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<p/><br></br><p><b> About the Book </b></p></br></br>He had an extraordinary Broadway career, wrote 90 novels and story collections, and among his immortal characters are Jeeves and the Empress of Blandings. McCrum's magisterial biography chronicles the achievements and shadows of a gilded life.<p/><br></br><p><b> Book Synopsis </b></p></br></br>To Evelyn Waugh he was simply "the Master." He wrote ninety novels and story collections, and among his immortal characters are Jeeves, Psmith, and the Empress of Blandings (who is, of course, a pig). Equally impressive is the range of his devotees: Dorothy Parker, John Updike, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Salman Rushdie, John le Carre, and Seamus Heaney. Wodehouse had an extraordinary Broadway career, working with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, and even dared to rewrite Cole Porter's Anything Goes for the London stage. Robert McCrum's magisterial biography chronicles the achievements and shadows of a gilded life. The ill-judged broadcasts from Berlin, where Wodehouse was interned during World War II, produced a violent backlash in England and tarred him, unfairly, as a Nazi sympathizer. His long love affair with America was compromised by endless acrimony with the IRS. This is the book all Wodehouse fans have been waiting for; it eclipses all previous accounts of his life. An Economist Best Book of 2004.<p/><br></br><p><b> Review Quotes </b></p></br></br><br>[An] absorbing and generous biography, which now takes its rightful place as 'the life.'--Christopher Buckley "Los Angeles Times Book Review"<br><br>For as long as P.G. Wodehouse is read, this will be the seminal work of reference, the indispensable <em>vade mecum</em>. In other words--as the Master might say--'ripping.'--John le Carré<br><br>McCrum . . . has written a biography that, if the subject were a general or a politician, would be dubbed 'magisterial.' This is a magisterial biography: disinterested, but never detached, and always intriguing. Under the kindly and scholarly tutelage of McCrum, you might want to explore here the Wodehouse genius, the inconsistencies and downright silliness in the man's life.--Frank McCourt "Globe and Mail"<br><br>This book is a triumph. Not only should all P. G. Wodehouse fans read it, but it is a masterly picture of twentieth-century history.--A. N. Wilson<br>

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