NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #3/NN_1993_3.iso/spool/alt/fan/wodehous/124

Text File | 1993-01-24 | 1.7 KB | 38 lines

Newsgroups: alt.fan.wodehouse
Path: sparky!uunet!utcsri!torn!spool.mu.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!The-Star.honeywell.com!umn.edu!csus.edu!netcom.com!lgolding
From: [e-mail] (Laurence J. Golding)
Subject: PGW and Gilbert & Sullivan
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Summary: Connections between PG Wodehouse & works of G&S
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest)
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 20:35:15 GMT
Lines: 27

How many of you get a giggle when you run into quotes from and references
to the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas in PGW's books?  Three examples from
the Blandings stories:

1) In "Something Fresh", this description of the Efficient Baxter:
"His lordship's secretary he calls himself, but he's really everything
rolled into one, like the man in the play."  (Pooh-Bah, from "The Mikado")

2) In "Summer Lightning", detective Percy Pilbeam marvels at the illegal
scheme proposed by the baronet Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe: "Baronets are
proverbially bad, but surely, felt Percy Pilbeam, there was no excuse for
them to be as bad as all that." (Robin Oakapple in "Ruddigore": "I know
I'm a bad Bart., but I'm not as bad a Bart. as all that.")

3) Again in "Summer Lightning", Percy Pilbeam experiences the effects of a
second pre-dinner cocktail: "The re-lighting of the beacons had the effect of
removing from Pilbeam the last trace of diffidence and shyness."
(Yum-Yum in "The Mikado": "There's not a trace upon her face of diffidence
or shyness.")

Can anyone think of others?  A good friend and fellow PGW fan thinks I'm
reaching too far on those last two - that PGW didn't intend the apparent
quote.  What do you think?
--
Laurence J. Golding
[e-mail]
[phone]