Helping Freddie

by P.G. Wodehouse

Dear old Freddie, don't you know, has been a dear old pal of mine for years and years; so when I went into the club one morning and found him sitting alone in a dark corner, staring glassily at nothing, and generally looking like the last rose of summer, you can understand I was quite disturbed about it. As a rule, the old rotter is the life and soul of our set. Quite the little lump of fun, and all that sort of thing.

Genres: Fiction, Humor, Short Stories

28 pages, Paperback

First published March 29, 2013

About the author

Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, KBE, was a comic writer who enjoyed enormous popular success during a career of more than seventy years and continues to be widely read over 40 years after his death. Despite the political and social upheavals that occurred during his life, much of which was spent in France and the United States, Wodehouse's main canvas remained that of prewar English upper-class society, reflecting his birth, education, and youthful writing career.

An acknowledged master of English prose, Wodehouse has been admired both by contemporaries such as Hilaire Belloc, Evelyn Waugh and Rudyard Kipling and by more recent writers such as Douglas Adams, Salman Rushdie and Terry Pratchett. Sean O'Casey famously called him "English literature's performing flea", a description that Wodehouse used as the title of a collection of his letters to a friend, Bill Townend.

Best known today for the Jeeves and Blandings Castle novels and short stories, Wodehouse was also a talented playwright and lyricist who was part author and writer of fifteen plays and of 250 lyrics for some thirty musical comedies. He worked with Cole Porter on the musical Anything Goes (1934) and frequently collaborated with Jerome Kern and Guy Bolton. He wrote the lyrics for the hit song Bill in Kern's Show Boat (1927), wrote the lyrics for the Gershwin/Romberg musical Rosalie (1928), and collaborated with Rudolf Friml on a musical version of The Three Musketeers (1928).

Reviews

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not one of Wodehouse’s strongest works. The story revolves around a lost boy and play being written.

[Dayo Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice easy read

[L · Rating 3 out of 5]

A close call for Reggie indeed. Kidnapping a boy so that Freddie’s ex would soften up and get back together with Freddie? Only Wodehouse can make a scene like this seem cozy and cute.

[Mark Gibbs · Rating 5 out of 5]

From out the mouths of Babes - quite literally! - excellent situation comedy by Wodehouse - involving a baby and a lovesick young man called Freddie - a sort of cross between the future Freddie Threepwood of Blandings Castle fame and Gussie Fink - Nottle from Jeeves - - this one has word - play a plenty - and just shows how hopeless Reggie can be when in any given situation - wonderful!