P G Wodehouse

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Topic started by Saketh on Mon Aug 30 17:11:04 .


What do you think of British Humour?
Partiularly the funny world of Wodehouse and his characters?

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Makes good light reading. I am a big fan. Read a lot of his books. I dont see many PGW fans in US.
Heard that he had emigrated to US and wrote most of the books while living in US. Dont know if that is true.
Trivia: Only two characters appear both in Blandings Castle stories and Bertram Wooster stories. Who are they?

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Just finished reading my first PGW book. Goes by the name of 'Picadilly Jim'. It's very humourous but not in the sense that one can laugh out loud. Everything is taken lightly. I found that it reminded me of 'Crazy Mohan's' screenplays. A lot of 'aal maraadam' going on. Of course, this is the first book so let's see how it goes.

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great!!!!!

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aruvi: PGW is most famous for aaL maaraattam. In "Aunt's aren't gentleman" Bertram Wooster and his friend (monty bodkin?) get arrested for trying to steal a policeman's helmet during Oxford Boat Race Night. Bertie gets fined 5# and is let off. Next when his friend's turn came the judge decides to take notice of the increasing number of attempts to steal policemen's helmtets and delivers a lecture and sentences him to 1 month in jail. But the friend is engaged to the Vicar's daughter and has to be present in the village. So Bertie goes there taking his name, the girl knows him and cooperates. She has eight aunts. The friend gets clemency on the queen's birthday so decides to go to the village, but since bertie has already gone there in his name, he goes as bertram wooster. Oh my god you got to read the book. Does it remind you of the plot of a recent tamil movie?

The number of aaL maaraattams in Uncle Dynamite is just too much! Is that where a character will be living with three different false identities at the same time in the same house?

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Freddie Threepwood marries the daughter of the owner of Dog-Joy dog biscuits and emigrates to US. He returns and announces he is the Vice President of Dog-Joy. "So it pays to marry into the family in America?"
Freddie:"No pretty much everyone starts out as a vice president over there. If I really do well I hope soon to become a second assistance deputy salesman" (paraphrased.). He tries to get the exclusive contract to sell dog biscuits to Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe, with the help of Lady Constance Keeble, his aunt. But Sir Gregory is the arch rival for Clarance, the ninth Earl of Emsworth, owner of Empress of Blandings, hoping to win the Fat Pigs Section of the Shrophshire Country Fair. Wow, so long since I read PGW. nice remniscences.

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Some of PGW quotes...
1. They crached into each other proving that two people cannot be at the same time at the same place
2. He went in and came back so quickly that he saw himself going in.
more later

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Two lovable characters at Blandings:
1.Pig-headed Lord Emsworth,who has nothing but the
prize pig that he rears on his mind all the time.
2.Uncle Galahad,the trouble-shooter at
Blandings,who pulls out all his young nephews/nieces out of the tight holes in
which they're fixed,sometimes with the able
counsel provided by his all-efficient
(inimitable,in .G.W's words)valet,Jeeves.. (Incidentally one of his policies in life is never
to turn in b'fore 4.00 in the night(morning!)every day)

Also,P.G.W's predeliction for aunts is quite overwhelming:aunt Connie,aunt Agatha,aunt
Hermione,aunt Diana...the list goes on..Every
youngster introduced is done so with a long line
of aunts trailing him/her!!

Another of P.G.W's interesting characters is
Comrade Psmith,the communist,possessor of a
profound vocabulory,who has the uncanny ability of
framing huge complex sentences out of the most
simple of statements!
(eg:Chided by a bank manager,about his intriguing
stare,he replies politely,saying:"I'm sorry if my
stare falls short in any view of ur ideals of what
a stare should be!")

P.G.W's musical comedies really do lit up a smile on even the most impassive sect of his readers..!

(Interestingly,Crazy Mohan himself once admitted
in a Vikatan interview,that his writings were inspired by P.G.W's lighter vein of writing,&
humorous color.)

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meera:

That was a good write up on PGW, one of my all time fves.

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Thanks Ramji..nice to discover some (hard to find)P.G.W's admirers out here...