Very Good, Jeeves! by P.G. Wodehouse

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

And here we are, continuing our reviews of PG Wodehouse’s wonderful menagerie of characters. Bertie Wooster and R. Jeeves are one of the most beloved duos in English Literature. This is certainly true for me, at the very least. This volume is generally considered Jeeves #4. It was first published in the USA in 1930, containing eleven previously published short stories. The stories form a very loose novel, it one desires that coherence. Otherwise, they can be read as individual short stories.

Naturally, “Very Good, Jeeves!” features the genius valet Jeeves and his hapless gentleman employer, Bertie Wooster. The reader gets a great blast of the supporting characters, the reappearing players that spice up the soup. There is fierce Aunt Agatha, the bane of Bertie’s existence. Aunt Dahlia is there as well, she of the sporting voice and straight talk. Bertie Wooster is not without friends. His old chums are here, Tuppy Glossop and Bingo Little, as well as a few girls to make the confirmed bachelor nervous. Bobbie Wickham, the dangerous redhead and one-time Wooster bride-to-be, gets Bertie into some jams that are a bit thick, what.

PG Wodehouse can still make me laugh out loud, even after multiple readings. A sentence or phrase will catch me just right and before one can say ‘Piffle!” I am chucking away like a kettle on the boil. The man is just funny, and he is funny in devious ways. He can be dishing out what is essentially slapstick, while using a subjunctive clause as the ladle. It is a very difficult thing to transform a subjunctive clause into a humorous device. Just go on and try it once. You see, not such an easy feat.

There is a formula to many of the Jeeves stories, but it is such a delicious formula that I don’t mind it at all. The basic framework involves a conversational introduction from Bertie. Something like: ‘Have I ever had the opportunity to relate to you the odd story of…’ and then we are off to the races. Bertie Wooster, the idler, the wastrel, will dive into the story. Usually there will be some small contretemps with Jeeves over a poorly chosen item of clothing. Jeeves, ever a stickler for proper appearances, will object to Bertie’s acquisition of purple socks. A battle of wills will ensue, a battle for which Bertie is unarmed. Meanwhile, a hapless friend will need rescuing, or a fierce aunt will require avoiding. Jeeves, with his giant fish-fueled brain, will extract the bungling Bertram from the soup. In gratitude for his salvation at Jeeves’ masterful hand, Bertie will yield up the offending item and peaceful will be the quiet bachelor flat.

PG Wodehouse was a stickler for plot lines. He often called the plot line the hardest part of writing. Before writing a story, Wodehouse had to know that the plot was airtight. First, he would write a bare-bones outline of a plot. If the thing agreed with him, if it looked like a ‘Go-er,’ he would flesh out the outline with a full plot treatment. In a novel, this might run to twenty or thirty thousand words. Satisfied that there were no plot holes, he would then write the actual story or novel, adding dialogue and setting. The result of this are stories with very complex twists and turns, yet without the sense of being overly contrived. Very often I will know where Wodehouse is going to go, but I will be damn’d if I know how he is going to get there.

The Jeeves and Wooster stories are still very high on my list of ‘Escapist Refuge Reading.’ When I need to let the world spin on its own, or calm my own mental meanderings, PG Wodehouse is one of the places I turn to as a safe haven. I should warn the reader: these stories can be addictive. Almost ninety years old, and these stories may still cause a new reader to laugh aloud. And that, my Dearly Beloved, is a very, very precious thing. Happy reading until next time!

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