Classic Comic Novel. This 1934 novel was, in fact, the first novel starring the duo, after four collections of short stories were published from 1919 to 1930.
Thank you, Jeeves – P.G. Wodehouse
I was teaching English in Japan when the Jeeves and Wooster TV series ran from 1990 to 1993. So, I have only recently watched Hugh Laurie as dim cheery Bertie and Stephen Fry as deadpan Jeeves. So funny that they drove me, in stiches, to the original stories.
At the beginning Wodehouse takes a chance of alienating the reader by introducing about 10 previously met characters in the tiny of space of four pages. But soon enough the reader is laughing too much to care about not recognizing the settings or the who’s who from previous stories
I enjoyed the comic situations as they snarled up and, as hair-pullingly tangled as they may seem at times, they are made more than believable thanks to the characters themselves. The plot unfolds an uninterrupted comedy of errors, during which Bertie gets into trouble and Jeeves saves his bacon. The rhythm of the action is impressive. Wodehouse sets up pieces not too long, not too short. The action beats along smartly because all the characters have a pulse.
Yes, we have to steel ourselves for too causally used words that our post-modern culture has ruled no longer to be used without dire consequences. It was 1934 and many turns of phrase that are unacceptable to us were absolutely not a problem for them. So we must make allowances for ugly epithets while we condescend to snicker at outdated slang like “bally” and “corking.”
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