&nbsp;lbs. Age&nbsp;32.'' When he was later asked by biographer John J. McAleer at what age Archie was fixed in his own mind, Rex Stout replied, "I like 34."<ref name="McAleer"/>{{rp|pages=383, 565}} }}{{efn|Archie's conversation with Cynthia Nieder in "[[Man Alive (short story)|Man Alive]]" sets his age as 32.}} He was born on October&nbsp;23{{efn|Describing his new wallet, Archie writes "Wolfe had given it to me on October&nbsp;23, at the dinner-table, and I didn't even know he knew when my birthday was."<ref>''[[The League of Frightened Men]]'' (1935), chapter&nbsp;12</ref>}} in [[Chillicothe, Ohio]].<ref name=Cop-Killer>{{cite magazine |first=Rex |last=Stout |author-link=Rex Stout |title-link=The Cop-Killer (short story) |title=The Cop-Killer |date=February 1951 |magazine=[[The American Magazine]]}}</ref> At age 12 he lived in [[Zanesville, Ohio|Zanesville]].<ref>''[[The Silent Speaker]]'', chapter&nbsp;10</ref> Archie once mentions a sister in Ohio (who sent him silk pajamas for his birthday).<ref>''[[The Rubber Band]]'', chapter&nbsp;7</ref>

Rex Stout was never overly concerned with consistency in the Wolfe books, and Archie himself comfortably relates unreliable information as it came during the course of the story,<ref name=Final-Deduction-10>''[[The Final Deduction]]'', chapter&nbsp;10</ref> so some specifics of Archie's background vary in the corpus. In ''[[Fer-de-Lance (novel)|Fer-de-Lance]]'', he comments that his parents died when he was a child,<ref name=Fer-de-Lance/> but in ''[[The Final Deduction]]'' his mother is still living.<ref name=Final-Deduction-10/>

The most concentrated – but suspect – biography of Archie comes from [[Too Many Women (novel)|''Too Many Women'']],<ref>[[Too Many Women (novel)|''Too Many Women'']], chapter&nbsp;27</ref> in which Mrs.&nbsp;Jasper Pine has his background investigated. The details she relates are contradicted in other stories. She tells Archie that his father's name is James Arner Goodwin{{efn|In ''[[Some Buried Caesar]]'' Archie himself implies that his father's name was Titus, when he tells [[Nero Wolfe supporting characters#Lily Rowan|Lily Rowan]] to use the name ''Mrs.&nbsp;Titus Goodwin'' while asking her to call Wolfe, pretending to be his mother.}} that his mother's [[maiden name]] is Leslie, that he has two brothers and two sisters, and that he was born in [[Canton, Ohio]]. Archie never mentions the alleged brothers and second sister in the series.{{efn|"Rex thought Mrs.&nbsp;Pine – who was the kind of person who supposes money can buy anything – got what she deserved", wrote Stout's authorized biographer John J. McAleer. He quotes Stout: "Of course Archie was born in Chillicothe. I don't know how he got Mrs.&nbsp;Pine's dick misinformed."<ref name="McAleer"/>{{rp|page=249}} }}{{efn|Goodwin himself brings up his birthplace “''Wait till you see [[Chillicothe, Ohio]], where I was born''.”<ref name=Cop-Killer/>{{rp|at=chapter&nbsp;1}} }}

Although he is from the [[Ohio|American Midwest]], Archie has the ‘street smarts’ to handle just about any situation he finds himself in, and he knows New York City like the back of his hand. Though he freely admits that there is no one better than [[Nero Wolfe supporting characters#Saul Panzer|Saul Panzer]] in many aspects of investigative work, such as remembering faces and tailing people, Goodwin is one of the most competent private detectives in the city. 

When Wolfe disappears for an extended period in ''[[In the Best Families]]'', Archie rents an office of his own and works as an independent detective. During this time, Archie writes, "My idea was to net more per week than I had been getting from Wolfe, not that I cared for the money, but as a matter of principle." Later, Archie needles Wolfe, pointing out that he made a little more than double the amount that Wolfe had been paying him; Wolfe claims not to believe it.<ref>''[[In the Best Families]]'', chapters&nbsp;12 and 13</ref>

Archie has a long-time cordial and intimate<ref>''Rex Stout: Killer Conversations with Edgar Winner John McAleer'', chapter&nbsp;3</ref> relationship with Lily Rowan, a wealthy society woman. However, they do not try to limit each other's social lives, and Archie has many passing love interests throughout the series. When meeting a woman he considers particularly beautiful, Archie often facetiously expresses a desire to propose marriage. The only serious affair apart from Lily that he shares with the reader is Lucy Valdon, with whom he has a series of extended assignations during ''[[The Mother Hunt]]'', prompting Wolfe and Fritz to fear that Archie may finally settle down. This does not happen, and Lucy Valdon did not appear in any other story although she receives a mention in ''[[A Right to Die]]''.

==As narrator==
Archie, as Stout's first-person narrator, faithfully relates each case in the past tense in meticulous detail. His narrative includes his own thoughts over the course of the story, from ruminations on the case in progress to personal impressions of and opinions about the people involved. He is very thorough in describing the details of other characters' physical appearances, often adding his own positive or negative judgments.

Because Wolfe routinely keeps Archie in the dark about certain key insights and key tasks assigned to other operatives, Archie's openness with the reader over the course of the story he is telling from his own point of view does not risk giving away the solution prior to Wolfe's climactic revelations. (However, despite his candor toward the reader, Archie occasionally discloses that he's holding back some particularly private thought or event.)

From time to time Archie acknowledges the reader directly, by speculating as to whether we will be interested in this or that detail, showing us supposed copies of vital documents when the originals are no longer accessible to him at the time he is writing, or discussing whether we might have figured something out yet at a certain point in the narrative. He occasionally expresses mild concern that another character, such as Wolfe or [[Nero Wolfe supporting characters#Inspector Cramer|Inspector Cramer]], may read his account of the case and take offense at something he has written.

Archie's narratorial wittiness includes a repeatedly employed [[Callback (comedy)|callback]] maneuver whereby he quotes a character using a striking or unusual turn of phrase, and then later uses the phrase himself, in some other context, in the course of his narration.

==Portrayals==
[[image:Hutton-Wolfe-02.jpg|right|thumb|upright|[[Timothy Hutton]] portrayed<br>Archie Goodwin in A&E TV's<br>''[[A Nero Wolfe Mystery]]''<!-- FAIR USE of Hutton-Wolfe-02.jpg: see image description page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Hutton-Wolfe-02.jpg for rationale -->]] 
*[[Lionel Stander]] in the Columbia Pictures films ''[[Meet Nero Wolfe]]'' (1936) and ''[[The League of Frightened Men (1937 film)|The League of Frightened Men]]'' (1937)
*John Gibson and Joseph Julian in the 1943–44 radio series ''[[The Adventures of Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Elliott Lewis (radio)|Elliott Lewis]] in the 1945 radio series ''[[The Amazing Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Gerald Mohr]], Herb Ellis, [[Lawrence Dobkin]], [[Harry Bartell]], [[Lamont Johnson]] and [[Wally Maher]] in the 1950–51 radio series ''[[The New Adventures of Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Gene Reynolds]] in the 1956 ''[[Omnibus (US TV series)|Omnibus]]'' TV series episode, [[Nero Wolfe#Omnibus, "The Fine Art of Murder" (ABC)|"The Fine Art of Murder"]]
*[[William Shatner]] in the aborted 1959 CBS-TV series ''[[Nero Wolfe#Nero Wolfe (CBS)|Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Joachim Fuchsberger]] in the 1961 German TV movie ''[[Too Many Cooks (novel)#Zu viele Köche (NWRV)|Zu viele Köche]]''
*[[Paolo Ferrari (actor)|Paolo Ferrari]] in the 1969–1971 [[Nero Wolfe#Nero Wolfe (Italy 1969–1971)|Italian TV series]]
*[[Tom Mason (actor, born 1949)|Tom Mason]] in the 1977 TV movie ''[[Nero Wolfe (film)|Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Lee Horsley]] in the 1981 TV series ''[[Nero Wolfe (1981 TV series)|Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Don Francks]] in the 1982 Canadian radio series ''[[Nero Wolfe (1982 radio series)|Nero Wolfe]]''
*[[Timothy Hutton]] in the A&E TV movie ''[[The Golden Spiders: A Nero Wolfe Mystery]]'' (2000)
*[[Sergei Zhigunov|Sergey Zhigunov]] in the 2001–2002 [[Nero Wolfe#Poka ya ne umer (Russia 2001)|Russian TV movies]]
*[[Timothy Hutton]] in the 2001–2002 A&E TV series ''[[A Nero Wolfe Mystery]]''
*[[Pietro Sermonti]] in the 2012 [[Nero Wolfe#Nero Wolfe (Italy 2012)|Italian TV series]]

==Influence==
* The character of Lord Bontriomphe from Randall Garrett's ''[[Too Many Magicians]]'' is based on Archie Goodwin. Lord Bontriomphe – the name means "good win" in French – is London's Special Investigator who uses his "flair for narrative and an eidetic memory" to collect information as the "eyes and ears" for his superior.<ref>{{cite book | url = https://archive.org/details/toomanymagicians0000garr/ | title = Too Many Magicians | first = Randall | last = Garrett | author-link = Randall Garrett | location = Garden City, New York | publisher = Doubleday & Company | year = 1967 | lccn = 67-22473 | pages = 29 and 98}}</ref>
* In the [[Bernie Rhodenbarr]] series by [[Lawrence Block]], Bernie's friend Carolyn Kaiser owns a cat named Archie Goodwin, named after the detective.

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist|25em}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote|Nero Wolfe}}
*[http://www.nerowolfe.org The Wolfe Pack], official site of the Nero Wolfe Society
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20091008071310/http://www.nerowolfe.ru/archie.html Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin],  site about Nero Wolfe in Russian

{{Nero Wolfe}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Goodwin, Archie}}
[[Category:Fictional American detectives]]
[[Category:Fictional private investigators]]
[[Category:Nero Wolfe characters|Goodwin, Archive]]
[[Category:Fictional characters from Ohio]]
[[Category:Literary characters introduced in 1934]]
[[Category:Characters in American novels of the 20th century]]
[[Category:Characters of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction]]
[[Category:Male characters in literature]]