Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on Fate Waiting to Strike)

“Unseen, in the background, Fate was quietly slipping the lead into the boxing-glove.” — British humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), Very Good, Jeeves (1930)

The image accompanying this post shows Hugh Laurie (right) as the clueless Bertie Wooster and Stephen Fry as his imperturbable butler Jeeves in the British comedy series of the early 1990s, Jeeves and Wooster.

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on a Man With a VERY Unpleasant Experience)

“He had the look of one who had drunk the cup of life, and found a dead beetle at the bottom.” — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975), The Man Upstairs and Other Stories (1914)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on a Reversal)

“Mike nodded. A sombre nod. The nod Napoleon might have given if somebody had met him in 1812 and said, ‘So, you're back from Moscow, eh?’” — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975), Mike and Psmith (1953)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on a Valet’s Unusual Literary Taste)

 

“‘The sky is the limit. State your desire.’

‘Well, sir, there has recently been published a new and authoritatively annotated edition of the works of the philosopher Spinoza. Since you are so generous, I would appreciate that very much.’

‘You shall have it. It shall be delivered at your door in a plain van without delay. You’re sure you’ve got the name right? Spinoza?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘It doesn’t sound probable, but no doubt you know best. Spinoza, eh? Is he the Book Society’s Choice of the Month?’

‘I believe not, sir.’” — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975), Joy in the Morning (1947)

The valet (and Spinoza aficionado) in the above quote is Jeeves, the indispensable wingman to his utterly clueless employer, Bertie Wooster. They were embodied for a transatlantic TV audience in the 1990s series Jeeves and Wooster, starring (from left to right in the accompanying photo) Stephen Fry as Jeeves and Hugh Laurie as Wooster.

I’m not sure I would want to live in a world where, in one country or another, the creator of this duo, P.G. Wodehouse, would not be a book society or book club’s Choice of the Month.  

Born on this day in 1881 in Guildford, England, he had, by the time of his death 93 years later, published 90 books, 40 plays, and 200 short stories and other writings. He is also, at one and the same time, one of the most polished stylists and funniest writers in the English language.

As good as it is to discover Wodehouse on one’s own, it is even better to hear his work read by a fellow master craftsman. Such was the case in February 2018, during the one-man show John Lithgow: Stories by Heart. One of the two tales conjured up by the versatile actor at that marvelous matinee performance was Wodehouse’s “Uncle Fred Flits By.”

For a fine introduction to Wodehouse for newbies, see this fine appreciation of the comic novelist by blogger Robert Pimm.

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on a Great Rugby Player)

“Rugby football is more or less a sealed book to me, I never having gone in for it, but even I could see he was good. The lissomeness with which he moved hither and thither was most impressive, as was his homicidal ardor when doing what I believe is called tackling. Like the Canadian Mounted Police, he always got his man, and when he did so the air was vibrant with the excited cries of morticians in the audience making bids for the body.” — British humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves (1963)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on Golf, ‘The Great Mystery’)

“Golf is the Great Mystery. Like some capricious goddess, it bestows favors with what would appear an almost fat-headed lack of method and discrimination."— British humorist, playwright and lyricist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), The Heart of a Goof (1926)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, Inside the Restless Mind of a London Pub Puppy)

“I was born…in a public-house in the East End, and, however lacking a public-house may be in refinement and the true culture, it certainly provides plenty of excitement. Before I was six weeks old I had upset three policemen by getting between their legs when they came round to the side-door, thinking they had heard suspicious noises; and I can still recall the interesting sensation of being chased seventeen times round the yard with a broom-handle after a well-planned and completely successful raid on the larder. These and other happenings of a like nature soothed for the moment but could not cure the restlessness which has always been so marked a trait in my character. I have always been restless, unable to settle down in one place and anxious to get on to the next thing. This may be due to a gipsy strain in my ancestry--one of my uncles travelled with a circus—or it may be the Artistic Temperament, acquired from a grandfather who, before dying of a surfeit of paste in the property-room of the Bristol Coliseum, which he was visiting in the course of a professional tour, had an established reputation on the music-hall stage as one of Professor Pond's Performing Poodles.”— English humorist and lyricist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), “The Mixer,” in The Man With Two Left Feet and Other Stories (1917)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on a Loud Young Woman)

“She laughed - a bit louder than I could have wished in my frail state of health, but then she is always a woman who tends to bring plaster falling from the ceiling when amused.” — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), The Code of the Woosters (1938)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on How to Deal With ‘A Fat Man in a Yachting Cap’)

"When you see a fat man in a yachting cap, horn-rimmed spectacles, plus fours, and black and white buckskin shoes, I maintain that there is convincing evidence of premeditation and that the matter should be firmly dealt with by the proper authorities." — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975), Louder and Funnier (1932)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, on Good and Bad Aunts)

“It is no use telling me there are bad aunts and good aunts. At the core, they are all alike. Sooner or later, out pops the cloven hoof.” — English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), The Code of the Woosters (1938)

(The image accompanying this post shows Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie, as, respectively, faithful and all-knowing valet Jeeves and his dim-witted young aristocratic employer, Bertie Wooster, in the 1990s British series Jeeves and Wooster. Guess which ones comes out with the above gem?)

Quote of the Day (P. G. Wodehouse, Parodying T.S. Eliot)

“I am a bat that wheels through the air of Fate;

I am a worm that wriggles in a swamp of Disillusionment;

I am a despairing toad;

I have got dyspepsia.”— English humorist P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975), “Darkling: A Threnody,” in Meet Mr. Mulliner (1928)

The image of Wodehouse that accompanies this post was taken around 1904.