[lit-ideas] Re: Wodehouse
- From: Carol Kirschenbaum <carolkir@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 25 Jun 2006 20:29:26 -0700
David wrote:
The only thing that British
> people registered--since they didn't hear the broadcast-- was the fact
> that P.G.W. had recorded a talk in Berlin and got out of jail as a result.
ck: I appreciate your reply, though I doubt that PG's exact political
stance, or naivete, would matter to a reader who wants his authors to be in
line with him politically, or else--the kind of reader my father was,
unfortunately. (More than reading. He quit, in a huff, having worked in
physics at Columbia University, as a young man in the 30s.) I try to avoid
knowing artists' biographical data, myself. The real-life details would
affect my feelings about the work itself, which usually doesn't enhance the
aesthetic experience. Such has been my experience, at any rate.
I wonder if the current tell-all atmosphere (globally enabled) has done away
with that always invisible yet credible line between fiction and
nonfictional accounts, in writing, to the reader's detriment and
displeasure. For the author...can go either way. (Believe me, I'm a con
artist.)
Carol K.,
cooling down to a mere 106 degrees...
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Ritchie" <ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, June 25, 2006 3:14 PM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Wodehouse
>
> On Jun 25, 2006, at 12:32 AM, Carol Kirschenbaum wrote:
>
>> *Was the Mufti the only person who supported Hitler at
>>> the time ? Ezra Pound did, too. What could this tell
>>> us about the American writers ?
>>>
>> ck: An aside, of course. I'm remembering my father. He had loved PG
>> Wodehouse, and then he learned about the author's politics, by accident.
>> That was it--no more Wodehouse for him. He couldn't read PG with good
>> humor
>> anymore. Ruined. I feel somewhat that way towards quite a number of
>> anti-Semitic American authors, Pound among them.
>
> We've had several go-rounds on this list about P.G. Wodehouse's time in
> Germany. Last year I read the two most recent biographies. I'm
> convinced, having finally read the text of what was broadcast, that
> Wodehouse's crime was having no sense of politics at all. He agreed to
> broadcast, thinking that people would listen to his account of prison
> life. He'd had a fairly harrowing time. The only thing that British
> people registered--since they didn't hear the broadcast-- was the fact
> that P.G.W. had recorded a talk in Berlin and got out of jail as a result.
>
> David Ritchie,
> Portland, Oregon
>
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