Goodbye to All Cats

by P.G. Wodehouse

Goodbye to All a Wodehouse Pick-me-up

Genres: Humor, Fiction, Comics, British Literature, Short Stories, Classics

Paperback

First published March 28, 2000

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

[Dee · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.75 *
A decent pick-me-up! Good fun. The first story was fantastic I laughed out loud 3 times in the first five pages!! The other two stories were funny also but I felt the first was brilliant. I need more Wodehouse in my life 😀

[Ritinha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Temia que o Wodehouse da short story não me agradasse tanto como o das novels. Sem qualquer razão. Foi tão deliciosa a leitura quanto a companhia em que a fiz (Mitenka).

[Jonathan Corfe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm giving The Brothers Karamazov another try and am 782 pages in of just under 1,000 pages. Dostoyevsky had a bit of time on his hands, as I'm sure you do in long vodka-fuelled Russian winters.
Just for devilment I took a short break to knock out three short stories in 82 pages written by the grandfather of modern British comedy. Where Dostoyevsky prognosticates, prevaricates, pontificates, preambles, postambles and penises about with old ladies putting on the samovar and regaling us with folksy homilies when there's a murder to be solved, Wodehouse has his main character lobbing cats at passing members of the aristocracy or a dissolute fortune hunter has stolen half a dozen Pekinese dogs from his aunt to train for the circus or a perfectly executed insurance fraud is derailed by amnesia. Wodehouse had a knack for grasping the reader by their eyeballs and insisting that you fly through the pages; your attention ought to be rewarded, by thunder, or your money back.
Wodehouse' writing is a fail-safe mood booster and the man was a master of his art. Everyone ought to read one Wodehouse book at least once in their life.
9.75 out of 10

[Brian Skinner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Decided to listen to the audiobook book of this again after my stepdaughter threw a cat on her sister. 😃😃😃😃

[GP · Rating 2 out of 5]

Comedic and humorous fiction is usually perfect for me, however the writing style of this book really bothered me. The style of writing could have and in some parts did, add great effect, creating a marvellous wacky story world, however the overzealous descriptions were milked to death and ended up detracting rather than adding. The character of Urkridge is the star of the book and is what kept it interesting and led to me (Eventually) finishing the book.

[David Robert Bloomer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read on the plane back from Amsterdam. So not a long read but a delightful and highly enjoyable read. I'm sure I've read one of the stories in another collection but never mind, that's not a negative. 3 stories, short and enjoyable; not a missed opportunity within its 82 pages.

[Parvathy Santhosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pick-me-up it was, indeed! This is my first Wodehouse, and reading it was quite an amusing experience. It’s a collection of three short stories. I found the titular story the least impressive, while the other two garnered a few chuckles from me. I’m hoping to read more of this author soon!

[Ryan Barretto · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a meeting with a lovable old friend.

3 short stories full of humour and beautiful application of the english language.

Totally enjoyed it, though I had read one of the stories years ago.

[Fuzzball Baggins · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit short and simple, but funny!

[Ariel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hilarious! Must read slowly so as not to miss any jokes.

[Ishan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terribly funny! Read something like this after a long time.

[Maj · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my first Wodehouse and I was very pleasantly surprised. It really was a pick-me-up and made me laugh out loud a few times! Will definitely be exploring more of his works.

[Bonnie]

Wasn’t for me

[Rutebega has no friends · Rating 5 out of 5]

I finally gave in to my friend's demands and picked up this Wodehouse collection. Thank god I did.

Goodbye to all cats, the short story that gives the collection its name, was hilariously written and is enough to make me wary of my own cat. Not that I wasn't before.

The adventures of Ukridge that complete this collection, namely The Dog College and The Accident Syndicate, completely uphold the opinion I have been given that Ukrigde is the finest of Wodehouse's works. True, I have nothing to compare him to but surely a character can't be much funnier than this?

[Kate Voyce · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was in my hotel room - nice touch. I read it in one session. Very funny and of course, well written; I would expect no less from P G Wodehouse.
I could really imagine this being performed on the stage, a real farce.
It starts with the present situation and then takes you back to explain why we are where we are.
A great little series of short stories written on a large sheet of paper and folded like a map. I will look out for more of these.

[Timothy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Goodbye to All Cats (from Young Men in Spats, 1936)
Ukridge's Dog College (from Ukridge, 1924)
Ukridge's Accident Syndicate (from Ukridge, 1924)

[Edwin Staples]

So funny I fell off my chaise lounge and spilled my g&t.