Philo Vance

[andave_ya]

Anybody read this American mystery series by Willard Huntington Wright under the pen name S.S. Van Dine? I read it and thought Philo Vance was a lout and a twisted mockery of Lord Peter Wimsey. Ogden Nash, reviewing the book when it came out in the Twenties, said that "Philo Vance needs a kick in the pants." Any opinions?

[PrinceMyshkin]

Anybody read this American mystery series by Willard Huntington Wright under the pen name S.S. Van Dine? I read it and thought Philo Vance was a lout and a twisted mockery of Lord Peter Wimsey. Ogden Nash, reviewing the book when it came out in the Twenties, said that "Philo Vance needs a kick in the pants." Any opinions?

I read the series as a kid since my parents, relatively uneducated immigrants, had few books at home: mostly series they'dreceved from some book-club or other, so Philo Vance and the Fu Manchu series wree among the first 'grown-up' books I read.