Modesty Blaise is a British comic strip featuring a fictional character of the same name, created by author Peter O’Donnell and illustrator Jim Holdaway in 1963. The strip follows Modesty Blaise, an exceptional young woman with many talents and a criminal past, and her trusty sidekick Willie Garvin. It was adapted into films in 1966, 1982, and 2003, and from 1965 onwards eleven novels and two short story collections were written.
In 1945, a nameless girl escapes from a displaced person (DP) camp in Kalyros, Greece. She remembers nothing from her short past and wanders through post-World War II Mediterranean, the Middle East, and regions of North Africa, where she learns to survive the hard way. She befriends Lob, another wandering refugee who is a Jewish Hungarian scholar from Budapest. He gives her an education and a first name: Modesty. Sometime later Modesty creates her last name, Blaise, after Merlin’s tutor from the Arthurian legends. When Lob dies is unclear, other than it being prior to her going to Tangier. In ‘The Xanadu Tailisman’ it is mentioned that Modesty has left Lob at a village to recover from a wound; she goes alone to sell a car tyre. In 1953 she takes control of a criminal gang in Tangier from Henri Louche and expands it into an international organization called the Network.
Having conceived the idea after a chance meeting with a girl during his wartime service in the Middle East, O’Donnell elected to work with Jim Holdaway, with whom he had worked on the strip Romeo Brown, after a trial period of collaboration with Frank Hampson, creator of Dan Dare, left O’Donnell dissatisfied. Modesty Blaise debuted in the London Evening Standard on 13 May 1963. The strip was syndicated among a large number of newspapers ranging from the Johannesburg Star to the Detroit Free Press, the Bombay Samachar, The Telegraph (Calcutta, India), The Star (Malaysia), The West Australian (Perth) and The Evening Citizen (Glasgow, Scotland).
After Jim Holdaway’s death in 1970, the art of the strip was provided by the Spanish artist Enrique Badía Romero. Eight years later, Romero quit to make time for his own comics projects, and after short attempts by John Burns and Patrick Wright, Neville Colvin drew the strip until 1986. Then Romero returned to the job and continued until the end of the strip.
The strip’s circulation in the United States was erratic, in part because of the occasional nude scenes, which were much less acceptable in the US than elsewhere, resulting in a censored version of the strip being circulated. (Modesty occasionally used a tactic that she called the “Nailer,” in which she would appear topless, distracting the bad guys long enough to give Willie or herself a chance to incapacitate them.) An example of this censorship appears in the introduction to the 2007 Titan Books reprint volume Death Trap, which illustrated two segments of the story arc, “The Junk Men” that were censored by the Detroit Free Press when it published the strip in 1977; in both cases a screen was drawn over scantily-clad images of Willie and Modesty. Reportedly, O’Donnell did not approve of the changes, although they were made by the artist, Romero.
The final Modesty Blaise strip ran in the Evening Standard on 11 April 2001. Some of the newspapers that carried the series, feeling that it had become a tradition for their readers, began running it again from the beginning. O’Donnell, to give Romero some additional work, gave the artist permission to adapt one of his short stories (“The Dark Angels”) as a graphic novel that was published in Scandinavia in 2002, later being reprinted in the US in a special issue of Comics Revue.
From 1 December 2008, the Evening Standard, which had stopped including comic strips for some time, republished La Machine, using the original artwork. Following a change of ownership of the paper, they did not continue with subsequent stories.
The ordinary strips are consecutive numbered from 1 to 10183. Outside this numbering are the two newspaper stories “In the Beginning” and “The Killing Ground” and the two comic book stories “Modesty Blaise” and “The Dark Angels”.
Outside the ordinary numbering is also an amount of A-strips. An A-strip has the same number as the previous strip but followed by an A. They were used on days when not all the newspapers running Modesty Blaise were published. An A-strip is not vital for the continuity of the story and is often just supplementing the previous strip.
The first A-strip was 194A and was published during Christmas 1963 in Scottish newspapers.
Since December 1974 The Evening Standard has not been published on Saturdays. So, since then, and the story “Cry Wolf”, a sixth of the strips have been A-strips and have not had their premiere in The Evening Standard.
A single strip is numbered with an X suffix, e.g., strip number 3641X, and is similar to the A-strips.
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UPDATE 21-12-2022
Modesty Blaise 1 story updated
Modesty Blaise – 27 – The Wicked Gnomes
Thanks to Ar
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UPDATE 20-12-2022
Modesty Blaise 1 story updated
Modesty Blaise – 26 – The Gallows Bird (page 15 is now complete)
Thanks to Ar
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UPDATE 09-12-2022
Modesty Blaise – 06 – Uncle Happy Upgrade 624, 636, and 732, now present
Thanks to Ar
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UPDATE 14-11-2022
Modesty Blaise 2 stories updated
Thanks to Ar
Modesty Blaise – 13 – Bad Suki
Modesty Blaise – 42 – Green Cobra
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UPDATE 02-12-2019
Complete and better quality.
Modesty Blaise – 30 – Highland Witch
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19 stories
00 – In The Beginning
01 – La Machine
02 – The Long Lever
03 – The Gabriel Set-Up
04 – Mister Sun
05 – The Mind of Mrs Drake
06 – Uncle Happy
07 – Top Traitor
08 – The Vikings
09 – The Head Girls
10 – The Black Pearl
11 – The Magnified Man
12 -The Jericho Caper
13 – Bad Suki
14 – The Galley Slaves
14a – The Killing Ground
15 – The Red Gryphon
16 – The Hell-Makers
17 – Take Over
11 stories
18 – The War Lords of Phoenix
19 – Willie the Djinn
20 – The Green Eyed Monster
21 – Death of a Jester
22 – The Stone Age Caper
23 – The Puppet Master
24 – With Love From Rufus
25 – The Bluebeard Affair
26 – The Gallows Bird
27 – The Wicked Gnomes
28 – The Iron God
12 stories
29 – Take Me To Your Leader
30 – Highland Witch
31 – Cry Wolf
32 – The Reluctant Chaperon
33 – The Greenwood Maid
34 – Those About to Die
35 – The Inca Trail
36 – The Vanishing Dollybirds
37 – The Junk-Men
38 – Death Trap
39 – Idaho George
40 – The Golden Frog
7 stories
41 – Yellowstone Booty
42 – Green Cobra
43 – Eve and Adam
44 – Brethren of Blaise
45 – Dossier on Pluto
46 – The Lady Killers
47 – Garvin’s Travels
5 stories
48 – The Scarlet Maiden
49 – The Moonman
50 – A Few Flowers for the Colonel
51 – The Balloonatic
52 – Death in Slow Motion
7 stories
53 – The Alternative Man
54 – Sweet Caroline
55 – The Return of the Mammoth
56 – Plato’s Republic
57 – The Sword of the Bruce
58 – The Wild Boar
59 – Kali’s Disciples
6 stories
60 – The Double Agent
61 – Butch Cassidy Rides Again
62 – Million Dollar Game
63 – The Vampire of Malvescu
64 – Samantha and the Cherub
65 – Milord
6 stories
66 – Live Bait
67 – The Girl from the Future
68 – The Big Mole
69 – Lady in the Dark
70 – Fiona
71 – Walkabout
9 stories
72 – The Girl in the Iron Mask
73 – The Young Mistress
74 – Ivory Dancer
75 – Our Friend Maude
76 – A Present for the Princess
77 – Black Queen’s Pawn
78 – The Grim Joker
79 – Guido the Jinx
80 – The Killing Distance
7 stories
81 – The Aristo
82 – Ripper Jax
83 – The Maori Contract
84 – Honeygun
85 – Durango
86 – The Murder Frame
87 – Fraser’s Story
4 stories
88 – Tribute of the Pharaoh
89 – The Special Orders
90 – The Hanging Judge
91 – Children of Lucifer
5 stories
92 – Death Symbol
93 – The Last Aristocrat
94 – The Killing Game
95 – The Zombie
96 – The Dark Angels
This set of Modesty Blaise strips is beyond amazing! Many thanks! Hoping for Garth (Frank Bellamy’s stuff) and The Seekers down the road!
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You are welcome. I am afraid i don’t have these titles. Will look out for them. I believe there are some Garth stories in indrajal, not sure that is the same Garth. I am planning an Indrajal blog also for the nearby future.
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This is a great resource, but some of the files have been compressed too much and the pictures are not clear. For example, the Green Eyed Monster is so bad I even have to strain to read the text, and the detail in the drawings is lost. It’s a real pity.
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What program can you use to open the files?
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Most of the strips are packed with winrar, so you have to unpack the files first. After this you will have cbr files that you can read with any cbr-reader, there are many free to choose from on the internet. Some people prefer to unpack this cbr files also and read the pages one by one with a pictureviewer. All this for a windows based computer. I hope this works for you, don’t hesitate to ask further if you have questions.
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Thanks for uploading these.
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You are welcome.
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FANTASTIC..A BEST DETECTIVE COMIC SERIES .THANKS FOR ALL HELP TO UP LOAD .M.R.P.P.
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You are welcome.
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why am i not able to see the files on google drive? it try to open but doesnt open it.
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Do you mean these Modesty Blaise ? They are all on Mediafire as far as i know. If you are referring to other titles, let me know which, so i can look what the problem can be.
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This website has been a real blessing. I have been collecting the modesty blaise books for a long time, and even comic strip cuttings. Thank you so much
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You are welcome.
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I only see 1 page for each title ! Say – in the beginning – only one page with 3 strips ! Don’t we have the full story for each one?
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As far as i can see all files contains the full stories that are mentioned above the download, can you let me know which file you are referring to so i can look into the matter, perhaps something went wrong with down- or uploading.
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Thank you so much for uploading my childhood treasure! i am 57 now and i have read most of these during my pre teen / teen days between 1971 thru 1981! I still read them! my Tab is full of all these comics now and enjoy the frequent travel much more than anything, though the copassengers wonder at a salt n pepper hair gent reading comics! Most of them dont know what they are missing!
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Thanks, you are welcome.
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Great Modesty Blaise collection, but I’ve run across a few glitches. Each of the following three stories have pages missing. I’ve downloaded them more than once, but to no effect. As all the other stories in the downloaded sets are fine, maybe the fault lies at your end.
No.13 Bad Suki – Missing what should have been pp 3 & 4, strips 1470-1477 inc. I’ve only been able to find a Slovak version of those!
No. 30 Highland Witch – Missing pp 13, 18, 22, 23, 24 & 26. I’ve downloaded a complete version from another source and can let you have a pdf of it if you want.
No.42 Green Cobra – Missing pp 5 & 8
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Thanks, i am afraid i have the same problem, sometimes the stories are incomplete indeed, i am looking out for complete ones. You can leave a link for the complete 30 i will make sure to replace the incorrect one.
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Hi Alan,
Chanced upon your facebook page. Awesome. Thanks!
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Thanks as well. You’ll find no.30 Highland Witch here
https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3598988&userid=131795&perpage=40&pagenumber=3
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Thanks, i can’t seem to find the download, do i have to download the pages 1 by 1 ?
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Doesn’t appear to be one for MB 30, though there are for some earlier stories. You’ll find a cleaned up version on my facebook page for Nov 20th https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100014372373695
Make a friend request you can message me an email and I can let you have the pages as jpegs and/or a pdf. Best I can do.
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Thanks for your help, i will download the separate pages tomorrow and make 1 cbr for the blog.
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Thank you so much!!! since 1974, when i was 14 years old, i read the adventures from modesty. my dream was to have all the comic stripes …. and now the dream came true!!!!
i still read the books sometimes, it is a warm feeling in the stomach 🙂 .
best to you
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Thanks, you are welcome.
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Hi Boutje,
Here is a complete collection (I believe they are better source or scans). Cheers!
https://mega.nz/folder/onh3VCYJ#QonPIeWUmqz5ze17TNw5ug
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Thanks, i will look through them when i find some time this week. Anyone interested can always download them from your link if they want to.
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Mate, its asking for decryption key in Mega. Please send.
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The links in comments are always for a short periode, i place all that is suitable on the downloadpages.
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I didn’t set any key for it. Are you sure? Did anybody else try?
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Are the links working? The download site opens and closes
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I have the same since yesterday with more Mediafirelinks, i think something is wrong with Mediafire with direct links. I worked my way around it with rightclick, copy link address and than paste the adress into the browser.
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I believe the problem is solved allready.
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My antivirus software has discovered the last download link has been infected.
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Good evening Boutje (and everybody)
The message left by companion Dusan Dangubic alerted me and the companion Alan Hebden’s comment led me to at least try to verify the three stories he mentioned.
In fact in the 3 stories in times downloaded, there are flaws of several strips.
In story 30, this no longer happens (given the update), but in story 13 and 42 the same doesn’t happen.
So here are the respective links.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/tsw4m5t6z2biqe0/MBL13_-_Bad_Suki.cbr/file
https://www.mediafire.com/file/cmbuh5h8bp73je6/MBL42_-_Green_Cobra.cbr/file
A big hug to all, and stay safe
Ar
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Thanks Ar. I will update these later today.
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Good afternoon once again
As I am checking all M.Blaise stories, I attach link to the story
Modesty Blaise – 06 – Uncle Happy
This is because it lacks strips 624, 636, and 732, now present.
O link
https://www.mediafire.com/file/h8z5435zlnfv4li/MBL06_-_Uncle_Happy.cbr/file
A big hug to all, and stay safe
Ar
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Thanks Ar, i will update this one tomorrow.
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Good afternoon Boutje (and everybody)
Here are some more indications regarding “Modesty Blaise”, relative to what is released on the site:
Block – np-modb02.rar (stories 18 to 28)
Story 20
the file: NP Modesty Blaise – 20 – The Green Eyed Monster.cbr
It contains, in addition to story 20, stories 21 and 22 that are repeated after.
Story 26
the file: NP Modesty Blaise – 26 – The Gallows Bird.cbr
The page 15 is incomplete (I’ve downloaded it twice and the result is identical), there’s a black blur covering part of the 2nd strip and completely the 3rd and 4th strips of that page.
The rest of the stories looks OK
To replace the problem, here is a link for story 26
https://www.mediafire.com/file/d8ukg6dr4ltc9fa/Modesty_Blaise_-_26_-_The_Gallows_Bird.cbr/file
A big hug to all, and stay safe
Ar
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Thanks Ar, i will place this update tomorrow.
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Good afternoon Boutje (and everybody)
Here are some more indications regarding “Modesty Blaise”:
Contrary to what was mentioned in my last comment, I detected two more lapses (or
just one) in the stories:
Modesty Blaise – 27 – The Wicked Gnomes
Modesty Blaise – 28 – The Iron God
In the first case, strip 3194 is missing, already detected and joined in the
respective link that follows.
On the second one, I detected the lack of strip 3276, however, and due to the
research carried out, the only thing I found was the information that follows taken
from a website in German
“Strip 3275 was published on January 2, strip 3277 on January 3, 1974, and strip 3276
apparently does not exist. This is probably due to an error in the numbering.”
If anyone has more information about this situation I would appreciate your help in
advance.
Follows the link of story 27
https://www.mediafire.com/file/hizy1eh61wmbl8x/Modesty_Blaise_-_27_-_The_Wicked_Gnomes.cbr/file
A big hug to all, and stay safe
Ar
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Thanks Ar, i will update story 27 tomorrow.
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Hi the mediafire link for 00-17 is not working.
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Thanks for letting me know, i’ve made a new link.
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Thanks 👍
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Hi boutje777, Ar and all others. I love the Modesty Blaise strips- both the intricate stories by Peter O’Donnell and superb artwork by its artists (in all eras). You would know that Peter O’Donnell wrote both Modesty strip comics and novels, but there is some difference in the timeline. The final Modesty Blaise comic strip story, The Zombie, published in 2001, ends (planned to coincide with Peter’s birthday on 11th April 2001) with Modesty and Willie planning to return to the site of Willie’s fight with Delicata, recover the buried treasure they left there, and donate it to the Salvation Army. In that strip, it ends with a panel 10183 – almost walking into the sun moment (with literal clouds behind them), where Modesty is talking about a break, with just Willie and her. But in the novels, both Modesty and Willie dies (in fact we read about Tarrant’s death as well) in the novel story published in 1996- ‘Cobra Trap’ (though he had originally planned to stop writing the modesty novels in 1985, with ‘Dead Man’s Handle’), where that novel is set into the future (when compared in age-terms with other modesty strips/novels). I searched for that story and since I couldn’t find it anywhere online, I bought the book since I just had to read that (though I finally read through it with some sadness, like reading about a close relative) and scanned just that story. Link to download and read the same is: https://mega.nz/file/7j5gxZbL#aTOUVxjem6jjnxqdKQa9ZWEye_c3JKRQR4gmtk7jdsg
I then searched if I could find something that Peter said about the ending story and was first frustrated that I couldn’t see a single video of Peter O’Donnell in the www! For Pete’s sake, he died in May 2010 only, and hence very much in the YTube & video era and though he died aged 90 with Parkinsons, I am surprised that nobody went to him with a camera for a videotaped interview (in fact Peter was interviewed as part of the DVD release of the 2004 film My Name Is Modesty, but I was not able to find that video anywhere).
But thankfully, I found excerpts from 2 interviews (which are not available in the original webpages anymore) on the same, reproducing the same below:
1) Excerpt from Interview with Peter O’Donnell by Simon Moss (Dec 3rd 1996- hence same year as release of Cobra Trap- hence it would be fresh in his memory) at POD’s study:
“SM. We are sat here in your office, and I can see you are working on the
cartoon strip for the Evening Standard (Note – this is the London daily
paper), but as it is fairly common knowledge that Modesty and Willie both
die in Cobra Trap, what is the future for them ?
POD. Well, the thing is I’m 76 now, and I retired from writing books 10
years ago, but I kept the strip cartoon going, and during this time I kept
thinking how Modesty and Willie would end, as I didnt want to leave them
in mid air with no ending, and I couldn’t concieve they would end up in an
old folks home, tottering around on zimmer frames (laughs), and I thought
they would probably end up doing something rather worthwhile in a small
way perhaps, so what I did, I moved 20 – 25 years into the future, so
Modesty would be around 52,or something , and Willie a few years older,
and I had something crop up, that demanded their attention….I’m not
going to give the plot away!….but the fact is they go together, they go
under rather good circumstances. I think it is a most satisfying end to
the saga, and from the reactions I have had..I must say a lot of tears
have been shed, and not only female tears, quite a few chaps have
confessed to shedding a manly tear or two, but, that was the way I
thought it should end, and it seems to have been satisfying to the
readers, but it does allow for 20 odd years of adventures between now and
then. In fact, as they have this facility of ageing only one year in every
15, you have almost 300 years of adventures, which will probably see me
out! (laughs)”
2) Excerpt from Interview with Peter O’Donnell by KENT HEDLUNDH (August 2002) done by correspondence: “Bill Wottlin asks if the scripts I provided for he strips that Enric (Romero) draws could be adapted as short stories, and is there any plan for other authors to write them. Well the answer is that they could be adapted, but Cobra Trap was my swansong, and there are no plans for other authors to adapt the strip stories.”
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