A Wodehouse Bestiary

October 1, 1985
To read the 14 selections here garnered from Wodehouse's writings is like listening to the melody of some old ballad after a dose of heavy metal rock. Most of the pieces retain in undiminished strength the qualities that characterized them when they were newcharm, readability, and humor. The common denominator of the gathering is, or is alleged to be, animals; but our furred and feathered and scaly friends hardly figure into the proceedings. The time-honored device of imposing some sort of unity on selections of writingsin this case animalsmay just be a pretext to march out the old Wodehousian troupe of characters and set them to performing again. And what Wodehouse idolater is going to object? A.J. Anderson, Graduate Sch. of Library & Information Science, Simmons Coll., Boston