MUSEUM OF MODERN MYTHOLOGY AND POP CULTURE

MODESTY BLAISE

1963. An orphaned child of six who has lost her memory, Modesty Blaise eventually fights her way up into the criminal hierarchy, and then becomes an agent for the British Secret Intelligence Service. Modesty began her career in the media as a comic-strip created by British writer Peter O'Donnell. Modesty's adventures were adapted into a series of twelve novels and a short story collection, beginning in 1965. Her film adventures were released in 1966, 1982, and 2003. Creator O'Donnell had thought it was about time for a female hero who could operate as the males had been doing. O'Donnell told interviewer Simon Moss he had wanted Modesty to be plausible, deciding: "I don't think you could take a girl from behind a ...I don't know...a shop counter for example and turn her into a MB, it had to be born in the blood and the bone."

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