The Music of the Spheres - Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett was a master of the art of British comedy. What's more: he was one of the great fantasy novelists and satirists of the 20th Century. In being all these things, he is - at least in America - often unfairly overshadowed by specialists in each. He created a famous black-haired, bespectacled young wizard who goes to a school in a castle, and then a young upstart came along and stole his thunder. A successor to Monty Python and P.G. Wodehouse, a contemporary of Douglas Adams, he was a bit more serious than any of them. The breadth of his invention rivaled Dickens, but then, he wasn't Dickens. And of course, Pratchett was far too funny to be taken seriously as a satirist.

Happy Birthday, P.G. Wodehouse

I grew up watching Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie as, respectively, omniscient valet Reginald Jeeves and spineless but eloquent aristocrat Bertie Wooster. Wodehouse's books, while light weights, are a beautiful example of meticulous attention to excellence. Yes, they're romantic comedies, but they're the best romantic comedies you'll ever read. The father of modern comics like Terry Pratchett and Stephen Fry, and continuing the grand tradition of G.K. Chesterton and Jerome K. Jerome, Wodehouse was one of the funniest men to have ever lived.

I'm perfectly aware that I'm a day late. I'm also very ashamed of myself for not having a post prepared.

In penance, I hereto link to two excellent posts on P.G. Wodehouse. The first is for the new initiates:

"Simply put, Wodehouse is a black belt metaphor ninja."
Who Is P.G. Wodehouse, and Why Should It Matter to Us? - by Douglas Wilson

This is more in-depth, and if you have a sweet tooth for philosophy...

"The best answer to Friedrich Nietzsche we've managed yet to come up with is the prose of P.G. Wodehouse."  
God & Bertie Wooster - by Joseph Bottum

And these are also superb:

Jeeves and Wooster - Episode 1 - "Jeeves Takes Charge"

Enjoy.

Longish