‘Jeeves and The Hollywood Way’, a Wodehouse discussion at the Slapstick Festival, and Takarazuka Revue company adaptation of the Wodehouse 1926 musical Oh, Kay! Continue reading Wodehouse News: movie reviews, Slapstick festival & a Japanese stage adaptation
Better to have loved and lost, and bunged the whole thing down on paper, than never to have loved at all. Continue reading Love in the Time of Wodehouse: Chiefly About Chickens
Having apprised regular readers of certain facts about an upcoming Wodehouse exhibition at the British Library, the keen observer may have detected an absence of new material here at Plumtopia. But the world of Wodehouse has not suffered. Indeed, it has been buzzing along quite nicely. The P G Wodehouse Society dinner On 11 October, the P G Wodehouse Society (UK) held its biennial dinner. This is always a special occasion, and in 2018 included readings from Neil Pearson, Katy Reece, and Robert Daws. Daws is well known to Wodehouse fans for playing Tuppy Glossop in the Jeeves and Wooster … Continue reading P.G. Wodehouse in the news
On 28 January, the British Library celebrated their recent acquisition of the Wodehouse archives with P.G. Wodehouse: A musical celebration. As the title suggests, the event celebrated Wodehouse’s lesser known but important contribution as a musical theatre lyricist, working in collaboration with Guy Bolton, Jerome Kern and others (including George and Ira Gershwin). I felt privileged to be among those present as singer Hal Cazalet and actress Lara Cazalet (Wodehouse’s great grandchildren) and pianist Stephen Higgins performed songs from the Wodehouse songbook, including: ‘Put Me in My Little Cell’, ‘You Never Knew About Me’, ‘The Enchanted Train’, ‘Oh Gee Oh … Continue reading P.G. Wodehouse: A musical celebration at the British Library — Report
Originally posted on The Aroma of Books:
//published 2011// As soon as I heard about this book, I knew that I wanted to not just read it, but to own it, so that I could savor it whenever I wished. I haven’t regretted investing in this hefty tome (especially since I got it used, hardcover, for only $5!), even though it has taken me months to wade through it. ? While, on the whole, I’m not someone who enjoys delving into the personal lives of individuals whose art I enjoy, there are some exceptions to the rule. Agatha Christie’s autobiography… Continue reading P.G. Wodehouse – A Life in Letters edited by Sophie Ratcliffe
On a beautiful autumn day, I left London’s Victoria Station for the glorious Sussex countryside to visit the home of Sir Edward Cazalet, P.G. Wodehouse’s step-grandson. I had met Edward and his wife Camilla, Lady Cazalet, in London during the summer, and they generously invited me to visit their home to view the family’s archive of Wodehouse materials. The train journey was a pleasant, uneventful affair, which did not seem, to me, to be in quite the proper Wodehouse spirit. I ought to have been playing ‘Persian Monarchs’ with a genial stranger, or thumbing through a volume of poems by … Continue reading A Visit to the Wodehouse family archives
P.G. Wodehouse received his knighthood in the 1975 New Year’s Honours List. His letters from that time, published in Sophie Ratcliffe’s P.G.Wodehouse: A Life in Letters, reveal that he had a busy time with press interviews, as well filming introductions for a new BBC Television Series called Wodehouse Playhouse. Reflecting on his first month of knighthood, Wodehouse wrote: I am still trying to decide whether I would advise a young man to become a knight. The warm feeling it gives one in the pit of the stomach is fine, but oh God those interviewers. They came around like flies, and … Continue reading On this day: P.G. Wodehouse knighted 1 January 1975
Wodehouse offers so much more to female readers than he is usually given credit for. A few months ago, I responded to criticism of Indian Summer of an Uncle by Janet Cameron (see my case for the defence). I feel sad that Cameron’s cursory appraisal of perceived gender issues has blinded her to the exquisite joys of his work. So today, I want to talk about why Wodehouse is a great writer of, and for, women. First, Wodehouse presents readers with heroines who are full of pep and ginger; independent, sometimes feisty, characters who frequently outsmart the men. What a … Continue reading Wodehouse’s women: in the eye of the beholder
This summer I visited the Hampshire town of Emsworth, where P.G Wodehouse once lived. He first arrived at the invitation of Herbert Westbrook, who was teaching at Emsworth House School. Westbrook is described in Sophie Ratcliffe’s ‘P.G.Wodehouse, A Life in Letters’ as “handsome, charismatic, and permanently broke.” He is forever associated in my mind with the character Ukridge and, for some reason, the novel I most associate with Emsworth is Love Among the Chickens (1906). Wodehouse lived for a time at Emsworth House School, run by Baldwin King-Hall and his sister Ella. The school is mentioned in Mike (1909) and … Continue reading A visit to P G Wodehouse’s Emsworth
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