Psmith in the City

Description

“Psmith in the City” is one of the early writings of Wodehouse, being published in 1910. It is a good story, with humorous situations, about a cricket player, Mike Jackson, who wants to go to Cambridge University but his dream is spoiled by his father, who loses the family money in mysterious circumstances. So, Mike starts working at a Bank and meets a friend from the cricket who just started to work there, just like him. Their boss and nemesis is Mr. John Bickersdyke, the bank manager, who even makes Mike lose his last cricket game.

Once again, Wodehouse uses his own life as a background for his novel: he could not go to Oxford as he wanted, so he went to work at the Shanghai and Hong Kong Bank, where he did not really impress his superiors, especially when he started a ledger just to fill it with an imaginary story about… opening a new ledger. This is the tone used in “Psmith in the City”.

The strange thing is that there is no real story until the final chapters, but the writing is deliciously funny (the dialogs, the situations…), even if it is not the best Wodehouse’s work. When he wrote it, he hadn’t mastered his style yet, this is why the plot is not very strong, but it is replaced by first rate humor, and readers who cannot understand it probably have had a very-very bad day. The book is really able to make you laugh out loud, and Psmith is a delightful character, eccentric and refreshing. It seems that he was based on an acquaintance – a student at Wodehouse’s cousin’s public school, with a particular style and personality.

Psmith in the City will be an enjoyable reading and – why not? – maybe also a great gift to a friend.
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