Two Tomes
It's been a while since I posted but I've been reading books which clock in at kilos so I'm allowed to take a bit of time on them.
I almost didn't buy "PG Wodehouse: A Life" because I thought that I had enough bios of my favourite author, but Dymocks didn't have the book I really wanted to buy and I had to have SOMETHING. (I'm not a book addict. I could give up any time I like.)
It's the bee knees and then some of biography. It's so insightful, balanced and comprehensive. I learnt much eg, that Ethel had been widowed twice before she married PG.
The author doesn't shirk the war broadcasts controversy, but he clearly is a fan of the Old Master. When he starts a paragraph with the phrase "The psychology of the individual..." you know that he has spent many an hours with Jeeves and Bertie et al.
I had to jump ahead to the death chapter when I was only in the 1930s in an effort to avoid crying lots. I thought I might not have got attached enough and could read of his demise with equanimity but it just meant that I cried a lot twice instead of once.
PG would have to be the big hero of my life. To start writing novels just as Edward VII was finally getting his chance to wear the fancy crown, and then 70 years and 97 novels later to have your final novel on your typewriter the day you die is a superhuman achievement. He makes Terry Pratchett seem reluctant to publish.
And the best thing is that "Aunts Aren't Gentlemen" which was published in 1974, is just as good as "The Mating Season" which he wrote thirty years before. The guy gives you unprecedented quantity and quality. And he could still touch his touch his toes on his 90th birthday.
Anyone who has read a good selection of his stuff will realise that half of my conversation is gleaned from his fabulous use of metaphor, simile and quotation. It was always my intention to marry the person I found closest to being Psmith in real life because I just loved the way he talked so much. It's a bit ironic that Jason is renowned as the strong, silent type.
Finishing the book, and mopping up the tears meant I had to immediately start reading "Enter Psmith" which ends with
"Shall we stagger?"
They staggered.
Wodehouse's obsession with inventive verbs for 'walk' means that Genevieve, at five years old, says "I was toddling along, when..."
Hmmmm seem to have got a bit carried away with my love of Peeg. Will briefly mention that the other tome was Stephanie Alexander's "Cook's Companion". Just browsing through this book is an exhausting process, even if you skip the sections on tripe, offal and chokos as I did. She told me more about gelatine than I ever thought it could be necessary for a human to know.
I almost didn't buy "PG Wodehouse: A Life" because I thought that I had enough bios of my favourite author, but Dymocks didn't have the book I really wanted to buy and I had to have SOMETHING. (I'm not a book addict. I could give up any time I like.)
It's the bee knees and then some of biography. It's so insightful, balanced and comprehensive. I learnt much eg, that Ethel had been widowed twice before she married PG.
The author doesn't shirk the war broadcasts controversy, but he clearly is a fan of the Old Master. When he starts a paragraph with the phrase "The psychology of the individual..." you know that he has spent many an hours with Jeeves and Bertie et al.
I had to jump ahead to the death chapter when I was only in the 1930s in an effort to avoid crying lots. I thought I might not have got attached enough and could read of his demise with equanimity but it just meant that I cried a lot twice instead of once.
PG would have to be the big hero of my life. To start writing novels just as Edward VII was finally getting his chance to wear the fancy crown, and then 70 years and 97 novels later to have your final novel on your typewriter the day you die is a superhuman achievement. He makes Terry Pratchett seem reluctant to publish.
And the best thing is that "Aunts Aren't Gentlemen" which was published in 1974, is just as good as "The Mating Season" which he wrote thirty years before. The guy gives you unprecedented quantity and quality. And he could still touch his touch his toes on his 90th birthday.
Anyone who has read a good selection of his stuff will realise that half of my conversation is gleaned from his fabulous use of metaphor, simile and quotation. It was always my intention to marry the person I found closest to being Psmith in real life because I just loved the way he talked so much. It's a bit ironic that Jason is renowned as the strong, silent type.
Finishing the book, and mopping up the tears meant I had to immediately start reading "Enter Psmith" which ends with
"Shall we stagger?"
They staggered.
Wodehouse's obsession with inventive verbs for 'walk' means that Genevieve, at five years old, says "I was toddling along, when..."
Hmmmm seem to have got a bit carried away with my love of Peeg. Will briefly mention that the other tome was Stephanie Alexander's "Cook's Companion". Just browsing through this book is an exhausting process, even if you skip the sections on tripe, offal and chokos as I did. She told me more about gelatine than I ever thought it could be necessary for a human to know.