I’m re-reading Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, published in 1954.
The casus belli has been socks, banjos , hats, dinner jackets, other items of apparel, etc. This time it is Bertie’s moustache, cultivated while Jeeves was on holiday at Bognor Regis. Strange, because Jeeves usually favours Herne Bay for shrimping, although as you know he hankers after a bigger catch – a tarpon in the Caribbean.
My grandfather had a moustache; it was compulsory in the army until 1916 when George V signed something or other repealing this tradition. I think Plum remembers G V when he chose Bognor for Jeeves. He also pays tribute to one of his favourite authors. Bertie is reading The Mystery of the Pink Crayfish by Rex West – an homage to Rex Stout? Aunt Dahlia is reading an Agatha Christie, at least she was until she threw it at Bertie in exasperation, and other characters talk of TS Eliot, WH Auden and good-old Spinoza. Fortunately there’s room for a lot of word play; imaginative similes, metaphors, mangled quotes, a tongue twister and a Spoonerism. Who could ask for more? Oh yes – a complex plot with multiple unexpected changes of direction. Spoiler: Aunt Dahlia bludgeons Lord Sidcup by the safe. Cluedo came on the market in 1949.
Golly it’s good to read Wodehouse, especially when there’s so much bad stuff on the news.
Hear, hear!