Review by New York Times Review
"AS A LARGE PART of the planet slipped from Britain's grasp one man silently maintained the country's reputation." Coming across that sentence a dozen years ago in an otherwise persuasive volume of social history, I raised an eyebrow. One man? The masculine specimen the author had in mind was Ian Fleming's suave, sophisticated bullet-dodger and lady-killer, "Bond, James Bond." That's as may be, I thought. Entirely plausible. But what of Wooster, Bertie Wooster - that blithe, hapless and unfailingly preux English gent dreamed up by P.G. Wodehouse in 1915? With the help of his brainy, discerning valet, Jeeves, Bertie had been dodging (sartorial) disasters and rogue (matrimonial) engagements for decades before Bond ordered his first martini. Was he not, in his breezy, feckless way (or "vapid and shiftless" way, as his fearsome Aunt Agatha would have it), an equally effective bulwark of his nation? Just imagine the boost to British prestige, not to mention morale, if the sang-froid of Bond and the sunniness of Bertie could be blended in one person! This thought might be enough to prompt Jeeves to observe "Rem acu tetigisti," ... prompting Bertie to ask Jeeves what that means. ("Put my finger on the nub?" "Exactly, Sir.") It also, evidently, has prompted Ben Schott, the author of the Jeevesian compendium of British cultural trivia known as "Schott's Original Miscellany," to attempt this patriotic hybridization himself, recrafting Wooster as his fleet of exfiancées only dreamed of doing, by injecting him with spine - or, at least, by assigning him a mission of greater import than swiping a silver cow creamer. In "Jeeves and the King of Clubs," a fizzy new homage to Wodehouse, Schott infuses Bertie with extra bounce, transforming him from sheer pleasure seeker to shrewd (sort of) secret agent - no wardrobe change necessary. The precise year of this metamorphosis is unstated, but the action occurs sometime in the 1930s, when cars were still called "motors" and the smart set dressed for dinner. As World War II looms, an emissary of His Majesty's Government, a Scottish lord named MacAuslan (who'd first met Bertie at a Burns Night frolic), visits the young toff at his Mayfair flat to enlist him to deploy his gadding skills to spy on the fascist demagogue (and recurring Wodehouse character) Sir Roderick Spode. Spode, also known as Lord Sidcup, is suspected of colluding with Britain's soon-to-be enemies. "HMG is concerned about Lord Sidcup," MacAuslan tells Wooster. "Are you sure you don't require Jeeves?" Bertie modestly asks. "Your help and Jeeves's, I should have said," Lord MacAuslan reassures him. Jeeves, it turns out, already is working for HMG through his club, the Junior Ganymede, whose members use their "unfettered admission to the country's most consequential drawing-rooms, dining tables, libraries and bedrooms" to report the doings of their employers and their prominent, and/or nefarious, guests to British Intelligence. "Spying, Jeeves?" Bertie tsks. "We prefer 'reconnaissance,' sir," Jeeves replies. "I bet you do," says Bertie, and he means it to sting. Usefully, Bertie, who generally is "not frightfully up on the personnel of the political world," knows Spode personally, and considers him a loathsome "carbuncle." In past run-ins he has described him as "a man with an eye that could open an oyster at 60 paces," and "a Dictator on the point of starting a purge." Nevertheless, he finds Spode's dress sense more disturbing than his politics. "Certainly he was an enemy of good taste, good manners, and good tailoring" Bertie muses. He doubts that such a buffoon could really be an enemy of the king, but takes on MacAuslon's task anyway, because the Code of the Woosters - "Never let a pal down" - demands it. "Eager to help His Maj in any way I can," Bertie declares, "so long as it does not impinge too momentously on the social calendar." It does not, as the laird knows. Conveniently, Spode and Wooster travel in the same Wodehouse-world circles - London clubs, the Ritz, Quaglino's, the theater, Savile Row tailors and weekend country house parties - mooting the impingement question. Besides, Spode lately has become engaged to one of Bertie's clingy ex-fiancées, Madeline Bassett (who believes that "every time a kitten sneezes a new star joins the firmament"), a coincidence that multiplies their run-ins. Furthermore, both men have invested in a play by another Wooster ex, the redoubtable Florence Craye, whose tastes run to Nietzsche, not kittens. At the opening night of Florence's latest, MacAuslon charges Bertie to undertake a Spode diversion, "in your own inimitable style." "I have a style?" Bertie asks. "Oh, you do, Mr. Wooster," he replies. "And it's inimitable." Devoted readers of the doings of Jeeves and Wooster (they are legion) will recognize that it is the manservant, not the man, who usually gets the "inimitable" epithet, but Schott strives valiantly to make his hero earn the compliment. Aside from this innovation, however, he applies a whitegloved light hand to other well-known figures from Bertie's entourage - from Bertie's bun-throwing Drones Club pals Pongo Twistleton, Tubby Glossop and Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright to his perpetually scheming Aunt Dahlia, and his flock of fiancees, taking care to avoid breakage as he buffs them with neo-Wodehousian wordplay. The few extra characters he adds to the lineup pass muster, from MacAuslon to an imperious bank manager; a beguiling, bright-eyed Scottish photographer; and an old Eton chum, Monty, who is besotted with Florence Craye. Monty arrives on the scene "bearing two glasses of Madeira and, so it seemed, the weight of the world." Busy though he is with spycraft, Bertie finds time to help Monty pitch woo. Saving England is an admirable goal, but saving himself from the possible return of la Craye's marital intentions is a matter of life and death. When Ian Fleming died, in 1964, other Bondsmen came forward to extend 007's adventures, producing dozens of books (by Kingsley Amis, John Gardner, William Boyd and Anthony Horowitz, among others). But hardly anyone has dared attempt to carry on the Wodehouse legacy. After Wodehouse's death in 1975, Jeeves and Wooster's exploits more or less ended on paper - though not on the small screen, where multiple productions of their high-toned scrapes and highjinks have aired, most memorably, though not most recently, by Stephen Fry (as the valet) and Hugh Laurie (as his master). But Schott is the second intrepid writer to risk a Wodehouse tribute in the last five years. The first, the novelist Sebastian Faulks, published a Bond sequel, "Devil May Care," before switching leading men for "Jeeves and the Wedding Bells." The Times reviewer called the book "lively, mostly effervescent" and remarked, "Needless to say, Jeeves saves the day." But with "Jeeves and the King of Clubs," Schott overturns that expectation. Jeeves does his bit; but for once, it is Bertie who plays Lochinvar - though he underplays his own role. What can explain this contemporary renaissance of the butler and the bachelor, apart from indulgence on the part of the Wodehouse estate? It may derive from nostalgia for Wodehouse's manicured milieu of mirth and privilege - "Downton Abbey" with a laugh track. Or, it might signal a newfound appreciation of the power of Wodehouse's levity to combat - and outlast - moments in history when affairs have taken on "a certain menacing trend," as Jeeves once put it; when, as Bertie sees it, "the blue bird had thrown in the towel." The pages of Wodehouse contain an "empire of comic writing on which the sun has never set," Schott writes. In elevating Bertie Wooster as its staunchest defender, he burnishes the gleam. LIESL SCHILLINGER is a regular contributor to the Book Review. One of Bertie's ex-fiancées believes that 'every time a kitten sneezes a new star joins the firmament.'
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [July 11, 2019]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Another P. G. Wodehouse impostor has turned up at the Drones Club, home away from home of Bertie Wooster, and he's banging on the door, demanding admittance. But before dismissing Mr. Schott as an impudent bounder, let's look at his credentials. He's the author of Schott's Original Miscellany (2002), and if ever a book could qualify an author to write an homage to Wodehouse, this hilarious compendium of useless information the flotsam and jetsam on the conversational tide, as Schott describes the nuggets of nothingness he collects is surely it. After all, Bertie, that Mayfair gadfly, floats on the conversational tide with aplomb, and he is drinking buddies with both flotsam and jetsam. So, OK, what does Schott have on offer? Plenty. Not only are Bertie and the unflappable Jeeves, Bertie's gentleman's personal gentleman, in full cry, but, shockingly, Bertie has a job! It turns out that Jeeves' club, the Junior Ganymede, an association of butlers and valets, has long been an arm of the British Secret Service (of course it has). Now the spying butlers and their spymaster need Bertie's help to nail an ascot-clad Fascist whose motto is Make Great Britain Great Again. To do so takes all manner of craziness, including an uproarious chase scene, but Schott brings it all off in high and hilarious style. Best of all, his wordplay can hold its own with the Master's. Here's Bertie describing the unctuous Fascist: The seventh Earl of Sidcup is a sore for sighted eyes. --Bill Ott Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Bertie Wooster and his gentleman's gentleman, Jeeves, venture into spy thriller territory in this impressive homage, authorized by the Wodehouse estate, from Schott (Schott's Original Miscellany). In The Code of the Woosters (1938), Bertie and Jeeves outwitted fascist demagogue Roderick Spode, leader of the Black Shorts. Now, officials of the British government suspect Spode is in cahoots with hostile foreign powers and enlist Bertie and Jeeves in an effort to thwart his schemes. Along the way, Bertie visits Brinkley Court, where he must impersonate Aunt Dahlia's chef, Anatole, and Jeeves reveals much new information about the operations of the Junior Ganymede Club, whose members are butlers and valets. Schott comes up with Wodehouse caliber metaphors ("she has a profile that, if not a thousand ships, certainly propelled a punt or two down the Cherwell") and otherwise expertly channels the master's voice, but some readers will wish that he had gone deeper into the nature of Spode's treachery. Nonetheless, this is an essential volume for Wodehouse fans, rounded out with endnotes full of fun historical and literary facts. Agent: Natasha Fairweather, Rogers, Coleridge & White. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Everyone and his butler thinks he can do the Wodehouse voice. They're all wrong, but Schott's version, a painstaking facsimile rendered in spun sugar, has its own particular charm.From 1915 to 1974, the British humorist and immortal genius P.G. Wodehouse tickled readers' palates with tales of the well-born, well-heeled Bertie Wooster and his unflappable valet, Jeeves. Wodehouse balanced frenetic plots with wordplay that drew its zing from the contrast between Bertie's breeziness and Jeeves' formality. All the elements are here in Schott's version: country weekends with the "Aged Relative," impersonations, taxi chases, narrow escapes across rooftops, matrimonial engagements that threaten like thunderstorms. Familiar characters stay in character: Madeline Bassett moons over daisy chains, Roderick Spode stomps around in his fascist black shorts, Uncle Tom obsesses over antique silver, and Bingo, Freddie, Barmy, Tuppy, and Catsmeat booze it up with Bertie at the Drones Club. Schott, known for his charming trivia (Schott's Quintessential Miscellany, 2011, etc.), is capable of true Wodehousian flights in lines like "From across the auditorium came a clatter of chairs and the resounding thud' of a tall man overestimating a low door" or "The majority of Dronesmen suffer from advanced cases of ergophobiaa sloth-inducing affliction that is as crippling as it is contagious. Medical Science has hitherto been reluctant to recognize ergophobia as a genuine diagnosis, but if Medical Science ever popped into the Drones Club on a weekday afternoon, then Medical Science's bow tie would spin round and round in amazement." But where the master's own voice seems to burble forth as effortlessly as a gutter's in a downpour, Schott gives the impression of infiniteif gleefullabor. He even includes endnotes. The endnotes are a joy, as one might expect from the author of Schott's Miscellany, but still.Anyone who hasn't read the original Jeeves and Wooster stories should start with the master himself, but fans longing for more will welcome Schott's homage, which was authorized by the Wodehouse estate. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
