Right Ho, Jeeves

 

by P.G. Wodehouse

Published 1934

So, in Thank You, Jeeves, which I recently read but somehow forgot to review, Wodehouse lifts Bertie and Jeeves from their short-story status and places them in their first full-length novel.  Personally, I prefer Wodehouse’s novels to his short stories, especially when Jeeves is involved.  In both of these  books, the story-line is so much richer due to the length of the story.  There is much more time for plot lines to scramble off on bunny trails and to run into old friends.

Still, the short stories are almost essential to really getting the full enjoyment from the novels, as we have met the majority of the characters elsewhere, thus making their reappearance (and actions) that much more entertaining.

Wodehouse is virtually always a win.  He is witty and brilliantly descriptive.  This was one of my favorite quotes from Thank You, Jeeves–

Outwardly [my new valet] was all respectfulness, but inwardly you could see that he was a man who was musing on the coming Social Revolution and looked on Bertram as a tyrant and an oppressor.

“Yes, Brinkley, I shall dine out,” I said.

He said nothing, merely looking at me as if he were measuring me for my lamppost.

And now you can see Brinkley’s precise glare.  Wodehouse could have brushed off this moment with a mere, “Brinkley said nothing,” or the slightly more descriptive, “Brinkley said nothing; he merely glared.”  But instead, he takes the time–and the words–to give us the exact way in which Brinkley glares, and thus brings a secondary character to life, and providing me with even more fodder to prove my claim that Wodehouse is one of the best writers of all-time.