Wodehouse: Weaving Wit’s Worth

"I know I was writing stories when I was five. I don't know what I did before that. Just loafed, I suppose",
says P.G. Wodehouse about himself. Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, KBE (15 October 1881 – 14 February 1975) was a British writer whose mastery over the art of sarcasm and humour is unparalleled. He is referred to by others as a writer of humour but he himself, the humble man that he was, begs to differ and says all he did was ‘light writing’.

‘Light’ it could not be for its exceedingly heavy dose of humour which had fans enthralled. Wodehouse penned a number of characters but Jeeves and Bertram Wooster shall remain immortal forever. Wooster is the personification of the British upper class, consisting mainly of the nobility and the other ‘idle rich’ who were well provided for and did not have to earn a living, in pre-war society. Their mansions and titles intact, they strut about in pride but their grey cells have all but rusted due to prolonged unuse and their finances in dire straits as they can no longer live off their lands and the feudal spirit is all but dead. Feudalism had indeed been all but consigned to the dungeons of perpetual oblivion both in law and in the public spirit. The British Empire’s sun which earlier never set was now staring at a bleak future and perpetual eclipse given that the onslaught on colonialism had taken its toll on Britain and the severe political and economic crises proved to be the last nail. “The sun never sets on the British Empire” was a feeble voice of denial and every ‘son’ of the Empire knew it at the bottom if his heart as much as he might hate the idea.

Wodehouse portrays the upper class as a creature that always mires itself in complications that are usually the complexity of the plot itself and their striving towards an amicable solution more often than not leads to a colossal disaster of sorts and it is solved in the nick of the time due to the timely intervention of Jeeves, Wooster’s butler, a servant who is an Epicurean in taste and language and attributes his shrewd intelligence to regular consumption of fish. While Wooster is the blundering fool, albeit he has a good heart, ends up causing a faux pas and it is always, without an exception, ‘Jeeves to the rescue’. Aunts and uncles are portrayed as lively creatures who while away their time in ‘constructive pastimes’ like collecting silver items, running a village weekly or Wooster-baiting. While one uncle busies himself in ravishing the delights of a French chef’s mastery, Wooster is ‘blessed’ with an aunt who was a hunter in her younger days and while indulging in that sport did a great disservice to her fellow sportsmen who till today suffer of hearing impairment and shiver at the thought of her hunting cries.

Wooster’s friends are characters unto themselves who indulge in puerile and juvenile antics. It seems that their favourite sport is an attempt at trying to nick the helmet of a policeman or trying to derive ways to win a wager at the races through underhand means. Their exploits might even include wooing a dozen of charming ladies, in whose love they keep on helplessly falling forgetting the pangs of their last separation which are not that ancient. They are usually attached to odd creatures like newts or pigs and take fancy to ladies whose fathers are dictators and precursors to Hitler. These fathers are always on the prowl for kidnapping a prospective son-in-law who is a member of the nobility. However, they are not totally hospitable to Wooster’s presence on their home turfs due to the fact that Bertram, in his magnanimity, takes up cudgels on behalf of his beleaguered friends which ends in a frantic call to Jeeves, the omniscient and the omnipresent who lends his wit to prompt action. Wooster’s bosom pal’s appearance is described “As for Gussie Finknottle, many an experienced undertaker would have been deceived by his appearance and started embalming on sight.” His friends are dedicated members of the Anti-Sausage League or the Revolution for Suppression of Eggs. Their idle pastimes which involve evanescent reveries of their school boy days where they saved many a butterfly and dying insects, proof of their heroic antics and noble spirits. They especially critique the magistracy who do not espouse their cause of high ‘spirited’ revelry and have often fined them and sent them to the clinker for a night as amercement for ducking a policeman’s hat or clubbing a constable as part of a wager.

Indeed I am reminded of the so called ‘babu’ class of Bengal that was created by the first British colonizers. These ‘Rai Bahadoors’ and ‘Rai Sahibs’ too indulged in such pastimes as they lived in the lap of luxury while the vox populi cried of deprivation and oppression. The Bengali aristocracy—western educated, western in thought and manners were bound to their Indian roots through only the colour of their skin. Their tales are akin to that of Wooster and his pals in a lot of ways.

One of the greatest Indian admirers of this brilliant author is Mr. Shashi Tharoor, the distinguished Indian diplomat. Tharoor, another great wit himself, was the President of the ‘Wodehousean Society’ during his days in St. Stephen’s. In his writings he always defers to Wodehouse as ‘The Great Master’.

The British upper class sticks to its code of honour, skewed as it has become due to the Woosters of that age. The principles of the ‘gentleman’, ‘tail-first’ as they are, provide The Great Master with perfect plots and settings that shall tickle one’s funny bone to the extent that your sides ache with laughing. Wodehouse redefined wit, sarcasm, humour and high-spiritedness. Wodehouse is a must read for all who desire to intellectually stimulate themselves and experience his authorship, who through his own works has reached the acme of glory. He has successfully carved out a niche place for himself in the mind of every connoisseur of witty literature. After all as Wodehouse says “the fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun”.

Wodehouse had very little connection with the law except maybe a case, Commissioner v. Wodehouse, 337 U.S. 369 (1949), in which he was charged by the IRS for not paying tax on sales of some books and representing the income as sale of property. This went upto the U.S. Supreme Court where The Great Master lost his case. However, his wit and command over Shakespeare’s language are surely two great attributes that would indeed make a very fine lawyer. Brevity and succinctly put humour often finds place in court chronicles where famous lawyers have indulged in such and favourably impressed the judges. Law students will indeed find The Great Master to be a very interesting read and with their acumen to accurately assimilate things, ravish the wit, humour and sarcasm that he has crafted. Though Wodehousean characters have a penchant for breaking the law and are often most critical of the way magistrates function yet he too shows how Nemesis does catch up with the corrupt and Wooster too has to finally stay on the right side of the law. One shall be forced to agree with what has been remarked about Wodehouse: ‘‘his critics have exhausted superlatives.’’