148 Quotes & Sayings By Pg Wodehouse

Freddie experienced the sort of abysmal soul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's Russian peasants when, after putting in a heavy day's work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city's reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only to find the vodka bottle empty. P.g. Wodehouse

I'm not absolutely certain of the facts, but I rather fancy it's Shakespeare who says that it's always just when a fellow is feeling particularly braced with things in general that Fate sneaks up behind him with the bit of lead piping. P.g. Wodehouse

I know I was writing stories when I was five. I don’t remember what I did before that. Just loafed, I suppose. P.g. Wodehouse

Unseen in the background, Fate was quietly slipping lead into the boxing-glove. P.g. Wodehouse

The fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun. P.g. Wodehouse

It was one of those cases where you approve the broad, general principle of an idea but can't help being in a bit of a twitter at the prospect of putting it into practical effect. I explained this to Jeeves, and he said much the same thing had bothered Hamlet. P.g. Wodehouse

I mean to say, I know perfectly well that I've got, roughly speaking, half the amount of brain a normal bloke ought to possess. And when a girl comes along who has about twice the regular allowance, she too often makes a bee line for me with the love light in her eyes. I don't know how to account for it, but it is so."" It may be Nature's provision for maintaining the balance of the species, sir. P.g. Wodehouse

A man's subconscious self is not the ideal companion. It lurks for the greater part of his life in some dark den of its own, hidden away, and emerges only to taunt and deride and increase the misery of a miserable hour. P.g. Wodehouse

I flung open the door. I got a momentary flash of about a hundred and fifteen cats of all sizes and colours scrapping in the middle of the room, and then they all shot past me with a rush and out of the front door; and all that was left of the mobscene was the head of a whacking big fish, lying on the carpet and staring up at me in a rather austere sort of way, as if it wanted a written explanation and apology. P.g. Wodehouse

There are situations in life which are beyond one. The sensible man realizes this, and slides out of such situations, admitting himself beaten. Others try to grapple with them, but it never does any good. When affairs get in a real tangle, it is best to sit still and let them straighten themselves out. Or, if one does not do that, simply to think no more about them. This is Philosophy. The true philosopher is the man who says "All right, " and goes to sleep in his arm-chair. One's attitude towards Life's Little Difficulties should be that of the gentleman in the fable, who sat down on an acorn one day and happened to doze. The warmth of his body caused the acorn to germinate, and it grew so rapidly that, when he awoke, he found himself sitting in the fork of an oak sixty feet from the ground. He thought he would go home, but, finding this impossible, he altered his plans. "Well, well, " he said, "if I cannot compel circumstances to my will, I can at least adapt my will to circumstances. I decide to remain here." Which he did, and had a not unpleasant time. The oak lacked some of the comforts of home, but the air was splendid and the view excellent. Today's Great Thought for Young Readers. Imitate this man. P.g. Wodehouse

She was, in short, melted by his distress, as so often happens with the female sex. Poets have frequently commented on this. You are probably familiar with the one who said, "Oh, woman in our hours of ease tum tumty tiddly something please, when something something something brow, a something something something thou. P.g. Wodehouse

From my earliest years I had always wanted to be a writer. It was not that I had any particular message for humanity. I am still plugging away and not the ghost of one so far, so it begins to look as though, unless I suddenly hit mid-season form in my eighties, humanity will remain a message short. P.g. Wodehouse

How anybody can compose a story by word of mouth face to face with a bored-looking secretary with a notebook is more than I can imagine. Yet many authors think nothing of saying, 'Ready, Miss Spelvin? Take dictation. Quote no comma Sir Jasper Murgatroyd comma close quotes comma said no better make it hissed Evangeline comma quote I would not marry you if you were the last person on earth period close quotes Quote well comma I'm not so the point does not arise comma close quotes replied Sir Jasper twirling his moustache cynically period And so the long day wore on period End of chapter.' If I had to do that sort of thing I should be feeling all the time that the girl was saying to herself as she took it down, 'Well comma this beats me period How comma with homes for the feebleminded touting for custom on every side comma has a man like this succeeded in remaining at large mark of interrogation. P.g. Wodehouse

...there was practically one handwriting common to the whole school when it came to writing lines. It resembled the movements of a fly that had fallen into an ink-pot, and subsequently taken a little brisk exercise on a sheet of foolscap by way of restoring the circulation. P.g. Wodehouse

[T]he success of every novel -- if it's a novel of action -- depends on the high spots. The thing to do is to say to yourself, "What are my big scenes?" and then get every drop of juice out of them.", Issue 64, Winter 1975) P.g. Wodehouse

My Aunt Dahlia, who runs a woman's paper called Milady's Boudoir, had recently backed me into a corner and made me promise to write her a few words for her "Husbands and Brothers" page on "What the Well-Dressed Man is Wearing". I believe in encouraging aunts, when deserving; and, as there are many worse eggs than her knocking about the metrop, I had consented blithely. But I give you my honest word that if I had had the foggiest notion of what I was letting myself in for, not even a nephew's devotion would have kept me from giving her the raspberry. A deuce of a job it had been, taxing the physique to the utmost. I don't wonder now that all these author blokes have bald heads and faces like birds who have suffered. P.g. Wodehouse

One of the poets, whose name I cannot recall, has a passage, which I am unable at the moment to remember, in one of his works, which for the time being has slipped my mind, which hits off admirably this age-old situation. P.g. Wodehouse

There is, of course, this to be said for the Omnibus Book in general and this one in particular. When you buy it, you have got something. The bulk of this volume makes it almost the ideal paper-weight. The number of its pages assures its posessor of plenty of shaving paper on his vacation. Place upon the waistline and jerked up and down each morning, it will reduce embonpoint and strengthen the abdominal muscles. And those still at their public school will find that between, say, Caesar's Commentaries in limp cloth and this Jeeves book there is no comparison as a missile in an inter-study brawl. P.g. Wodehouse

Great pals we've always been. In fact there was a time when I had an idea I was in love with Cynthia. However, it blew over. A dashed pretty and lively and attractive girl, mind you, but full of ideals and all that. I may be wronging her, but I have an idea that she's the sort of girl who would want a fellow to carve out a career and what not. I know I've heard her speak favourably of Napoleon. So what with one thing and another the jolly old frenzy sort of petered out, and now we're just pals. I think she's a topper, and she thinks me next door to a looney, so everything's nice and matey. P.g. Wodehouse

Mr Wisdom, ' said the girl who had led him into the presence.' Ah, ' said Howard Saxby, and there was a pause of perhaps three minutes, during which his needles clicked busily. 'Wisdom, did she say?'' Yes. I wrote "Cocktail Time"''You couldn't have done better, ' said Mr Saxby cordially. 'How's your wife, Mr Wisdom?'Cosmo said he had no wife.' Surely?'" I'm a bachelor.' Then Wordsworth was wrong. He said you were married to immortal verse. Excuse me a moment, ' murmured Mr Saxby, applying himself to the sock again. 'I'm just turning the heel. Do you knit?'' No.'' Sleep does. It knits the ravelled sleave of care.'( After a period of engrossed knitting, Cosmo coughs loudly to draw attention to his presence.)' Goodness, you made me jump! ' he (Saxby) said. 'Who are you?'' My name, as I have already told you, is Wisdom''How did you get in?' asked Mr Saxby with a show of interest.' I was shown in.'' And stayed in. I see, Tennyson was right. Knowledge comes, but Wisdom lingers. Take a chair.'' I have.'' Take another, ' said Mr Saxby hospitably. . P.g. Wodehouse

You probably think that being a guest in your aunt's house I would hesitate to butter you all over the front lawn and dance on the fragments in hobnailed boots, but you are mistaken. It would be a genuine pleasure. By an odd coincidence I brought a pair of hobnailed boots with me! ' So saying, and recognising a good exit line when he saw one, he strode out, and after an interval of tense meditation I followed him. (Spode to Wooster). P.g. Wodehouse

Lady Constance's lips tightened, and a moment passed during which it seemed always a fifty-fifty chance that a handsome silver ink-pot would fly through the air in the direction of her brother's head. P.g. Wodehouse

No sir, " said Mr Molloy. "I'm mighty sorry I can't meet you in any way, but the fact is I'm all fixed up in Oil. Oil's my dish. I began in Oil and I'll end up in Oil. I wouldn't be happy outside of Oil.""Oh?" said Mr Carmody, regarding this Human Sardine with as little open hostility as he could manage on the spur of the moment. P.g. Wodehouse

At the age of eleven or thereabouts women acquire a poise and an ability to handle difficult situations which a man, if he is lucky, manages to achieve somewhere in the later seventies. P.g. Wodehouse

And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity the girl who marries you will need. P.g. Wodehouse

When you have been just told that the girl you love is definitely betrothed to another, you begin to understand how Anarchists must feel when the bomb goes off too soon. P.g. Wodehouse

I read the paragraph again. A peculiar feeling it gave me. I don't know if you have ever experienced the sensation of seeing the announcement of the engagement of a pal of yours to a girl whom you were only saved from marrying yourself by the skin of your teeth. It induces a sort of -- well, it's difficult to describe it exactly; but I should imagine a fellow would feel much the same if he happened to be strolling through the jungle with a boyhood chum and met a tigress or a jaguar, or what not, and managed to shin up a tree and looked down and saw the friend of his youth vanishing into the undergrowth in the animal's slavering jaws. A sort of profound, prayerful relief, if you know what I mean, blended at the same time with a pang of pity. What I'm driving at is that, thankful as I was that I hadn't had to marry Honoria myself, I was sorry to see a real good chap like old Biffy copping it. I sucked down a spot of tea and began brooding over the business. . P.g. Wodehouse

Like so many substantial citizens of America, he had married young and kept on marrying, springing from blonde to blonde like the chamois of the Alps leaping from crag to crag. P.g. Wodehouse

The ideas of debtor and creditor as to what constitutes a good time never coincide. P.g. Wodehouse

The Duke of Dunstable had one-way pockets. He would walk ten miles in the snow to chisel an orphan out of tuppence. P.g. Wodehouse

One of the first lessons life teaches us is that on these occasions of back-chat between the delicately-natured, a man should retire into the offing, curl up in a ball, and imitate the prudent tactics of the opossum, which, when danger is in the air, pretends to be dead, frequently going to the length of hanging out crêpe and instructing its friends to gather round and say what a pity it all is. P.g. Wodehouse

There is no pathos more bitter than that of parting from someone we have never met. P.g. Wodehouse

You remind me of an old cat I once had. Whenever he killed a mouse he would bring it into the drawing-room and lay it affectionately at my feet. I would reject the corpse with horror and turn him out, but back he would come with his loathsome gift. I simply couldn’t make him understand that he was not doing me a kindness. He thought highly of his mouse and it was beyond him to realize that I did not want it. You are just the same with your chivalry. It’s very kind of you to keep offering me your dead mouse; but honestly I have no use for it. I won’t take favors just because I happen to be a female. P.g. Wodehouse

...with each new book of mine I have always the feeling that this time I have picked a lemon in the garden of literature. P.g. Wodehouse

Squiffy, have you ever felt a sort of strange emptiness in the heart? A sort of aching void of the soul?'' Oh, rather! '' What do you do about it?'' I generally take a couple of cocktails. P.g. Wodehouse

Boyhood, like measles, is one of those complaints which a man should catch young and have done with, for when it comes in middle life it is apt to be serious. P.g. Wodehouse

Stimulated by the juice, I believe, men have even been known to ride alligators. P.g. Wodehouse

He was always in a sort of fever because he was dropping behind schedule with his daily acts of kindness. However hard he tried, he'd fall behind; and then you would find him prowling about the house, setting such a clip to try and catch up with himself that Easeby was rapidly becoming a perfect hell for man and beast. P.g. Wodehouse

I always advise people never to give advice. P.g. Wodehouse

It would take more than long-stemmed roses to change my view that you're a despicable cowardy custard and a disgrace to a proud family. Your ancestors fought in the Crusades and were often mentioned in despatches, and you cringe like a salted snail at the thought of appearing as Santa Claus before an audience of charming children who wouldn't hurt a fly. It's enough to make an aunt turn her face to the wall and give up the struggle. P.g. Wodehouse

She gave me another of those long keen looks, and I could see that she was again asking herself if her favourite nephew wasn't steeped to the tonsils in the juice of the grape. P.g. Wodehouse

I could still see that Pauline was one of the most beautiful girls I had ever met, but of the ancient fire which had caused me to bung my heart at her feet that night at the Plaza there remained not a trace. Analysing this, if analyzing is the word I want, I came to the conclusion that this changed outlook was due to the fact that she was so dashed dynamic. Unquestionably an eyeful, Pauline Stoker had the grave defect of being one of those girls who want you to come and swim a mile before breakfast and rout you out when you are trying to snatch a wink of sleep after lunch for a merry five sets of tennis. P.g. Wodehouse

Lord Emsworth belonged to the people-like-to-be-left-alone-to-amuse-themselves-when-they-come-to-a-place school of hosts P.g. Wodehouse

I suppose half the time Shakespeare just shoved down anything that came into his head. P.g. Wodehouse

Every author really wants to have letters printed in the paper. Unable to make the grade, he drops down a rung of the ladder and writes novels. P.g. Wodehouse

The ideal adventurer needs... the quality of not being content to mind his own affairs... P.g. Wodehouse

I’m not absolutely certain of my facts, but I rather fancy it’s Shakespeare–or, if not, it’s some equally brainy lad–who says that it’s always just when a chappie is feeling particularly top-hole, and more than usually braced with things in general that Fate sneaks up behind him with a bit of lead piping. P.g. Wodehouse

I spent the afternoon musing on Life. If you come to think of it, what a queer thing Life is! So unlike anything else, don't you know, if you see what I mean. At any moment you may be strolling peacefully along, and all the time Life's waiting around the corner to fetch you one. You can't tell when you may be going to get it. It's all dashed puzzling. Here was poor old George, as well-meaning a fellow as every stepped, getting swatted all over the ring by the hand of Fate. Why? That's what I asked myself. Just Life, don't you know. That's all there was about it. P.g. Wodehouse

You see, the catch about portrait painting– I've looked into the thing a bit– is that you can't startpainting portraits till people come along and ask you to, andthey won't come and ask you to until you've painted a lot first. This makes it kind of difficult for a chappie. P.g. Wodehouse

It isn't often that Aunt Dahlia lets her angry passions rise, but when she does, strong men climb trees and pull them up after them. P.g. Wodehouse

At a time when she was engaged to Stilton Cheesewright, I remember recording in the archives that she was tall and willowy with a terrific profile and luxuriant platinum blond-hair, the sort of girl who might, as far as looks were concerned, have been the star unit of the harem of one of the better-class sultans. P.g. Wodehouse

There was something sort of bleak about her tone, rather as if she had swallowed an east wind. This I took to be due to the fact that she probably hadn't breakfasted. It's only after a bit of breakfast that I'm able to regard the world with that sunny cheeriness which makes a fellow the universal favourite. I'm never much of a lad till I've engulfed an egg or two and a beaker of coffee." I suppose you haven't breakfasted?"" I have not yet breakfasted."" Won't you have an egg or something? Or a sausage or something? Or something?"" No, thank you." She spoke as if she belonged to an anti-sausage league or a league for the suppression of eggs. There was a bit of silence. P.g. Wodehouse

All political meetings are very much alike. Somebody gets up and introduces the speaker of the evening, and then the speaker of the evening says at great length what he thinks of the scandalous manner in which the Government is behaving or the iniquitous goings-on of the Opposition. From time to time confederates in the audience rise and ask carefully rehearsed questions, and are answered fully and satisfactorily by the orator. When a genuine heckler interrupts, the orator either ignores him, or says haughtily that he can find him arguments but cannot find him brains. Or, occasionally, when the question is an easy one, he answers it. A quietly conducted political meeting is one of England's most delightful indoor games. When the meeting is rowdy, the audience has more fun, but the speaker a good deal less. . P.g. Wodehouse

I am strongly of the opinion that, after the age of twenty-one, a man ought not to be out of bed and awake at four in the morning. The hour breeds thought. At twenty-one, life being all future, it may be examined with impunity. But, at thirty, having become an uncomfortable mixture of future and past, it is a thing to be looked at only when the sun is high and the world full of warmth and optimism. . P.g. Wodehouse

Into the face of the young man who sat on the terrace of the Hotel Magnifique at Cannes there had crept a look of furtive shame, the shifty hangdog look which announces that an Englishman is about to speak French. P.g. Wodehouse

[T]he success of every novel -- if it's a novel of action -- depends on the high spots. The thing to do is to say to yourself, "What are my big scenes?" and then get every drop of juice out of P.g. Wodehouse

It is the bungled crime that brings remorse. P.g. Wodehouse

If girls realized their responsibilities they would be so careful when they smiled that they would probably abandon the practice altogether. There are moments in a man's life when a girl's smile can have as important results as an explosion of dynamite. P.g. Wodehouse