Wodehousekeeping

A solo episode this time, as I (Ian Cockburn) turn to 1917's The Man With Two Left Feet and Other Stories, P. G. Wodehouse's second collection of short stories for adults, which includes "Extricating Young Gussie", the story that first introduces the legendary characters Bertie Wooster (here apparently called Bertie Mannering-Phipps), Aunt Agatha and - in a cameo role - Jeeves. There are plot spoilers. Content note: see below next to individual stories.

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Stories covered, with start times:
"Bill the Bloodhound" 6m
"Extricating Young Gussie" 17m
"Wilton's Holiday" 33m 46s
"The Mixer: He Meets a Shy Gentleman" 42m
"The Mixer: He Moves in Society" 49m
"Crowned Heads" 54m
"At Geisenheimer's" 1h 1m
"The Making of Mac's" 1h 11m (CN: suicide)
"One Touch of Nature" 1h 22m
"Black for Luck" 1h 27m
"The Romance of an Ugly Policeman" 1h 35m
"A Sea of Troubles" 1h 43m (CN: suicide)
"The Man with Two Left Feet" 1h 46m

Other works by Wodehouse mentioned
The Man Upstairs and Other Stories
Piccadilly Jim
Something Fresh
The Reggie Pepper stories
"Three From Dunsterville"
"Deep Waters",
"Fixing it for Freddie"
The golf stories
The Girl on the Boat
Bustanoby's
"In Alkala"
"By Advice of Counsel"
"Something to Worry About"
"The Man Upstairs"
"The Man Who Disliked Cats"
My Man Jeeves
The Prince and Betty
Uneasy Money
Joy in the Morning
Nuts and Wine (revue)
A Man of Means

Reference works consulted
Sophie Ratcliffe, P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters
Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life
Norman Murphy, A Wodehouse Handbook
Richard Usborne, Wodehouse at Work to the End
Madame Eulalie's Rare Plums website

Also mentioned
George Grossmith, Jr.
Harry Leon Wilson, Ruggles of Red Gap
Percy Jeeves
Leslie Havergal Bradshaw
The Beatles, "Get Back"
Magnetic Fields, "Goin' Back to the Country"
O. Henry
The Golden Butterfly (film adaptation of "The Making of Mac's")
M. F. Carey, "Learning McFadden to Waltz"
Leonora Cazalet
Denis Mackail "At Mr Besley's"
Do the Right Thing podcast
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Ian is joined by Nigel Townshend to enthuse over 1917's Piccadilly Jim, a breakthrough novel for Wodehouse. Nigel voices his displeasure at the 2004 film version. There are plot spoilers.

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Other works by Wodehouse mentioned
Leave it to Psmith
The Little Nugget
A Damsel in Distress (film screenplay)
A Gentleman of Leisure
"Concealed Art"
The Riviera Girl (musical, with Guy Bolton and Emmerich Kalman)
Bring On the Girls (memoir, with Guy Bolton)
Love Among the Chickens
"Rallying Round Old George"
Anything Goes (musical)

Reference works consulted
Sophie Ratcliffe, P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters
Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life
Norman Murphy, A Wodehouse Handbook
Barry Day, The Complete Lyrics of P. G. Wodehouse
Lee Davis, Bolton and Wodehouse and Kern
Madame Eulalie's Rare Plums website

Also mentioned
The three film adaptations of the book
Blandings (TV series)
New York Giants
The Regent Grill
Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese
Hugh Laurie
George Herriman, "The Dingbat Family" & "Krazy Kat" comic strips
Delmonico's
Bachelors' Club
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Drop the Dead Monkey! Ian is joined by writer and artist Tom Bailey to look at 1916's Uneasy Money, Wodehouse's second serial for the Saturday Evening Post, which had a personal significance for Plum and Ethel Wodehouse, as it is set in Long Island, setting of their courtship and early married life; and like them, the hero and heroine are married at the "Church 'Round the Corner" on Madison Square, also the inspiration for the song of the same name by Wodehouse and Jerome Kern. Tom and Ian debate the merits or otherwise of Wodehouse's more romantic novels, and of romance stories in general.

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Other works by Wodehouse mentioned
"Bill" (song)
"At Geisenheimer's"
"Extricating Young Gussie"
Something Fresh
Performing Flea
A Gentleman of Leisure
Psmith Journalist
The Swoop
"Church Round the Corner" (song) in Sally
Indiscretions of Archie
Bachelors Anonymous
Ring For Jeeves (the Jeeves novel without Bertie)

Reference works consulted
Sophie Ratcliffe, P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters
Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life
Norman Murphy, A Wodehouse Handbook
Barry Day, The Complete Lyrics of P. G. Wodehouse
Lee Davis, Bolton and Wodehouse and Kern
Madame Eulalie's Rare Plums website

Also mentioned
Michael Buerk
Nicolae Ceaușescu
Bob Peck
Jeeves and Wooster
David Nobbs
The Rise and Fall of Reginald Perrin
Charles Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop, Bleak House, Pickwick Papers
Oscar Wilde
George Eliot
Olga Tokarczuk The Empusium, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of The Dead
Thomas Mann The Magic Mountain
Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote
Henry Fielding, Tom Jones
Laurence Sterne, Tristam Shandy
Tobias Smollett
Jonathan Coe
Honoré de Balzac
Emile Zola
Vanity Fair (US)
Mary Poppins
F Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Edna May
The Belle of New York (Musical)
Lady Constance MacKenzie
Sarah Bernhardt
How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies
John Mortimer, The Rumpole stories
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations
Superman III
Hergé,the Tintin stories
Ionicus (Joshua Charles Armitage)
Rashomon
Bringing Up Baby
The Church of the Transfiguration, New York
Alice Fraser, A Passion For Passion
Georgette Heyer
When Harry Met Sally
Nora Ephron, Heartburn
Sherlock Jr

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Host Ian Cockburn (of the Shropshire Cockburns) is rejoined by storyteller and writer Matthew Bellwood to discuss Psmith Journalist, the third Psmith novel, and one of the first of Wodehouse's novels to be set in America. The novel first appeared in The Captain from 1909-10 but didn't appear in book form till 1915, by which point it had already been repurposed in 1912 for the US version of The Prince and Betty

A tale of yellow journalism in gangland New York.
This podcast contains spoilers, and some discussion of racism.

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Put doubloons in the old oak chest at ko-fi.com/wodehousekeeping
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Wodehousekeeping cannot be muzzled

Other works by Wodehouse mentioned
Mike and Psmith
The Luck of the Bodkins
Psmith in the City
The Prince and Betty
A Gentleman of Leisure
The Kid Brady stories
The Little Nugget
The Luck Stone
"The Episode of the Live Weekly"

Reference works consulted
Sophie Ratcliffe, P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters
Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life
Norman Murphy, A Wodehouse Handbook
Madame Eulalie's Rare Plums website

Also mentioned
Columbo: Strange Bedfellows
Twin Peaks
The Godfather
Boardwalk Empire
Charles Dickens, David Copperfield
Colin From Accounts
Carol Vorderman
Ted Kessler, Paper Cuts
Al Capone
Monk Eastman
Groucho Marx
Doctor Who
Sandie Shaw, "Reviewing the Situation"
John Mitchell Jr.
Stella Gibbons, Cold Comfort Farm
Cole Porter
Noël Coward

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Ian is joined by Tania Agnihotri to look at Something Fresh, AKA Something New, the first Blandings novel, published 1915. The book introduces the immortal Lord Emsworth, Freddie Threepwood, Beach the butler and the Efficient Baxter, though much of the focus is on this month's imposters at the castle. Content note: bad American accents.

You can e-mail me at [email protected]
make a donation at ko-fi.com/wodehousekeeping
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Other works by Wodehouse mentioned:
The Mr Mulliner Stories
"The Story of Webster"
"The Truth About George"
Mike and Psmith (part two of Mike)
The Ukridge stories
Love Among the Chickens
The Luck Stone
"The Matrimonial Sweepstakes"
"The Delayed Exit of Claude and Eustace"
"A Man of Means: The Episode of the Hired Past"
Psmith in the City
"The Crime Wave At Blandings"
The Reggie Pepper stories
"Ruth in Exile"
Right Ho, Jeeves
"Pearls Means Tears"
"Strychnine in the Soup"
Leave it to Psmith
"The Goalkeeper and the Plutocrat"
"A Man of Means: The Episode of the Live Weekly"
"A Pal Like You" from Oh, Boy!

Reference works consulted
Sophie Ratcliffe, P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters
Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life
Norman Murphy, A Wodehouse Handbook
Paul Kent, Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
Madame Eulalie's Rare Plums website

Also mentioned
Saki, "Mrs Packletide's Tiger"
George Ade
Herbert W. Westbrook
William Townend
Samuel Johnson ("A man who is tired of London...")
Alfred Harmsworth
Simpson's in the Strand
Philip Peveril Wodehouse
Georgette Heyer
J M Barrie, The Admirable Crichton
Jeeves and Wooster (TV series)
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