Ye’re right, nobody remembers a series called Dallas and it didn’t have any offshoots. Or 90210.
You’re right that the US does this quite a bit. However, in the American case, it tends to be done earnestly. Whereas in the British case, it is not at all; PG Wodehouse celebrates an elite lifestyle as much as Jane Austen celebrates marrying for money or Gilbert & Sullivan celebrates bragging.
Bertie Wooster, Edmund Blackadder, Wilt, Basil Fawlty; all chief protagonists of their respective works but hardly celebrated.
I’m an American - although no one knows him where I live, I love his books; I actually first became interested in him because I’m also a huge Orwell fan, and I read the aforementioned essay about the controversy surrounding his activities in WWII.
Neither of which is at all “elitist and effete” but rather, portraying a wealthy version of ordinary middle class life – on a more lavish, and therefore exciting, backdrop.
The kids on 90201, they worried about finding love, getting grades, fitting in, etc. they are worried about the SATs and if they could get into a good college. All the same things that middle class kids worry about. (they did not believe they would be accepted into harvard on their family connections, as they had none). In fact, Brenda and Brendon were middle class back in Minnesota and their parents disapproved of the “rich kid” lifestyle and thought it was wrong and dangerous for their kids to not have responsibilities. Brandon worked at the Peach Pit because his parents wouldn’t give him spending money! Why, that’s just folks!
Just because you’re rich doesn’t make you “elite and effete.” I didn’t say Americans look down on wealth, but on things perceived as idle and useless and not acquired through effort. And having too much upperclass-style education is usually a bad thing. No one on Dallas was ever in any danger of appearing overeducated! Like I said Americans are both fascinated and repelled by the idle hereditary rich.
“Half a league,
half a league,
half a league onward.
With a hey nonnie-nonnie,
and a hot-cha-cha!”
One of my favourite authors, and I was born in Ohio!
Sentence 1. Nope, by personal observation of myself and many others.
Sentence 2. Just nope.
Wodehouse was popular enough in America to be regularly printed as a big name in Playboy in the 50s and 60s. Alongside Nabokov. This was after he moved Bertie Wooster to America, which everybody today appears to have blanked from their minds.
He was probably better known in some crowds in America for the many Broadway shows he contributed to.
He was very much a product of the pre-WWII era and he looked increasingly foolish as he kept writing the same things until the 1970s. I think he may be better appreciated today when he’s a relic of a nostalgic past and all the lesser works are tacitly swept under the rug.
Groucho ended a speech in one of the movies with “With a hey nonnie-nonnie, and a hot-cha-cha!” I wonder who took it from whom. They worked on Broadway at the same time for all of the 1920s.
My American born ex-wife, who had little exposure to British entertainment before she married me, was absolutely captivated by the Fry and Laurie version of Jeeves and Wooster when I introduced her to it. The only other British show she took to, to anything like the same degree, was Chef, starring Lenny Henry. (She absolutely could not wrap her head around the very concept of Minder. How could petty criminals be the heroes, and not be solving murders, or meting out rough justice, or something?)
As has been said, Wodehouse actually spent much of his career in America, although most (not all) of his stories remained set in England. Many of the stories include American characters. (They are stereotyped caricatures, but then, so are all the British characters; indeed, all his characters. One does not read Wodehouse for psychological or sociological realism.) I am pretty sure he still finds plenty of readers both in Britain and the USA (amongst that minority of people who do still read fiction for pleasure). I think I had read virtually all his stuff by the time I finished high school. I was rather shocked, when, some years ago, I ran across a British Eng. Lit. academic who had never read him.
This thread is the 1st I’m hearing of him.
(36 y/o American who grew up middle class)
Maybe this thread is as good a place as any to ask - I’m trying to find an ebook that collects all of Wodehouse’s work, in order of publication, and not having any luck. Suggestions?
If you enjoy reading, I recommend him highly.
ETA - And since some of his work is available for free, you can try it our for no cost. Right Ho Jeeves Right Ho, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse | Project Gutenberg
That would include me, a long-time fan and collector who has read virtually everything Wodehouse ever wrote – and proudly owns it in one form or another, including some first editions from as far back as the early 20s. If Bertie ever moved to America, it’s news to me, though Wodehouse himself, of course, did. Bertie certainly visited New York from time to time and fell into as many misadventures there as in his native London, but I’d be willing to bet there was never any permanent move to America. Perhaps in the Playboy stories, but I would have thought such stories would eventually have been collected in book form.
To answer the OP, here in Canada major bookstores used to have limited numbers of the more popular works, but in recent years they’ve pretty much vanished. I don’t think this reflects reduced popularity, but rather changes in the market that have forced bookstores to concentrate on high-volume mass-market crap.
I’m not much for possessions and the like, but the one thing I want to own is a first edition Jeeves. Some of those old ones are well into thousands of dollars though.
This surprises me, just because of how often his name comes up here on the SDMB. For example, several of his works have been mentioned in the current Do you have a “perfect” book? thread.
Such ebook “complete works” omnibuses are becoming increasingly common for writers whose works are in the public domain (but not otherwise). Here in the U.S. at least, a substantial number of Wodehouse’s earlier works are in the public domain, and are available in ebook collections, but the majority are not, and can only be purchased individually for nontrivial amounts of money.
The most famous Wodehouse collection in the world was the James H. Heineman collection, consisting of some 2,000 books, autograph manuscripts and typescripts, letters, and original artwork totaling some 6,300 pieces. It was auctioned off in pieces by Sotheby’s in 1998 – not to me, mind you, I’m not in that class! 
But I drooled over it! Any books from the Heineman collection that find their way into the market are still the most valuable. But as Heineman himself said, “No one seems to collect Wodehouse out of a stern sense of duty or, except very seldom, greed. Pure enjoyment is the main thing. The geniality Wodehouse inspires is especially evident among collectors. One cannot be absorbed in Wodehouse without being influenced by his characters’ examples of style, charm, decency and pluck.”
Interesingly, that wasn’t Heineman’s first collection. He had amassed a beautiful collection living in his parents’ house in Brussels as a youth in the 30s, with the precious hardbacks kept in their original sealed wrapping while he read the paperback versions. When he returned to the house as a soldier in the US Army in 1944, after four years of German occupation most of the contents of the house was still intact, but the Wodehouse books were gone.
For some unknown reason(at least to me) Wodeshouse does have a following in Russia.
In suburban Australia: the local library service here has some Jeeves and Wooster DVDs, one large print Jeeves hardcover, an audio CD, and a single Blandings omnibus. For some reason the books are expensive and hard to find in bookshops.
Perhaps I’m remembering visits, but my decades-old memory says there did seem to be a time in the short stories where Bertie was living in America. Most of the short stories predate the novels, which are set in Britain.
The first half of season 4 of Jeeves and Wooster are based on stories set in America but I don’t have the stories handy to look them up.
I’m fairly sure Bertie never moved permanently to America, although he certainly stayed there for long enough stretches that he had an apartment.
The name is familiar but I can’t say I’ve ever read any of his works.