Patricia T O'Conner
The Ghost of Christmas Presents Past
P G Wodehouse & the Art of Regifting
Remember that P G Wodehouse story where Jeeves shimmers into the presence on Christmas morning in a Santa suit, waking Bertie with a steaming cup and a sonorous ‘What ho-ho-ho, sir! God bless us, everyone’?
Neither do I. Never happened. As seasons go, Yuletide did not recommend itself to Wodehouse. His favourite carol, he once said, was ‘Christmas Comes But Once a Year’. He tended to write not about Christmas, but around it.
Maybe that’s one reason I find myself binge-reading him as Christmas hoves into view. The whole seasonal ballyhoo, the gift racket in particular, taxes the equilibrium, and Wodehouse has a calming effect, soothes the fevered brow, knits up the ravell’d nerve.
But while the holiday season does
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