Soaking It In: Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit

What I've been reading, seeing, listening to and otherwise absorbing.

Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
(1954)
by P. G. Wodehouse
Audio Partners audio recording
Read by Jonathon Cecil.

Never mind that the tale appears predictable and seems like most sitcom episodes you've seen. We can envision Three's Company's Jack Tripper attempting to fake a late-night burglary and accidentally climbing into the bedroom window of the women whose romantic advances he's trying to avoid. (Which is one of the situations in which Bertie Wooster finds himself in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit.) But you can blame any apparent familiarity on Wodehouse' successful influence on Western fiction. When so many writers have tried for so many years to out-Wodehouse Wodehouse, the original is bound to seem a bit unoriginal.

But never mind all that. The delight is in the language and the characterization, especially as read by the always-enjoyable Jonathon Cecil. I highly recommend this book.

Incidentally, the trail between P.G. Wodehouse and Three's Company leads through the British sitcom Man About the House, the British screwball comedy on which Three's Company was based.

Right Ho, Bully!

I'd like to extend a big Thank You! to the soft-hooved one.

Bully, the Little Stuffed Bull, has been inspirational in his advocacy of P. G. Wodehouse. As I'm writing this, Bully has just published #23 in his Wodehouse a Week series.

And he's made a convert out of me.

As CTO of a software company I read a lot of technical, non-fiction stuff. And by "read" I mean "read, listen to, attend conferences about, dream about, etc." In recent months I've recognized that I've been neglecting fiction. (Or, I've been neglecting non-non-fiction, if you know what I mean.)

So I took a trip to the library with the intent of adding some fiction to my diet. They had P. G. Wodehouse' "Right Ho, Jeeves!" as a book-on-tape, so I decided to see what Bully's been fussing about.

Love. It.

The Jeeves series is perfect for the book-on-tape format. You can tell that the readers love speaking in the various voices, especially the voice of the series' narrator and mentally negligible protagonist, Bertram Wooster.

I won't retread the ground that Bully's cushy hooves have already covered by telling you how delightful and so-very-fun Wodehouse' writing is. I'll just add my endorsement for all things Wodehouse and encourage you all to climb on board the Wodehouse bandwagon.