A Bunny of Sorts

[lifeisame.livejournal.com]

On the somewhat SERIOUS lines of fanfic:

Something that bothers me late at night is the thought of the time period J and W live in. Pretty soon the depression hits in the US, and I know England didn't suffer nearly as hard, but I wonder how they got by with that? And then of course, the scariest thing is WWII!! (and my knowledge of London life during this time is really limited to what I remember from high school history. Which isn't much.)

I mean, did Wooster have the money to avoid the military? Or did Jeeves for that matter? Or did Jeeves manage to get them both out of it? *fret fret* I'm pretty sure there's ample slash opportunities either way.

>_> These things keep me up at night. LOL, it doesn't make a very good plot bunny for me, but I figured I'd post these disturbing ideas here, in case someone else gets a bite.

I think waaaaaaaaaay to much into historical fiction and real history.

Comments

[peak-in-darien.livejournal.com]

As poisonivory says, those kinds of things don't exist in Wodehouse's fiction. One of the Wodehouse biographies I was reading (can't remember the author I'm afraid) said as much, too. He just wrote in his own happy, wonderfully eloquent little universe.

[derien.livejournal.com]

Several people have said that bad things just don't happen in the Wodehouse universe, but I'm not quite sure it's all of the Wodehouse universe. Psmith encounters tenement buildings, and is appalled by them and sets out to improve the street he saw. (Specifically only the street he saw - that's biting off a big bite, but Psmith never bites off more than he can chew.) "Psmith, Journalist" was written, I believe, before - perhaps well before - the Jeeves and Wooster stories. My guess is that Wodehouse hated suffering far too much to be able to deal with it in his fictional worlds, and perfected the Wooster universe as an escapist place.

[tootsiemuppet.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm not so sure about nothing bad happening in Plum universe, either. I always got the impression everything HAD happened, but that either because it waas just glossed over, or because of the circles Bertie just happened to be in, you never really got more than glimpses of it. Jeeves makes a couple of references, though, and some trouble among Bertie's friends is that the money they were used to having isn't there anymore. And what was that last book where Jeeves went to work for someone else (Lord Towcester? Rowcester?) and Bertie having to learn to stand on his own two feet.

Poor him. Like that'd ever work.

[derien.livejournal.com]

Lord Towcester, but someone did misspell it in a fic as Rowcester, I'm not sure why.

And in my fic off that story I had it that he really couldn't make that work, but I had it be a bad fight between them that caused him to do that, not lack of money.

[tootsiemuppet.livejournal.com]

Apparently it's not a misspelling. In the American edition, it's Towcester, in Britain it's Rowcester. What fic was that? Did I miss it?!

[derien.livejournal.com]

On Bended Knee - you commented on it, you didn't miss it. :)

http://www.livejournal.com/community/indeedsir/28798.html

[derien.livejournal.com]

And how bizarre! I wonder why they would change the spelling of the name in the different editions!

[derien.livejournal.com]

I mean, yeah, Bertie couldn't make it work to learn to stand on his own two feet. Although I'd like to think he could actually do a few basic things, it'd mainly be that he just can't keep ahead of it all, and he'd miss Jeeves too much.

(Jeeves would certainly go back to him without there being any money to pay him.)

[tootsiemuppet.livejournal.com]

Jeeves wouldn't leave Bertie for the world. He's far too attached to the man and he knows it.

Ah, Jeeves, how I love your extreme devotion.
Not imagining master/servant games in the bedroom. Of course not. Nooo.

[derien.livejournal.com]

Of course not, not after the nice, wholesome and non-kinky bit of fic I just sent you to beta, not at all.

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

*nod* That's a good point. Psmith and his socialist ideals, odd as they are, do represent some sort of acknowledgement of badness, I suppose.

Of course, one could also argue that everything seems to work out right, even in Psmith...he fixes his little street. He and Mike out of the finance rat-race and go to university. Psmith cuts ties with his father, goes for the ridiculous move of taking out an ad in the paper advertising that he'll do anything he's hired to do by anyone, and somehow makes it work through sheer ingenuity.

It's quite a lovely sentiment, actually. Even though there's suffering in the world, things can still come out right, even if it's just one street. *sigh*

Of course, the Wooster universe isn't free from suffering -- what with all the botched engagements and domineering aunts -- it's just that in comparison to the catastrophic upheavals that history shows us, Bertie's problems seem so trivial. I daresay they mean the world to Bertie.

Oh, to have such problems.

[peak-in-darien.livejournal.com]

I suppose one could say that those kinds of things do exist, but are usually used for comic purposes. One example I usually think of is Roderick Spode being referenced as a "dictator" and all the dictator-related jokes.

Psmith's street is the only exception I can recall... (and I think Wodehouse got a bit more social in that book, the whole American gangland thing...).