More than Coincidence: Something New

P. G. Wodehouse was born three years after “The Horse in Motion” was released, and lived long enough to have seen The Godfather, Part II in theaters. But Wodehouse will be best known as a chronicler of the fluff-brained Bertie Wooster and his hypercompetent valet, Jeeves, delightfully adapted into a ITV series starring Hugh Laurie (Wooster) and Stephen Fry (Jeeves). Jeeves and Wooster belong to a vague, mostly pre-war timeline, having the kind of adventures that only a man with more money than sense and his support staff could manage. But Wodehouse was a prolific author, with 71 novels, 42 plays and 3 autobiographies to his name, and his stable contained stalwart friends Mike and Psmith, the storytelling Oldest Member at an unnamed golf club, and the inhabitants of Blandings Castle.

Blandings, a big Tudor castle in the English countryside nominally belonging to the Earl of Emsworth, was first introduced in 1915 in Wodehouse’s novel Something New (or Something Fresh in the UK). A comedy of errors and a comedy of manners, Something New takes a fairly simple plot (an expensive scarab is missing¹ and several people try to find it) and adds on complications, plot twists and absurdities until everything collapses into farce. It’s the ski lodge episode of Frasier, with some class issues and a genuinely sweet romance substituted for the French sex comedy vibe.

In contrast to many of Wodehouse’s works, Something New starts with two characters cursed to work for a living: Ashe Marson (named by his aspirational parents after “a wealthy uncle who subsequently double-crossed them by leaving his money to charities”), a relatively successful writer who has grown creatively frustrated by the boilerplate mysteries he’s been churning out for the Mammoth Publishing Company, and fellow American expatriate Joan Valentine, who’s also been writing for Mammoth — in her case, boilerplate romances for a ladies’ magazine. Joan encourages Ashe to get out of his rut, and her inspiration takes him to Blandings in pursuit of that scarab. Meanwhile, Freddie Threepwood — the Earl’s son, and a classic case of “more money than sense” — is trying to keep his engagement on track. There were some rather scandalous letters sent to a chorus girl, you see. Aline Peters, Freddie’s fiance, is an old friend of Joan’s; through her Joan discovers that her father is offering a generous reward for his missing scarab, and now you now (most of) the plot. There’s more, of course: the eccentric residents and house staff of Blandings and the Byzantine system of etiquette they follow; the Hong Kong policeman, home on leave to plead his romantic case to Aline; an untrustworthy fixer named R. Jones, who puts his oar in at the worst possible time. 

Most of it all boils over in a slapstick sequence that had me laughing out loud in the car when I listened to the audiobook. Ashe, sick and tired of writing formulaic mysteries where a coincidence ends up saving the day, gets saved by — you may have guessed it — the stack of coincidences Wodehouse has piled on the deck, and everyone ends up with pretty much the ending they deserve.

Wodehouse has a great eye for human foibles, an affection for even his most odious characters that keeps the story more silly than mean. Wodehouse grew up as one of those perceptive boys that hung out with the kitchen staff while the adults were having fancy lunches, and he has great empathy for the working servants who make great houses work — but he portrays those servants as just as human and flawed as the upper-class goofballs he is best known for skewering (if usually a damn sight more competent). Wodehouse’s usual collection of immature young men, terrifying older women, and hyper-competent servants also appear, but if you’re a Jeeves and Wooster fan, you’ll notice some fun variations on the formula.

Something New isn’t Upstairs, Downstairs; the social critique goes down easily as one of Blandings’ carefully prepared dinners, and you’re never worried that anyone is at risk of any serious consequences. But it’s a breezy, fun read, and Blandings is well worth a visit.

Something New (or Fresh, if you prefer), is available for free on Project Gutenberg.

1. Note: the scarab has not been stolen. The reader knows from the start that the scarab has not been stolen. A good amount of the dramatic irony in Something New depends on the scarab having not been stolen, but absent-mindedly pocketed by the Earl, a good-natured but terminally absent-minded fellow. ↩︎