Talk:Bertie Wooster

Bertie's wealth

Yes, Bertie's family is filthy rich. However, Bertie does not have to rely on an allowance from his Aunt Agatha. Rather, as stated in several places in the stories, Aunt Agatha's hold is only her innate dominance and fierceness. Bertie states categorically that she does not hold purse strings. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.42.37.18 (talk) 22:23, 23 October 2003

Yes, in the prologue of What Ho! The best of P. G. Wodehouse, Stephen Fry states that Bertie is the second in terms of wealth of the members of the Drones Club (only surpassed by Oofy Prosser). Xvrbx (talk) 21:56, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Stephen Fry is wrong. In Ch. 3.I of Pearls, Girls and Monty Bodkin, the hero is described as "one of the two really moneyed members of the Drones Club – Oofy Prosser was the other". In Ch. 3 of The Luck of the Bodkins, Monty explains that he doesn't need to work "because a recent aunt had left me three hundred thousand quid in gilt-edged securities". (Apparently £300,000 in 1935 is about £21,000,000 in 2019 money.) Opera hat (talk) 14:36, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Bertie's Family

Resolved

 – Bertie's aunts are the sisters of his late father.

I'm not totally certain about the family as currently stated in the article. I was given to understand that Tom Travers is Bertie's uncle by blood (the brother of his mother, née Travers), and so Aunt Dahlia is his aunt by marriage. I'm also under the impression that Aunt Agatha was the sister of Bertie's father, though I'm not so sure about this latter point. Has anyone got anything to dismiss/corroborate these ideas? OnyxOnline 13:11, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I'd have said Dahlia was the blood relative myself, given Bertie's means of addressing her, notably "old thicker than water", "old ancestor" and so on. I forget the exact instances of those particular phrases being used, but his conversations with her are generally peppered with similar phrases, and I find it a bit odd to think he'd call a mere relative by marriage "thicker than water", a phrase traditionally used to refer to blood. I may well be wrong though; I'm no expert on Wodehousian geneology. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.29.41.127 (talk) 23:14, 4 August 2007

As mentioned in the article (at least now) Bertie's aunts are the sisters of his late father, thus blood relatives, see for instance Jeves and the Feudal Spirit, chapter 12. Tom Travers is also independently described as an uncle by marriage, same book, chapter 19. — Komusou ^talk @ 19:43, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Dhalia Travers was born as Dhalia Wooster. I can give references if needed but take my word on it :) Xvrbx (talk) 21:59, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Lord Yaxley

What of Bertie's uncle George Wooster, later Lord Yaxley? Where does he fit in? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.247.240.152 (talk) 17:35, 20 November 2005

Spineless invertebrate?

Resolved

 – "spineless invertebrate" is quoted from Wodehouse.

Isn't it redundant to say "Aunt Agatha ... considers him a spineless invertebrate", or does this phrase come from Wodehouse? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.159.192.10 (talk) 15:21, 23 August 2006

Not redundant because it's indeed a quote, e.g. in "Jeeves Takes Charge" -- but this should have been indicated with double quotes around it. — Komusou ^talk @ 19:46, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I was unaware when I removed it that it was a quote, I have no opposition to its current display. -Kirkoconnell 23:15, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Jeeves

Resolved

 – Bertie was 24, text was amended to remove ambiguity.

In the section "Jeeves", it is stated that Bertie hires Jeeves when he is 24. This is unclear. Was Jeeves 24, or Bertie? Xiong Chiamiov 19:46, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Bertie was 24 ^one/_zero 06:19, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Quick note on my revert

Just to say - I meant all very POV, of course. Anyhow- very debatable. Schissel | Sound the Note! 16:32, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

For the record (or the annals, if you wish), the above refers to this revert by Schissel. (No disagreement from me.) — Komusou ^talk @ 20:07, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Girl Genius Reference?

In Girl Genius there's a butler-ish English character named Wooster. Is this an obvious reference to (and subversion of) this story, or is it merely coincidence? Kilyle 12:53, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Prolly not a coincidence since he also have a character and novel named Psmith. I've documented that in a short para at Phil Foglio so as to fend off trivia items inserted at the Wodehouse articles. — Komusou ^talk @ 15:21, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Upjohn, Darts, Glossop etc

No article on Bertie can fail to mention his unhappy childhood experiences as a student at the preparatory school (Malvern something) run by the Rev. Aubrey Upjohn. Much later Bertie runs into Upjohn at Brinkley owing to Upjohn's stepdaughter Phyllis being Aunt Dahlia's god-daughter.

Bertie is a 'snip' at dart throwing, and one of the top seeds for the annual contest at the Drones. Once, Stilton Cheesewright is forced to go easy on Bertie after he (Stilton) draws Bertie's name in the darts sweep.

Mention should also be made of Bertie's evolving relationship with Sir Roderick Glossop, the eminent 'nerve specialist'. On several occasions Glossop is convinced that Bertie's sanity is less than perfect, especially with reference to Bertie's engagement with his own daughter Honoria. On another occasion Bobbie Wickham persuades Bertie into mistakenly piercing Sir Roderick's hot-water bottle. Eventually Bertie and Glossop get to know each other better, culminating in the hilarious story where Glossop takes temporary employment at Brinkley as the butler Swordfish.

Another Glossop who is an inseparable part of the Bertie saga is Tuppy (Sir Roderick's son), who infamously loops the last roman ring over the Drones swimming pool so that Bertie is forced into a ducking in full evening dress. In the hot-water bottle incident described above, Bertie believes it is Tuppy's h.w.b that he is piercing as revenge for the swimming pool perfidy.

Bertie has a sister who is married to a civil servant or somebody serving in India. This sister has two little daughters, and in one of the few stories to be narrated by Jeeves, Bertie's searing experience delivering a speech at a girls' school makes him drop the idea of having his nieces spend a summer with him. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.92.164.28 (talk) 17:57, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

External Links

Resolved

 – Down links restored via cached copy of Archive.org until site is back.

The BBC web pages that the external links point to, no longer exist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.167.1.141 (talk) 06:05, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I've removed them. BBC says it is "refreshing" the comedy guide; when it returns, we can link to it. - DavidWBrooks 11:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I have restored them in cached copies. Please, don't delete good links when you have Archive.org – see WP:EL#Longevity of links and WP:REF#What to do when a reference link "goes dead" about using the Wayback Machine and Webcite. — Komusou ^talk @ 13:30, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Wodehouse's Inspiration

Norman Murphy, in his book Wit and Wisdom of P.G. Wodehouse, argues that Wooster is likely based on George Grossmith Jr. Any thoughts on whether/how to incorporate this fact? Mgriffin (talk) 20:04, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

"This article does not cite any references or sources. (May 2008)"

What's wrong with some people in here? Bertie Wooster is one of the world's most well-known literary characters. Mr Wodehouse's books are available everywhere, some of the stories are published on the Net. A complete list of Jeeves & Wooster stories are linked to this page. Those mean little creatures who might doubt any of the information on this page, could very easily check it on the basis of information already given. Could someone please stop those ignorant freaks who pester Wikipedia with demands for references that's completely unnecessary? Unnecessary references should be avoided; references should be restricted to issues that are not evident, is disputed, or at least are not verifyable through a simple web search. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.104.166.58 (talk) 21:02, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

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wooster - american?

Is Wooster an English name? All the references to it I find are to the US - a version of Worcester? Perhaps Wodehouse picked up the name from the street in NY or place in Connecticut. Stikko (talk) 12:13, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Names of books

Could someone collect the names of the books with the years published? I think that would be extremely useful. Thanks. Risssa (talk) 23:58, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Another alias?

In The Delayed Arrival (a.k.a. "Arrested in a Night Club") episode of the Fry & Laurie television series, Bertie briefly goes by "Beryl" as a maid in the Travers household, a scapegoat providing a plausible story for the recovery of Aunt Dahlia's pawned pearls. According to Wikipedia, that episode was adapted from Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, which does not contain that impersonation.

This bit of trivia may not need to be mentioned in this article, since it is about the print canon, not a TV adaptation. Anyway, kudos to Miles26 for recent monumental work on this and related articles. Just plain Bill (talk) 15:31, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the kudos. And thanks for reminding me about the Beryl alias – it is significant and deserves to be mentioned in the adaptations section. I will add it. Jeeves's article already mentions his own alias of Daphne Dolores Morehead from the same episode, but doesn't mention the episode name, so I'll add the episode name there too. Miles26 (talk) 17:58, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Time setting

The article makes this claim:-- 'The Jeeves canon is set in a timeless world based on an idealized England in the early twentieth century.' Which is not the case at all. As with the Tintin canon, the Jeeves stories are always set at the time when they were written, with the quaint convention that the characters simply never get any older. Late in life, Wodehouse always denied that his stories were out of date, and in a piece he wrote in the 1960s (perhaps an introduction for one of the Jeeves collections, I forget) he pointed out that butlers were very much still in fashion. It should perhaps be noted that Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones had a butler for some years. Jeeves of course is not strictly a butler, even though 'he can buttle with the best of them,' but one takes the author's point.

In the 1920s stories, fashionable Communists appear, notably Bingo Little's unfortunate pash Charlotte Corday Rowbotham. In The Code of the Woosters in 1938, Roderick Spode, leader of the Blackshorts and would-be dictator, is clearly a parody of Sir Oswald Mosley, and Bertie's speech telling Spode exactly where to get off is the clearest political statement that Wodehouse ever made. This is possibly the best-known speech in Wodehouse's oeuvre and can hardly be overlooked. In Much Obliged, Jeeves in 1971, which centres on a parliamentary by-election, Spode has inherited the title Earl of Sidcup but, after speaking for the Conservative candidate at a meeting and rediscovering the power of oratory and the thrill of politics, determines to renounce his title so he can become an MP, something that was not possible until the Peerage Act 1963 which was arranged for the benefit of Anthony Wedgwood Benn, Viscount Stansgate. This puts Bertie in a difficult position because Spode's fiancee, the annoying Madeleine Bassett, who hoped to be Countess of Sidcup, is likely to marry Bertie in revenge, mistakenly believing that Bertie loves her. Bertie's Aunt Dahlia says, 'You remember me telling you he couldn't be a Member of Parliament because he was a peer. Well, he wants to give up his title so that he will be eligible.' Bertie says, 'Can a fellow with a title give it up? I thought he was stuck with it.' Aunt Dahlia says, 'He couldn't at one time, at least only by being guilty of treason, but they've changed the rules and apparently it's quite the posh thing to do nowadays.' Bertie says, 'Sounds silly.' (The Jeeves Omnibus 5, Hutchinson, London, 1993, ISBN 0 09 177354 7, p.115)

In the last Jeeves story, Aunts Aren't Gentlemen in 1973, fashionable Communists reappear, which is perfectly appropriate for the period. Bertie's open-top car gets stuck in the middle of a protest march in the West End and he meets his disagreeable old Oxford acquaintance Orlo Porter, who is a trendy Red. When Bertie reaches his destination, a Harley Street doctor's surgery, he meets Major Plank from Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves (1963) in the waiting room. Plank says, 'We've met before. I never forget a face. Isn't your name Allen or Allenby or Alexander or something?' (Jeeves Omnibus 5 p.168) Plank is referring to the pseudonym 'Alpine Joe' which Jeeves invented for Bertie in Stiff Upper Lip, for reasons which need not detain us. But note that, while Allenby was a famous general of the Great War, Alexander was a famous general of the Second World War, and clearly enough time has passed since then for such names to have become an undifferentiated blur for Major Plank. In the later Jeeves stories, when Bertie refers to his car as 'the old sports model', as he does in Aunts Aren't Gentlemen (Omnibus 5 p.161), he doesn't mean a 1920s 3-Litre Red Label Bentley, he means something like an Aston Martin DB6 Volante. Khamba Tendal (talk) 18:13, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

It is true that the Jeeves stories are to some extent set at the time when they were written, in a floating timeline, something which is mentioned in Jeeves's article but isn't really addressed here on Bertie's article. However, it is also the case that certain things that were popular in England in the pre-WWI/Edwardian era, such as valets and some slang words and clubs like the Drones Club, continue to be prevalent and commonplace throughout the Jeeves stories though they became less prevalent in real life, and the stories seem to take place in a sort of idealized England, since wars and other major events that really happened aren't mentioned in the stories or don't seem to affect anything.

I am reluctant to go too much into this on Bertie's article, since this article is just about Bertie and not the Jeeves series or Wodehouse's world in general (this combination of floating timeline, idealized world, and Edwardian elements is present in much of Wodehouse's work), but you are right that the statement 'The Jeeves canon is set in a timeless world based on an idealized England in the early twentieth century' is misleading. Perhaps we could change it to something like this: 'The Jeeves canon is set in a floating timeline (each story being set at the time it was written though the characters never get any older), in an idealized world where wars are downplayed or not mentioned, with certain Edwardian elements, such as traditional gentlemen's clubs like the Drones Club, continuing to be prevalent.' Would this be comprehensive enough? Miles26 (talk) 20:00, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

There haven't been any replies for a while, so I am going to go ahead and make the change. I will add more detailed information about the setting and timeline to the canon section of Jeeves's page. If anyone has questions or suggestions, feel free to comment. Miles26 (talk) 18:06, 2 June 2019 (UTC)