It’s often fun to think back to the person who first turned you on to a life long passion. Most people cite their parents as the source of common hobbies like baseball or soccer, but sometimes we stumble upon things on our own ; a sort of serendipitous experience that blossoms into one of the most fantastic human emotions—passion. In my case, this life long passion was started after I read my very first book by English author P.G. Wodehouse (pronounced “wood house”), who penned some 90 books, as well as a number of short stories and plays. Reading his work today, Wodehouse’s unique voice is as witty and humorous as ever. The comical hijinks of Bertram Wooster, one part of Wodehouse’s duo Jeeves and Wooster, are still incredibly funny and relevant to the much evolved modern sense of humor. Great comedy does not go out of date, or out of print for that matter—a large number of Wodehouse’s books are still available in print. Among them, his Jeeves and Wooster stories and novels are by far the most popular, The Code of The Woosters particularly, followed by his novels and short stories set at Blandings Castle. It is a body of work that is so vast, so widespread, and so prodigious, that no other author to my knowledge (not even Stephen King), has come anywhere near the level of output and quality that Mr. Pelham Greenville Wodehouse managed to achieve in his lifetime.
Wodehouse’s incredible life spanned some 93 years, beginning on the 15 of October, 1881, and coming to an end on February 14, 1975. I would consider such longevity an achievement by its own merit, but Wodehouse’s career as an author produced 70 some-odd years of wonderful writing. He was a man who very seldom felt the need to kick his feet up and relax, and much preferred an exhaustive daily routine which focused on his life’s passion, writing. In a way, Wodehouse wrote in order to escape the realities of the world he lived in. This was especially the case during the late 1930’s when World War Two was raging, and Wodehouse immersed himself in his Jeeves novels, producing one of his finest works, The Code of The Woosters (1938). Here and there, he would mention some topical world issues, such as when Bertie describes Roderick Spode in Code of The Woosters with “His gaze was keen and piercing. I don’t know if you have ever seen those pictures in the papers of Dictators with tilted chins and blazing eyes, inflaming the populace with their fiery words on the occasion of opening a new skittle alley, but that was what he reminded me of.” This sort of mention was about as far into matters as Wodehouse cared to delve, and in general he decided to avoid the true evils of the world. For him, the worlds he created were the perfect place to spend his time, where there were no Fascists trying to take over the planet, but just the adventures of Bertie Wooster.
When I try and introduce the works of P.G. Wodehouse to people I know, the first words out of my mouth are “Do you remember that Jeeves character from the search engine?”, and most will pause for a moment and remember that funny looking butler from askjeeves. Granted, this is a poor way to introduce the world of Wodehouse to the average person, but it at least gives you something to work with. I then go on further to explain that the character Jeeves is actually part of a very large catalogue of Jeeves and Wooster stories written by and English fellow with kind of a funny name, P.G. Wodehouse. By this point, most stop paying attention because most do not enjoy talking about books that are not written by either J.K. Rowling or Stephenie Meyer. This is a sad state of affairs on its own, but that is not what this piece is about. The concept of the duo is really quite simple ; Bertie Wooster is a rich, careless English playboy who is kept in check by his venerable butler Jeeves while he participates in a number of hilarious adventures and misunderstandings. Simple, yes, but incredibly versatile and durable at the same time. This explains why Wodehouse was able to write so many short stories and novels using these iconic characters, while at the same time delivering a fresh, brilliant story every time. Even some of Wodehouse’s worst work (which there is very little of), is better than many other failed attempts at humor in the 20th century.
Nearly ever person I’ve ever talked to about writing seems to share the same obsession in finding out what an author’s routine is like. We like to think that there is some method to all of this, and that sheer genius and creativity is not the only factor. Many wonder what secret sauce, or what magical pen and stationary combination an author used that made his or her words so beautiful and affective. The wise eventually learn that there is not secret, and that the only method proven to work time and time again is to write as much as possible. Wodehouse followed this method to an extreme. Still, there were things that Wodehouse did that certainly set him apart from other authors. Take his time consuming process of drafting a “scenario”, consisting of a careful roadmap for the eventual novel, which he’d often create before he wrote even a single word of what would become the final draft. This allowed Wodehouse to produce novels that had many seemingly unrelated and insignificant events all come together at the conclusion of a work. It’s this sort of magic thing that happens in a Wodehouse novel,thanks to an incredibly well-thought out plot.
The affect of Wodehouse’s wittily crafted comedic prose can be seen in many of Britain’s finest authors and entertainers. Douglas Adams, who penned the hilarious Hitchhiker’s Guide series, was profoundly influenced by Wodehouse, one time saying “What Wodehouse writes is pure word music…he is the greatest musician of the English language, and exploring variations of familiar material is what musicians do all day.” Actor Stephen Fry, who once played Wodehouse’s character Jeeves on the BBC television program Jeeves and Wooster has said “…one of the gorgeous privileges of reading P.G. Wodehouse is that he makes us feel better about ourselves because we derive a sense of personal satisfaction from the laughter mutually created.” It seems then, with such a profound impact on literature in this century— as well as his own—that Mr. Pelham Greenville Wodehouse has very deservingly earned his spot in the great pantheon of literary achievement and excellence. Thanks for all of those laughs, Plum.
—Steven P. Rodriguez
