Nick and Nora Charles the bantering, romantically involved detective duo has become a well-used trope in literature, stage, screen, and television ever since. The characters first appear in Dashiell Hammett's best-selling last novel "The Thin Man" (1934). Nick is an alcoholic former private detective who retired when he married Nora, a wealthy Nob Hill heiress. Hammett reportedly modeled Nora on his longtime partner Lillian Hellman, and the characters' boozy, flippant dialogue on their relationship. (The novel also mentions that Nick was once a Pinkerton detective, as was Hammett.) The novel is considered one of the seminal texts of the hard-boiled subgenre of mystery novels,
Arnstein Abbey Arnstein Abbey Arnstein Abbey (German: "Kloster Arnstein") is a former Premonstratensian abbey on the Lahn River, south of present-day Obernhof near Nassau, Germany. It is now a monastery of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (SS.CC.), known in Germany as the "Arnsteiner Fathers" ("Arnsteiner Patres"), who maintain a youth retreat center there. The history of the monastery dates back to the second half of the 11th century. In 1052, an Arnstein Castle on the Lahn is first mentioned as the seat of the Counts of Arnstein. This is the oldest mention of any castle on the