Ian is joined by former teenage Wodehouse obsessive Gavin Bradbury to look at Plum's first country house novel, A Gentleman of Leisure AKA The Intrusion of Jimmy from 1910. The book is at once a light romantic story, an exposé of the corruption in the New York police force, a satire of "gentleman criminal" style stories, and a precurser to the Blandings novels. Ian is unable to be impartial about one of the first Wodehouse novels he ever read, whereas Gavin is more critical.
We discuss the differences between the novel and the related novella "The Gem Collector", why this book was such a hit on stage and screen, changing mores in acceptable morality in early twentieth century entertainment, how Jimmy Pitt differs from our ideal Wodehouse leading man, and what's still missing from the later classic formula.
Other Wodehouse books mentioned:
The World of Mr Mulliner
The Coming of Bill
Something Fresh
The Man Upstairs
The Heart of a Goof
Psmith in the City
Psmith, Journalist
The Luck of the Bodkins
Also mentioned:
Fawlty Towers
The Young Ones
The Kenny Everett Show
Coronation Street
A Sharp Intake of Breath
The Lennie and Jerry Show
Tony Hancock
James Cagney
Philadelphia Story
Bringing Up Baby
Cary Grant
Wodehouse TV adaptations
John Stapleton
Douglas Fairbanks
John Barrymore
Tim Key
E.W. Hornung, Raffles
(The real) Spike Mullins
Trading Places
Alan Bennett
Steve Coogan
Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote
Charles Dickens, Pickwick Papers
Sir Walter Scott, "Marmion"
The Seven Inches, "Stop Pestering Me"
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