5: I hate golf. I love this.
Great literature is supposed to bring you an appreciation of something you hadn't considered before. Wodehouse's golf stories did it for me like few others. None are terribly subtle--most are told by the Oldest Member, who on the first half-page collars a helpless younger golfer and tells him a story that turns out to be worth staying for. The narration is slightly sarcastic, and there are only two types of stories at heart: guy and girl made for each other get married because of golf, or guy uses golf to avoid girl unfit for him. There's always a subplot of a bad golfer breaking 100 or two longtime rivals in an 18 hole match, but nothing seems to get reused.Despite using upper-crust characters in his stories, Wodehouse's work exhibits only a fake pretension. Plus there are cool names and recurring characters such as the golf champ Sandy McHoots. It's a bit more comprehensible than some Yoknapathawpa nonsense. A love triangle through three stories features a poet who(gasp) recites his poetry while people focus loses a golferess to a golfer, almost regains her, and then tries to learn golf courting her sister. Nobody is evil, although some people deserve--and get--a good comic socking. But what makes Wodehouse appealing is how his characters are comically obsessed with golf. I have better things to be obsessed with, but I was able to connect with this and recognize how Wodehouse laughs at them. After I stopped laughing. I've never read a collection of stories more insightful, easy to follow and enjoyable.
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