Blandings Castle and Elsewhere / Lord Emsworth and Others

Blandings Castle and Elsewhere ("and Elsewhere" is integral to the title, though for some reason those words never make it onto the cover) is one of Wodehouse's best short story collections and was first published in 1935.

The copy I am using was printed in 1988, hence the slightly ugly printing of Wodehouse's name which replaced the arched version earlier in the 1980s. Ionicus's design had however been published in 1971 with the Wodehouse arch. Lord Emsworth is a little plumper than usual, and the policeman is very baby-faced, but the illustration serves its purpose well in showing a dramatic moment in the first story.

The Penguin edition was first published in 1954, and the type is Monotype Garamond:

Only the first half of the book is taken up with Blandings stories; there is also an entertaining farce starring Bobbie Wickham followed by five tales of the Mulliners in Hollywood, classic depictions of that mad clime.

Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) is an even more varied selection of stories, including a Mulliner tale, a Drones Club yarn, three golf stories and three concerning that man of wrath, Ukridge; but the undoubted star is the one that comes first, "The Crime Wave at Blandings", one of the best things Wodehouse ever wrote and the inspiration for the wonderful Ionicus cover.

I am no artist, but even I can see the exquisite cunning in the design, allowing us to see the Library, the Lord, the gun and the target all together in one glance. Everything is right. Lord Emsworth, casting aside his beloved Whiffle on The Care of the Pig, has taken up the air rifle, and the Efficient Baxter, stooping to pick up a careless cigarette butt, presents too great a temptation. Strictly speaking, perspective tells us that Lord Emsworth is actually aiming some way to Baxter's right; but as I have examined this cover for over thirty years and the thought has only just occurred to me now, we needn't get too bogged down by that.

The title was first published in Penguin in 1966, and the Ionicus cover is from 1973. The type is the no-nonsense Linotype Times:

The Blandings short stories, which he called "short snorts in between the solid orgies", allowed him to develop the Castle's world. It was in "Pig-hoo-o-o-o-ey!" that Wodehouse discovered Lord Emsworth's obsession with his prize sow, Empress of Blandings; in these stories Lord Emsworth emerges as a woolly-minded hero in his own right. "The Crime Wave at Blandings", twice the length of a normal Wodehouse short story, and almost a little novella, is really the missing link between Heavy Weather (1933) and Uncle Fred in the Springtime (1939).

That's all I have to say, except that if you haven't read these stories, not only the Blandings ones but the Others and the Elsewheres, you really should.