Tag Archives: P.G. Wodehouse

SLL never tells its readers what to do. However, tonight I have a suggestion. If you need a laugh, or more accurately many laughs, or more accurately still many deep-from-the-belly laughs, give P.G. Wodehouse a try. He has, on occasion, reduced me to tears. From Wodehouse, (1881–1975), English author and humorist, The Best of Wodehouse: An Anthology (2007):

Freddie experienced the sort of abysmal soul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy’s Russian peasants when, after putting in a heavy day’s work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city’s reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only to find the vodka bottle empty.

From P.G. Wodehouse (1881-1975), English comic writer, from the Preface to Summer Lightning (1929):

A certain critic—for such men, I regret to say, do exist—made the nasty remark about my last novel that it contained ‘all the old Wodehouse characters under different names’. He has probably now been eaten by bears, like the children who made mock of the prophet Elisha: but if he still survives he will not be able to make a similar charge against Summer Lightning. With my superior intelligence, I have outgeneralled this man by putting in all the old Wodehouse characters under the same names. Pretty silly it will make him feel, I rather fancy.

If you’ve never read any of P.G. Wodehouse’s novels, do yourself a favor. Joy In The Morning is a fine one with which to start (Wodehouse was prolific).