#27. Emerald Stoker
I had no idea a sport called rackets existed. Just assumed rackets meant tennis, especially since he played doubles with Beefy Anstruther. You learn something new every day 
Thanks.
It is Mervyn Keene, Clubman. I know I’m right about the books, because I did check Is this cheating? I finished * The Inimitable Jeeves * two days ago, it was right next to my comp. The others were all off the top of my head, though.
I’ve only recently started with Wodehouse. I’ve almost finished the Jeeves series. I’ll be getting to the rest soon. Any recommendations which ones I could start with?
She was a waitress. I guess he was embarassed because he was pretending to be her earlier.
I have no idea about any of the others, even the Wooster ones. And I used to think I knew my Wodehouse…
Salil.
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A dead cat or dog, I think the latter. It had been in his bed, and he thought to dispose of the body by throwing it out the window.
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The Earl of Ickenham (Uncle Fred) and Pongo Twistleton.
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Horace Filmer, the Cabinet Minister. They were trapped by an angry swan.
Oh, that. That would have been the dead cat, with which the whacking great Alsatian had been toying in Freddie’s room. He’d rather have bunged it into a houseplant or something downstairs for the maids to find, IIRC, except for the Prenderbys’ butler who’d been posted outside his room to prevent his committing fresh offenses against the local population of dumb chums. As it was, the window represented the only avenue left to him. Just Freddie’s luck that on the two occasions in his life upon which he deemed it desirable or necessary to fling a cat out of a window, Sir Mortimer Prenderby should have been on hand to arrest the progress of said felines.
Now that I consider, your question commits the same error to which Sir Mortimer and Lady Prenderby both fell victim; to wit, that Freddie had directed the cats, both the quick and the dead, at Sir Mortimer. Freddie’s target with the cats, in each case, was some abstract point in the outer darkness; the point wasn’t to throw the cats at anyone, but merely to throw them out of his room. Not that you could make la famille de Prenderby, aunts included, understand the distinction. Not that it would have made any difference to Lady Prenderby, in any case.
The Earl of Ickenham, Ickenham Hall, Ickenham, Hants., better known to his nephew Pongo Twistleton as Uncle Fred.
Right Hon. A.B. Filmer. A swan.
Is #23 his monocle? (I have a vague feeling that’s it…)
(And may I also extend a welcome to Miss Mapp? Provided she keeps her hands off my lobster recipes, that is ;)).
Ukulele Ike, Northern Piper, thank you! (I’m all a-flutter now…)
Ike, you’re a Luciaphile? Perhaps I should start a thread on this subject. I’ve been recommending Benson’s novels to friends for years by telling them, “They’re kind of like Wodehouse, if the focus were on Aunts Dahlia and Agatha instead of Bertie and his chums.”
I’m at something of a disadvantage in answering questions, since I can’t post from work, but as long as I have Wodehouse books scattered all over the floor, I can pose some more questions:
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I haven’t found the answer to #9 yet, but in looking for it, I did find a reference to Oofy Prosser being swindled out of 2000 pounds. By whom, and how?
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Why did Jeeves give notice and leave Bertie’s service?
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What did Tuppy Glossop do to Bertie so that Bertie bears a grudge against him?
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What is the name of Rosie M. Banks’ food-faddist friend?
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As far as I know, there is only one short story written with Jeeves as the first-person narrator. What is the title of this story?
Tied back the final rope as Bertie swung across the pool.
I’ve forgotten the title. Story about Bertie’s misadventures giving a speech to a girl’s school.
Steve, thank you also! I will try, but if you give all your servants the day off and leave the kitchen unattended, and I just happen to be walking that way… well, I really can’t be held responsible.
Enough hijacking; I’m going to start a Benson thread.
Siiiigh…one more time…
[hijack]
I had a geography teacher in junior high named Ms. Mapp. I swear to God.
[/hijack]
I believe it was the episode with the prawns, whose details were never revealed.
Because Bertie wouldn’t give up that stupid banjo (and I can’t say I blame Jeeves here either…)
I’ve forgotten the name of the food fascist. Probably someone will beat me to recalling it, too… Alas.
But on a different note:
- What’s the name of the person who gets Bingo little taken off by the police for protesting the bomb?
Ah! I found these two at least. I’d pat myself on my back, but I admit that I had to cheat and look them up. The answer to 31 is Laura Pyke, and 32 is Bertie Changes His Mind.
…but has anyone here read The Lovecraft Papers, by PH Cannon? It’s sort of a parody crossover in three stories between HP Lovecraft and PG Wodehouse…kind of a Bertie Wooster meets Cthulhu type thing.
Herein lies my ignorance. I’ve not read much actual Wodehouse, and I found the stories in The Lovecraft Papers to be quite amusing. I’m sure some purists here will decry me for this opinion.
Tell me, how do these stories stack up against the original Wodehouse? I think Cannon nailed Lovecraft pretty well. How’d he do with Bertie?
Don’t worry. After I reduce my current reading pile, Wodehouse is one of the very next up to bat.
Well I’m dashed! I thought I had this one in the proverbial bag. But after trying to remember if it was Spink-bottle who compared the sunset to a piece of rare roast beef or someone else entirely, I finally had to go and look the bally thing up and I think I’ve found the answer you’re looking for - Gussie ate a ham sandwich! (Fairly brazenish stuff for old Gussie, but then he had just survived two b’s with d at the hands of Roderick Spode, so I imagine he was feeling particularly bucked, or chuffed, as the poet Kipling might have put it.)
I had remembered the cook, the basin and the crumpled form of Spode, but I had forgotten it was the ham sandwich that made Madeline cry, “This is the end!” Ah well. One must take the roughs with the smooths, I suppose.
Some more questions:
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What was the name of the worthy barmaid of the Angler’s Rest? (Hint: Freddy Widgeon was once mistaken for someone of that surname).
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What was the magazine published by Aunt Dahlia, and what article did Bertie write for it?
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Who was the prizefighter managed and promoted by that “battered man of wrath” Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge?
General comment on the Wodehouse canon: at his best there was no finer writer in the English language, but he also produced a lot of junk. I think his best stuff was produced at around the midpoint of his career. Earlier he had not yet found his voice, and his later stuff was, for the most part, sub-par replays of his earlier work.
I’m back again (real life has been intruding recently, so it looks like I’m a once-a-day poster.)
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Rackensack got the answer I was looking for - a dead cat, “one that had made the great change - after life’s fitful fever it slept well.” I take the criticism, rack, but as you point out, such abstract concepts were irrelevant to the Penderby ménage.
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Buck up aseymayo - better l. than n. Have a snootful of something soothing for the tonsils.
18 & 19. sc913 got this. Rosie was working as a waitress to get background for her next book. The reason Bertie was embarrassed was that to help reconcile Bingo to Bingo’s uncle during an earlier contretemps, he had pretended to be Rosie, who was the uncle’s favourite author. When Rosie married Bingo, unpleasantness with the uncle resulted, which Jeeves soothed over by advising Bingo to tell the uncle that Bertie was off his rocker. The episode is spread over several short stories collected in The Inimibtable Jeeves.
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IzzyR nailed this one - it’s in the short story “Uncle Fred Flits By,” in the Drones collection, Young Men in Spats. Some feel that this is Plum’s finest short story ever - it always makes the lists of everyone’s favourite. sc913 - this collection would be a good one to expand your acquaintance with Wodehouse. I’d also recommend Summer Lightning, one of the key Blandings novels, as well as Leave it to Psmith, one of the first novels were Plum has made the transition from school-boy novels to the sublime souffles of his mature years.
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ENugent got this one - it’s featured in Summer Lightningand Heavy Weather, both set at Blandings Castle.
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Steve Wright got this one - off the top of my head, I can’t remember which of the Blandings novels it’s mentioned in.
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IzzyR and rackensack got this one. Amongst his many talents, Jeeves of course knew how to deal with a peevish swan, rescuing the young master from both the swan and a political career.
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gallows fodder got this one. Emerald made the ham sandwich which Spink-Bottle ate to sever relations with Madeline Bassett, adding further poignancy and irony to a tale of tragedy.
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gr8t guy got this one - it led to Bertie almost being disembowled by his replacement, Bingley, in an inebriated fit of Bolshevism (Bingley’s fit, not Bertie’s).
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IzzyR got this one - provided the motive for several short stories of Bertie trying to get revenge, but they finally buried the hatchet when Tuppy got engaged to Bertie’s cousin Angela.
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Laura Pyke sounds right to me.
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“Bertie Changes his Mind” - Bertie was temporarily bored with the clubman’s life and suggested to Jeeves that he might get involved with some organizations for the young - Jeeves took prompt action to avert the threat, trapping Bertie into making a speech at a girl’s school. Bertie scuttled back to the Drones quickly.
[aside] grt8 guy - you looked them up?? not quite playing the game, old chap. [/aside]
Now, I’m going to take a crack at a couple of the new questions.
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Miss Mapp, was it Soapy Molloy, the silver-toungued fraudster-salesman of Silver River Oil shares?
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The magazine was Milday’s Boudoir, featured in several of the Jeeves novels. Bertie’s “piece” (“as we journalists call it”) was “What the Well-Dressed Man is Wearing.”
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IzzyR, was it Battling Bilson, or am I confusing my pugilists here?
Now, there’s still some questions left: -
Lord Emsworth’s precursor to the fat pig mania.
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The Christian name of the Duke of Dunstable.
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Lord Emwsorth’s cook-like sister.
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Reggie Tennyson’s smuggling method.
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Horace Davenport’s unusual garb.
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Jeff Miller’s missiles.
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The recipient of Jeff Miller’s missiles. (hint - one of the characters mentioned in reply to another question is part of the answer here.)
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What did Bingo do with their son, leading to the resumption of civil relations with Oofy Prosser?
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What did Monty Bodkin swear he would change about his personal appearence, and why?
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When Sue Brown got engaged, what comment did one of her acquaintances make on the appearence of Sue’s financé, Ronnie Fish?
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What’s the name of the person who gets Bingo little taken off by the police for protesting the bomb?
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What was the name of the worthy barmaid of the Angler’s Rest? (Hint: Freddy Widgeon was once mistaken for someone of that surname).
[BTW - is there a point where people want the poser of the question to give the answer?]
I’m late for work so don’t have time to think of any new questions. 
sigh
Yes, I know, it’s quite embarrassing. My excuse is that while I KNEW those stories and could lay my hands on them, describe the plots from memory, etc etc, the NAMES escaped me (and by the time I reached this thread, the answers I DID know off the top of my head, complete with names, had already been given). I’m horrible with names in general though, so it’s not surprising.
But I think it’s not Battling Bilson. Bilson was the pub-keeper in… umm… darn. Name escapes me (see?). I think it was called something along the lines of The Butler Did It, or some such, about the marriage tontine. Although I suppose the same character could be used in unrelated stories (I’ve read but little about Ukridge).
No, he’s right. It is Battling Bilson.
No, that’s not it.
I think all of my other questions have been answered. I’ll have to go dig up some more…