In Defense of P.G. Wodehouse by George Orwell is the twenty third of The Essays that are placed on the 917th spot on The Greatest Books of All Time site, where the algorithm changes the structure of the compilation, I don’t know what data is used, but if it takes into account the ‘reading public’, then the chefs d’oeuvre will descend to the bottom of the hierarchy, and the likes of The Da Vinci Code will be omnipresent in libraries, if they will still exist, and they will become the “GOAT” – nevertheless, you have more than five thousand reviews on books from the aforementioned site and others, with notes on films from The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made and other lists waiting for you on my blog and YouTube channel https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html where you will be privileged, singular guests

 

In Defense of P.G. Wodehouse by George Orwell is the twenty third of The Essays that are placed on the 917th  spot on The Greatest Books of All Time site, where the algorithm changes the structure of the compilation, I don’t know what data is used, but if it takes into account the ‘reading public’, then the chefs d’oeuvre will descend to the bottom of the hierarchy, and the likes of The Da Vinci Code will be omnipresent in libraries, if they will still exist, and they will become the “GOAT” – nevertheless, you have more than five thousand reviews on books from the aforementioned site and others, with notes on films from The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made and other lists waiting for you on my blog and YouTube channel https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html where you will be privileged, singular guests

 

 

10 out of 10

 

The more I read of the Essays https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/10/anti-semitism-in-britain-by-george.html the more resplendent I find them, and regret the fact that they will soon be ending, In Defense of P.G. Wodehouse is the 23rd, and there will be only a few left, so far, there have been about seventeen hours of listening and there are only about eight left, what a genuine and wondrous surprise this book has been

 

“When the Germans made their rapid advance through Belgium in the early summer of 1940, they captured, among other things, Mr. P. G. Wodehouse, who had been living throughout the early part of the war in his villa at Le Touquet, and seems not to have realized until the last moment that he was in any danger.”

 

Perhaps you disagree, but I find this start of the essay amusing, and more of the rest, not in a brutal sense, you do not fall from the chair laughing, it is ironical, well intended, and functional, Wodehouse does have a good lawyer here, and his defense is successful, I am sure I am not the only one who is convinced after reading this

Although P.G. Wodehouse https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/07/joy-in-morning-by-pg-wodehouse-author.html is present on lists of the best books, he is not one of my favorites, nevertheless, the arguments presented by George Orwell have won me, even if this does not mean I will read again Something Fresh or the others

 

Wodehouse appears to have been worse than naïve, he had no political sense, and I remember Orwell saying in one of his essays (maybe the first, Why I write) that writing is political, even when not intentionally, and when the creator of Jeeves and Wooster is imprisoned by the Nazis, he is making serious mistakes

He had lived abroad, and is not familiar with the state of mind of his compatriots, furthermore, he sees himself as American – at one point, he states that ‘we are not in the war’ - and when talking about the situation he offers to ’give India and some recipe for cooking potatoes on a radiator, together with his signed books’ for freedom

 

Wodehouse is jesting https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/07/something-fresh-by-pg-wodehouse-one-of.html but the British have been upset, nay, furious to hear about the talks he had on the Nazi radio, except the writer did not realize how serious this was, he had left Britain before the war, and was stuck in the first part of the century

Goebbels has sent his assistant to see Wodehouse, because they have realized that they could use the writer for what today they call soft power, America was not yet in the war, and the Nazis saw they could not take Britain, Soviet Union and America all at the same time, they would have to, and we know how that ended

 

They thought that given the popularity of P.G. Wodehouse in the USA, having him ‘on board’ would help, but then they dropped him after only very few programs, within days I think it was…besides, as George Orwell emphasizes, there were much bigger fish to fry, the impact of the man who was nearly sixty was small

Nothing much, if anything happened to the ‘big rats’, in France and elsewhere: women who slept with Germans and small pray were grilled and punished, while important political, business figures suffered no consequences

 

 Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – I am on Goodreads as Realini Ionescu, at least for the moment, if I keep on expressing my views on Orange Woland aka TACO, it may be a short-lived presence

Also, maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the benefits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

 There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html

 

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

 

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

 

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