Saturday, November 12, 2022

"Had circumstances been different..."

Selected quotations from Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit:
  • As I presented myself, she gave the moustache a swift glance, but apart from starting like a nymph surprised while bathing and muttering something about ‘Was this the face that stopped a thousand clocks?’ made no comment.
  • He gave me a long, reproachful look, similar in its essentials to that which a black beetle gives a cook when the latter is sprinkling insect powder on it.
  • ‘Then I’m all for it,’ said Aunt Dahlia, making for the door. Her face was grim and set. She might have been a marquise about to hop into the tumbril at the time when there was all that unpleasantness over in France.
  • I spread the hands in a dignified gesture, upsetting the coffee pot, which was fortunately empty.
  • It is at moments like this that you catch Bertram Wooster at his superb best, his ice-cold brain working like a machine.
  • ‘Oh, Bertie, if I ever called you a brainless poop who ought to be given a scholarship at some good lunatic asylum, I take back the words.’ I thanked her briefly.
  • Had circumstances been different from what they were – not, of course, that they ever are…
  • [Bertie] ‘If I am to stave off the Cheesewright challenge, I shall have need of a weapon. His strength is as the strength of ten, and unarmed I should be corn before his sickle.’ [Jeeves] ‘Extremely well put, sir, if I may say so, and your diagnosis of the situation is perfectly accurate. Mr Cheesewright’s robustness would enable him to crush you like a fly.’ [Bertie] ‘Exactly.’ [Jeeves] ‘He would obliterate you with a single blow. He would break you in two with his bare hands. He would tear you limb from limb.’ I frowned slightly. I was glad to see that he appreciated the gravity of the situation, but these crude physical details seemed to me uncalled for.
Leigh Turner, "Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit: 20 delicious quotations," May 12, 2018.

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