My Man Jeeves
Ratings71
Average rating3.7
I read this for book club–I'd never read or seen any Jeeves & Wooster stories before but I was vaguely familiar with the premise from existing in Western pop culture. And I have to say: even though this is the first collection and some of them are explicitly first drafts of stories that were later revised and republished, and some of these aren't even about Jeeves but instead about the off-brand Reggie Pepper...this was a delight! Still some genuinely LOL moments and a lot of droll observations about human nature that honestly hold up.
I get why this kind of humor was popular around the beginning of the twentieth century, but generally slapstick humor isn't much to my taste. The trickery of it just isn't that funny to me, and reminded me a little bit of The Canterbury Tales, which I also wasn't crazy about. This “brilliant” butler who is always making up ways to get his employer — Bertie Wooster — and Mr. Wooster's friends out of scrapes, but whose plans always get caught out or end up backfiring, and while things usually turn out fine in the end, it all seems like so much unnecessary trouble.
Plus, Mr. Wooster uses the word “chappie” too much.
I feel old and codgity.My family has always used the word “codgity,” but I didn't know how to spell it, so I googled it and apparently it isn't a word and my whole life is a lie. But this book counts toward Read Harder (a humor book), so yay for small wins.
I listened to this whenever Knucklehead (or other challenging reads/news) was too much. This meant that I was often a bit challenged by the disconnect between my world and Bertie's. Regardless, I get why people love these books with such a passion and re-read them regularly. Pure comfort.
Shudder. Oh, no. No. This was supposed to be hilarious because of all the stupid nincompoop hijinks they get into, but how can anyone be this flat-out stupid? There's no hero to this tale. Everyone in the tale thinks Jeeves is. But he's not—except in matters of style and information. His big plans get Bertie and his friends into all kinds of trouble.
Other than the vapid behavior on the part of grownups, it was the continual habitual lying that bothered me the most. It never worked and they never learned. And no one ever seemed to realize there was anything wrong with it.
Then the four stories about Reggie Pepper are thrown in the middle without any transition. By page three, you're wondering where Jeeves is and then realize it's because you're reading about Reggie. Who is he? We have no clue!
I may try other Jeeves stories, as I've heard the later ones are an improvement, but they are nowhere near being a priority.
Language: some “acceptable” swear derivatives plus some actual profanity
Dated, but very witty. Rich brat gets rescued from any situation by perfect butler. His rich brat friends, too. The delight is in the dialogue - the deadpan remarks of butler Jeeves, the cheerful naiveté of rich Bertie and his many silly friends, all good for nothings who rely on stipends of rich uncles, which they invariably stand to lose.
I listened to the audiobook narrated by Simon Prebble, who does a great job as a voice actor. A second book Narrated by someone else was only half as charming.
Great little plots, too. Often surprising.
Dated because women will aways be a riddle to men etc. but who cares. I have chuckled a lot.
And I need to get a paper copy of the collected works to enjoy the language better.
It's Jeeves and Bertie (mostly), so it's going to be pretty good no matter what. The plot and writing aren't as good as his later stuff, and the Reggie stories didn't do it for me at all.
An extremely humorous read. I enjoyed each of the stories and found them very funny despite being written almost 100 years ago. I look forward to reading more Wodehouse in the future.
