"Something Fresh" by P G Wodehouse

 First published in the US in 1915 (there is a remark about motion pictures which clearly refers to those of the silent variety), this is the first of the Blandings Castle saga starring the absent-minded Earl of Emsworth.

The full eccentricity of the characters is not yet fully developed and several of the key characters of the later books are missing, for example Lord Emsworth's sister Constance and his pig the Empress of Blandings. Whereas the later books are delightful for the utter absurdity of their plots and give pleasure as one gazes at the absurdities of the English aristocracy, this book remains fundamentally plot-driven and determined to progress the two love stories at is heart. 

Nevertheless, there are flashes of the Wodehouse to come,

• One of his techniques is to take a metaphor and show that, if taken literally, it is absurd. For example:
• "Larsen's Exercises are the last word in exercises. ... They enable you, if you persevere, to fell oxen, if desired, with a single blow." (1.1) Notice how PGW uses subordinate phrases to interrupt the flow of the sentence so as to wring out the maximum humour.
• "The wolf was glued to the door like a postage stamp" (3.6)
• In general PGW delays punch lines. For example: "Your Senior Conservative, when at lunch, has little leisure for observing anything not immediately on the table in front of him. To attract attention in the dining-room of the Senior Conservative Club between the hours of one and two-thirty, you have to be a mutton-chop, not an earl." (3.1) The second sentence could have omitted everything between 'attention' and 'you' but by adding the extra words PGW keeps one waiting for the pay-off and also adds colour.

There are connections with other books by PGW:

• Mike went to a school "at Emsworth" in Mike
• One of the characters is Algernon Wooster ... is he any relation to Bertie Wooster of the Jeeves books?
• "One of the Georges - I forget which - once said that a certain number of hours' sleep each night - I cannot recall at the moment how many - made a man something, which for the time being has slipped my memory." (7.2) Again, the humour is aided by the subordinate clauses. This is almost identical to a sentence in Mike: “One of the Georges,” said Psmith, “I forget which, once said that a certain number of hours’ sleep a day—I cannot recall for the moment how many—made a man something, which for the time being has slipped my memory." Recycling?

PGW always wrote strong female characters and there are hints that he was perhaps ahead of his time (still debating women's suffrage)  in his understanding of the need for women to have equality with men:

• "You look on woman as a weak creature to be shielded and petted. We aren't anything of the sort. We're terrors. We're as hard as nails. We're awful creatures." (6.2)
• "Woman is invading Man's sphere more successfully every day, but there are still certain fields in which Man may consider that he is rightfully entitled to a monopoly, and the purloining of scarabs in the watches of the night is surely one of them." (9.3)

Other selected quotes:

• "Beggars approached the task of trying to persuade perfect strangers to bear the burden of their maintenance." (1.1)
• "Collecting, as Mr Peters did it, resembles the drink habit. It begins as an amusement, and ends as an obsession." (3.2)
• "There is every kind of restaurant in London, from the restaurant which makes you fancy you are in Paris to the restaurant which makes you wish you were." (3.3)
• "The heroine was having a perfectly rotten time, kidnapped and imprisoned every few minutes." (3.5)
• "In the profession of living by one's wits in a large city the first principle of offence and defence is to sum people up at first sight." (3.6)
• "It is the saddest sight in the world, that of the crowd collected by a 'Wanted' advertisement. They are so palpably not wanted by any one for any purpose whatsoever; yet every time they gather together with a sort of hopeful hopelessness." (4.1)
• "Among the compensations of advancing age is a wholesome pessimism, which, while it takes the fine edge off whatever triumphs may come to us, has the admirable effect of preventing Fate from working off on us any of the gold bricks, coins with strings attached, an unhatched chickens at which Ardent Youth snatches with such enthusiasm." (6.1)
• "In most English country towns, if the public-houses do not actually outnumber the inhabitants, they all do an excellent trade. It is only when they are two to one that hard times hit them and set the innkeepers blming the Government."(7.2)
• "Baxter felt like a man taking his first ride in an express elevator who has outstripped his vital organs by several floors and sees no immediate prospect of their ever catching up with him again." (8.4)
• "I'm like one of the old 'bus horses who could go on for ever if people got off without making them stop. It's the having to get the 'bus moving again that wears one out." (10.5)
• "Life is nothing but a mutual aid association." (10.5)

This is not yet classic PGW but we are moving towards perfection and this is already funnier than most comic novels.

The sequel to this book is Leave it to Psmith

Other books by PGW reviewed in this blog can be found here:

December 2021; 260 pages

This review was written by the author of Motherdarling  and The Kids of God