Topper Takes a Trip

Topper #2

by Thorne Smith, Carolyn See (Contributor)

The beloved characters--mortal and immortal--of Topper return in this uproarious romp through the south of France. One of Thorne Smith's best-loved comedies, it proves once again that he is the undisputed master of urbane wit and sophisticated repartee.
        Cosmo Topper, the mild-mannered bank manager who was persuaded to take a walk on the wild side by the ghosts of George and Marion Kerby in Topper, finds himself reunited with his dyspeptic wife for an extended vacation on the Riviera. But he doesn't have long to enjoy the peace and quiet before the irrepressible Kerbys materialize once again and start causing fracases, confusing the citizenry, alarming the gendarmes, getting naked, and turning every occasion into revelry or melee. Soon Marion decides that Topper as a ghost would be even more laughs than Topper in the flesh. And all she needs to arrange is one simple little murder.

Born in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1892, educated at Dartmouth, THORNE SMITH was an early cohort of Dorothy Parker's. He achieved literary success in 1926 with the publication of Topper and went on to publish nine novels in the next eight years. He earned a passionate following among both critics and readers before his death, at the age of forty-two, in 1934.

Genres: Fiction, Humor, Fantasy, Paranormal, Classics, Comedy, France

267 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1932

About the author

James Thorne Smith, Jr. was an American writer of humorous supernatural fantasy fiction under the byline Thorne Smith. He is best known today for the two Topper novels, comic fantasy fiction involving sex, much drinking and supernatural transformations. With racy illustrations, these sold millions of copies in the 1930s and were equally popular in paperbacks of the 1950s.

Smith was born in Annapolis, Maryland, the son of a Navy commodore and attended Dartmouth College. Following hungry years in Greenwich Village, working part-time as an advertising agent, Smith achieved meteoric success with the publication of Topper in 1926. He was an early resident of Free Acres, a social experimental community developed by Bolton Hall according to the economic principles of Henry George in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey. He died of a heart attack in 1934 while vacationing in Florida.

Reviews

[Henry Avila · Rating 3 out of 5]

The return of Cosmo Topper; and it is quite apparent he hasn't become any wiser, learning nothing from previous mistakes. The ghosts still control Mr. Topper movements and actions a childish need for companionship even from the non-living, causing notable confusing scenes and we the readers are most grateful. A bored wealthy man vacationing in France during the bleak 1930's, the wife rightly escapes early the crazy sights and sounds the chaos around the husband (who could blame her). Buyers of the book will be enchanted by the reactions from the puzzled public, windows smashed, partially seen bodies floating in air, voices coming from empty spaces, invisible things biting people, constant wild endless parties , bottles being drunk by what? Waiters feeling nervous , food disappears by unknown eating creatures, an uneasy driver sees a head carried by Cosmo in the backseat and he looks unconcerned. Think this over, normal humans would run for the hills and do. Strange inanimate objects for anyone but not for our Topper, he's seen it all before. The fixed horse races and the favorites never win why ? However a few will make money from the fraud. The spirits shenanigans I don't need to tell. A pleasant insane romp for those who want the weird situations to break up the dull life and turn the ordinary up -side- down, maybe the ridicules can wake the dead. With Marion Kerby, in love with Topper, George Kerby her jealous mate with a bad temper and the new spirits the flirtatious Mrs. Hart and greedy Colonel Scott on the beautiful Riviera by the even prettier blue Mediterranean as yachts slowly traverse the sea with not a trouble in the world . Still no surprise the tumult will go far into the dark night, the police quite busy yet how to stop the fading apparitions, impossible. Mr. Topper in a forest jumping from tree to tree like Tarzan while the gendarmes look helplessly . The fun is for any who like the silly and think mad is a perfect comedic atmosphere . The former banker now retired has always a drink in his shaky hand, nobody could be critical about this after the numerous experiences and manifestations his eyes viewed. The second Topper novel isn't as good as the first , the novelty like the ghosts are becoming tired, nonetheless for most it is good enough. The main problem the sleaze comes through ...

[Kimley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, Topper, how I do love you!

The second Topper book by Thorne Smith, although not quite as good as the first, is still a biting confection of wit and well worth the read if you enjoyed the first. While the first book takes dear old Topper, our mild-mannered, suburban-dwelling, bank executive and spins him on an adventure with some free-wheeling ghosts that causes him much reflection on his life, this second book has Topper, now a retired bank executive, galavanting in the south of France with the very same mischievous, sexy, prohibition-despising ghosts as accomplices.

The book is basically a series of madcap mishaps which give Thorne Smith much ammunition to poke fun at what silly humans we all can be. His satire is deadly sharp and Smith has a keen understanding of human frailty and foibles. There are even a few eerily prescient political comments on the state of Europe in the early 30's - the book was published in 1932. But mostly Smith enjoys making sly commentary on social interactions and at the same time he clearly loves his characters in all their silliness.

[Realini Ionescu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Topper Takes a Trip by Thorne Smith


8 out of 10


We can find Topper Takes a Trip on the 1,000 Books Everyone Must Read list https://www.theguardian.com/books/200... though to try perhaps the same passé jocularity that pervades the book it would be difficult to see why, especially if one has not managed to finish the damn book, except by just turning the pages to see The END written all over and place it on the shelf…well, given its electronic format, it was not really physically moved anywhere.

The problem with comedy books might be that if the reader does not find them particularly funny, does not go for the kind of humor that is peddled by the writer, perhaps – maybe more likely in this instance – the man or woman taking up the narrative does not have the sense of humor that is so vital for the wellbeing of humans in that it is one of the preconditions of happiness, and is even listed as one of the components of Transcendence as a Signature or Character Strength https://www.viacharacter.org/survey/a... - then there is little or nothing left to do with a story that is supposed to amuse and it does not.
If we use The Trip that Topper Takes to the French Riviera, there is not much in it, unless of course you have a taste for the type of humor that has been so much appreciated in 1926 and thereafter, when Thorne Smith had enjoyed success with readers and critics, albeit he seems to have sunk into a sort of obscurity, given that this particular book, although allegedly one of those We Must Read, together with Everyone else, does not even have a Wikipedia page and if you search for it, you only find among the first Google results links to Amazon (of course, it is among the billions of things they have in store and to other virtual shops that want to sell you the item.

Cosmo Topper is the main character in this novel that is part of a series and he has a troubled, if supposedly comical, relationship with his spouse, jealous as she is and observant of the interest that the husband has in various other women, starting with the German model – it is assumed that she is, but is she…the under signed does not know and frankly does not really care – and continuing with other apparitions on and near the beach in the South of France.
The German woman walks on the sand and she keeps taking off more of her clothing, up to the point where she might get naked and this is an aspect that does not in itself make for interesting reading, unless of course we appreciate the ‘humorous’ manner in which Thorne Smith describes it or not, according to your judgment of this and other episodes in the opus.

There is also the ridiculous, if entertaining (?) attitude that Topper takes to his departure from home and the habits he has, since he disagrees with French ways, from the breakfast to other particulars, he makes every effort to get the meals he enjoys at home, with omelet and bacon (if this is not a wrong recollection) and that again could be construed as hilarious by those who include this with gems, Magnum opera like Lucky Jim by divine Kingsley Amis http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/05/l...

For this reader though, the idea of putting aside one of the most famous and best cuisines in the world and take the American style of cooking instead does not look like the most amusing gesture, but the sort of thing that those going to a motorcycle rally for 250,000 people, in the middle of a pandemic, with record numbers of newly infected men and women would do.
As for the ghosts that haunt Cosmo Topper – now that is a rare reason to appreciate the hero, for Cosmo sounds great and it was also used for Cosmo Kramer – they seem to belong to the same category of bizarre, outré, outlandish personages and not ones that would provoke laughter, say as in another glorious masterpiece, A Good Man in Africa by the master of the genre, William Boyd http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/09/a...

You do not have to take my word for it, indeed, it would be better to consult another source and this is just a probably very wrong negative opinion, based on little engagement with a book that, once I had discovered I do not really enjoy the first maybe forty pages or less, I decided I just turn the rest quickly, hoping for some gems and then did not offer it a proper treatment, the attention it probably deserves and which would have brought some scenes of absolute exhilaration and hilarity in the most extreme forms.

[Rob Slaven · Rating 2 out of 5]

From my younger days as a much older person in a younger person’s body I had some familiarity with the old Topper movies though if the reading of this book is any judge of such things my concept of what the movies were actually ABOUT might be more than a tad askew of reality.

Cosmo Topper is an average American bank executive on holiday in the French Riveria. He’s utterly normal in his generally loose moral fibre and unexceptional in most ways that are worth noting except that he happens to be plagued by the most curious company in the form of four ghosts which haunt his every step and send him on no end of random misadventures. One of the phantom quartet is bent on using Topper solely to supply a good time. Another of the foursome is Cosmo’s mistress and she’s bent on killing him so that they need not be bound by their differing status in the afterlife. The other two simply seem to go in whichever way the wind blows them (as the wispy and non-corporeal are wont to do anyway.)

The most noteable thing about Smith’s novel, aside from its utterly bizarre and original concept (it spawned several movies) is the twisted and writhing manner in which he writes. I realize, of course, that such a phrase coming from me is, at the least, a bit shocking. I look at my own prolix prose and see tendrils that are convoluted far beyond easy human comprehension but Smith makes me look like a grunting Neanderthal by comparison. Smith’s long and sometimes fruitless journeys into metaphor, combined with his copious use of French terms that are unknown to me makes him a real chore to sift through. This combined with the unfamiliar vernacular of the 1930s makes this one a tough nut. That said, if you can grind his prose down to its meaning, you have a good nut, but my attitude going into this was of a book to be easily tossed off in a couple of nights. It came to span four and not without some fair amount of dread when it came time to sit down and read. As example I give you the early description of Cosmo Topper:

Topper, it is to be learned with some relief, was virginal more through circumstance than choice. This does not imply that his was a low and lecherous nature. Nor does it necessarily follow that he was epicurean in such matters. But he did like things nice that way. Most men do, when and if possible.

Topper had been a banker by profession. He still was a husband–an original error of judgement unrectified by time. Habit is a dreadful thing. Once he had commuted without realizing the error of his ways. Most men commute through necessity. Topper had done so ritualistically. In Glendale, USA, the Toppers had been socially solid. All that was changed, but not through Mrs. Topper.
I’ll admit that even after having read the entire book and that exact passage several times, I’m still not EXACTLY sure I understand what he’s saying. At any rate, to the studious and focused reader, this book would no doubt be at least a small riot. Smith’s verbal wit is good though would have benefited from anything even remotely approaching a plot. Like an episode of The Stooges, one is left with the idea that something odd might have happened (one falls short of using the word ‘funny’) but without a common thread to bind events together the result is a handful of milkweed fluff. If nothing else, I suppose, I was amused to hear again the phrase “mon petit chou.” One can never have enough cabbage in one’s life.

[Xenophon Hendrix · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the sequel to Topper. It lacks much of the compassion of its predecessor, and it's darker while at the same time being sillier. Still, it's pretty funny.

[Anthony Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

My co-reviewers have given enough of a rundown on Thorne Smith for me not to need to repeat the little I know. Suffice it for me to say that as a random choice from one of my regular secondhand bookshops (Border Books, Todmorden) this turned out to be a goody.

Mind you, I suspect it’s either a style and authorial tone you’ll like or won’t. Smith writes in a kind of Wodehousian longhand, so for people like me who rather enjoy playful prolixity, it’s fun. Having said that, like Wodehouse, Smith not infrequently produces inconsequential conversations that struck me as tiresome. In Wodehouse’s case it tends to be the kind that goes ‘What did you say? – Did I say anything? – Yes, you did. I distinctly heard you say X’ – Did I? – You did – I don’t remember – You most certainly did – I most certainly do not remember’. Smith’s are rather more longwinded, and usually occur when the speakers are in their cups, so they impress with the same dullness as, in real life, do the conversations of those who have a few pints inside them on a listener who has been drinking tonic without the gin.

The other aspect of the book which I found wearing if I did not limit the number of chapters I read at a sitting was the one-trick idea of a man bedevilled by ‘lower plane’ ghosts who are keen to enjoy the pleasures of life to the full with him and quite often at his expense. This means that the novel, set in the South of France, reads as a series of episodes, each one focused on a single escapade, and I found it most enjoyable if I read a couple of episodes at a time so that custom could not stale Smith’s capacity to get infinite variety out of his trick.

The novel also struck me as a manifestation of the end of the Prohibition Era in the USA as it was published in 1934. Thus all alcoholic restraints are off among the Americans in Europe. Equally, of course, those restraints would not have applied in Europe during Prohibition. Either way, the Americans, material, materialised and ectoplasmic, are set on having a good time, especially after Mr Topper has enjoyed divesting himself of his killjoy, dyspeptic wife and those of his compatriots he associates with ‘Glendale’ prudery and respectability. This is achieved with help from his ghostly friends – George and Marion Kerby, Colonel Scott and Mrs Hart and the back half of a dog called Oscar. The life-lovers can then set about enjoying sun, food, sex, drink and mischief in a riot of hedonistic naughtiness and delinquency.

Such delinquency often manifests itself through the ghosts’ deployment of their ability to materialise and dematerialise at will. In their visible form, they are capable of smoking and drinking and eating as normal human beings, and this adds a great deal to the book’s joie de vivre. In their invisible – or semi-invisible – form they can get up to no-good. They upset a swimming float; they kick balls into groups of beach-picknickers; they remove the last vestiges of swimming costume from a sunbathing German model; they dematerialise in the middle of a dive; they tip Topper’s hat for him; they cheat in the casino, they wreck Topper’s rented villa, and, perhaps most memorably, brilliantly sabotage an entire race meeting to their own pecuniary advantage. Marion, in particular, is wickedness itself in terms of her sexual libertarian behaviour with the cuddly but distinctly unadonean Topper and her growing determination to have him all to herself on the lower plane, necessitating Topper’s continual watchfulness towards the end of the novel as he finds knives and rocks in unexpected places and discovers himself being led to a diving place above rocky shallows. All good fun.

Two things gave me great pleasure. Firstly, Wodehouse tends to people his stories with a small cast suitable to stage farce. After I finish one of his books I increasingly find myself feeling what a small, melancholy, limited and unfruitful world he portrays. Smith, by contrast, in this novel has a film set in mind with his core (or corps?) of stars and a large supporting cast; he creates a world that is more recognizably real because it’s fuller and less confined. I prefer this.

Secondly, many of this supporting cast are French and their speech is presented in literal English. This I found very funny, juvenile as I am. Thus we have moments such as:
“But should it eventuate that he does go ‘poof!’ then it is that one makes water to run on a scale very grand.”
“If you do not descend all at once, it is that I shall fire!”
“It is of a marvellousness in full truth, but – hein! It is also an affair of the most lamentable nature, for is it not that there go an illimitable number of francs that should be rightfully ours?”

Maybe you have to be there to get a kick out of that sort of stuff, but I was and I did.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite funny, but not Thorne Smith's best work. Topper is once again pursued by ghosts who turn his life upside down, this is an extract which sets gives you some idea of the tone of the book:

'Entrez!' called Mr Topper.
The manager stepped into the room, quietly closing the door behind him.
'Good morning, m'sieu,' said the manager. 'Were you, by any chance, forced to eject a naked woman through that window a few moments ago?'
'Certainly not,' replied Mr Topper indignantly. 'I wouldn't throw a naked woman out of my window. Waste not, want not, say I.'
The manager coughed delicately behind his hand.
'I can understand that,' he agreed, Mr Topper thought a shade too readily. 'Nevertheless, an unclad woman emerged but a moment ago with great speed through that window.'
The manager with a nod indicated the window through which Marion had hoped to commit suicide.
'For all I know, Earl Carroll's Vanities could have been bounding in and out of that window all morning,' Mr Topper calmly assured the manager. 'I've been sleeping. You're the first person I've seen to-day, and I'm not particularly glad to see you. Go away.'
'Yes,' came a woman's quiet voice. 'Why don't you get the deuce out of here and give my husband the chance to get some sleep?'
Marion Kerby, in the stunning costume she had worn at the races, appeared gloriously in the bathroom door and stood looking coldly upon the manager.
'Madame,' he replied apologetically, admiration sharpening his eyes. 'I ask a thousand pardons-'
'Well, I don't hand you one,' she cut in curtly. 'What's all this about windows and naked women?'
'One of them went through that window, madame,' the manager explained.
'Do you want a naked woman?' Marion demanded.
'But no madame. That was not my intention,' protested the man.
'Then why do you come barging in here, putting ideas in my husband's mind? You could have seen at a glance it isn't any too strong. Anyway, you shouldn't be looking for naked women at this time of day.'
'A mere matter of routine,' declared the manager. 'You were not perhaps that woman, madame?'
'Do I look as if I'd been thrown through a window?' Marion asked haughtily.
'On the contrary, madame,' the manager answered gallantly. 'I only asked because she had such a glorious figure.'
Marion looked seriously at Topper.
'Do you think we could have got ourselves into a bad house by mistake?' she asked him. 'The things this man says.'
'I assure you, madame, this is a most respectable hotel.'
'And yet you make a practise of asking your guests for naked women - practically begging them for naked women. Call that respectable? Aren't you able to get your own naked women? Must my husband turn procurer for your sake, may I ask? If there is going to be a naked woman in this room I'll be that woman. Understand?'

The entire book is all pretty much in that manner of writing. Topper's ghostly friends drag him along to races, which they manage to rig by turning invisible and dragging the horses they haven’t bet on to a stop, end up having Topper knocked unconscious by a German model on a beach and make his annoying prude of a wife leave him. A fun light-hearted read, it's rather a shame more people haven't read it.

[Jonathan Palfrey · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the second outing of Cosmo Topper and his ghostly friends, and time has gone by, the author is six years older and even more world-weary. Although this time the action is set in France, which gives him a chance to have a go at the French as well as the Americans.

I originally preferred this second book, but now I find the first rather charming—childish in a nice way. The second book has its moments, but it displays a more adolescent sense of humour with a touch of malice, which may not appeal unless you’re in the mood for it.

By now we’re into the 1930s, and sex is permitted—adulterous sex, even—although quite discreetly and not in front of the cameras. This comes as something of a relief: two consecutive novels in which Cosmo and Marion fail to consummate their relationship would have been too much to swallow, at least for modern readers.

[Leslie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A vast expanse of cool ocean as blue and virginal seeming as the garments adorning the figure then inspecting it from the balcon> of a discouragingly pale stucco villa set in a garden fairly bristling with grass of a repellent toughness -- grass so hostilely tough that only a rhinoceros could sit on it with any showing of dignity and aplomb. Unfortunately, as rhinoceroses are rarely if ever encountered in these drab days sitting on Riviera grass in Riviera gardens, this observation must of necessity remain merely one of those vast mental pictures upon which to dwell during the interminable reaches of a family reunion."

Thus the stage is set for this hilarious novel. Even better than (and quite different from) the movie with Constance Bennett and Roland Young! I laughed out loud multiple times while reading this and wanted to quote passages aloud to anyone nearby.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Britain has Wodehouse; America has Thorne Smith. He is a national treasure who should be more widely read. Unfortunately, he is out of print in this country. However, you can still find his books at Amazon.co.uk. "Topper Takes a Trip" is the follow-up to Topper. Topper is a banker who develops a following of hard-partying ghosts. In this book he goes to the South of France. My favorite wordplay is the drunken slurring of "Goddarme Gendamns" (French cops). Hilarity ensues everywhere. This is not a serious novel, but it is in the canon of humorous novels. Read Smith and you will think you've seen it all before in comedy films. That is because Hollywood stole a lot of what it knows about comedy from Smith, and it is still funny today.

[Marvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another prime example of Thorne Smith's sophisticated skewering of the early 20th century bourgeois...

"Madame is your wife?" exclaimed Monsieur in a mixture of surprise and disappointment.

"But yes," replied Mr Topper. "Is it that you believed her my mistress?"

Monsieur Grandon shrugged temporizingly.

"It is of an occurrence unique." He Observed. "One expects more of an American when he visits our Riviera."

[Karen]

* 1000 novels everyone must read: the definitive list

Selected by the Guardian's Review team and a panel of expert judges, this list includes only novels – no memoirs, no short stories, no long poems – from any decade and in any language. Originally published in thematic supplements – love, crime, comedy, family and self, state of the nation, science fiction and fantasy, war and travel – they appear here for the first time in a single list.

[Tosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

The sequal to 'Topper.' Thorne Smith is one of America's most underrated writer. You want screwball energy and wit? This is it! Depression era writing at it's most great.

[Fishsanwitt]

from Library Thing list

[Trevor · Rating 4 out of 5]

There was a style of comedy at the time that I don't think any writer would be allowed to be verbose enough to get away with today.

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

A true American classic - Thorne Smith is delightful!

[Nicola · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have loved Topper since I was a teenager!

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I so enjoy this kind of humor. I suppose there are some deep thoughts here but first enjoy its humor and fun and then contemplate all those things.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cosmo Topper is back, this time on vacation on the French Riviera with his wife and cat when who should show up but the ghosts from the previous novel, George and Marion Kerby, Colonel Scott, Clara Hart, and Oscar, the semi-materialized ghost of the Colonel's dog. Of course, they immediately whisk Topper away from his villa on a debauched journey through southern France and Monaco, getting him in trouble not only with his wife and her friends, but also the law. I didn't like it as much as the previous book, but still had fun reading it.

[Mehmet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Similar to the first book but not as good in my opinion. This is set during the Toppers trip to the French Riviera. More of a straight comedy with the return of our ghostly friends. Humour comes from ghostly antics and the slightly french stereotypes. Although the gloom of the first book is even stronger is this book, there seemed to be a fatalistic attitude to life. The ghost are slightly more chaotic and sometimes evil. But if you enjoyed the first book it is worth the read.

[Joelle · Rating 1 out of 5]

Trash. Warning this is nothing like the movie, like the basic storyline but the book was kinda trashy and I skimmed it and ended up not finishing it at all. I bought it because I recognized that it had been a movie but I won’t be collecting more by this author and I discarded this copy.

[Jo-jean Keller · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remembered watching Topper and decided to read some of the Topper stories. What fun! The descriptions are fascinating and the situations hilarious!

[Michael Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

Book two was bit funnier than Topper ( book 1 ) but still not as I remembered from 50 years ago. Author never finished book three so we have some small loose ends.

[YAMAMURA Tsukiko]

The mirthful Mediterranean holiday of a haunted man.

[Eva Sterner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as fun and fresh as Topper, but a joy nonetheless.