Rated P.G.: P.G. Wodehouse is certainly one of my favorite writers ever. I have probably been through the entire Jeeves and Wooster cannon twice. Unlike many other satirists of his time, he never had an ounce of disdain for his caricatures (although I suppose he was more of farceur than a satirist). He wrote something on the order of 90 books, all of them characterized by florid sentences and unmatched vocabulary. This article in Slate does a decent summary of his life from the standpoint of explaining him as really more American than British, despite his birth and the Edwardian Country House settings that he is known for. Best line: "He himself liked to characterize his work as 'a sort of musical comedy without music.' " That about says it all.

I don't want to give the impression that you should run out and read P.G. It's hard for many people to get past the extraordinary Englishness of Jeeves and Wooster. And let's face it, a comedy of manners is not something that plays well to an audience with South Park sensibilities. On the other hand, a sharp observer would see the close relationship between Wodehouse and Seinfeld. The comedy is all based on the desire to follow social norms, whether they be real or imagined, and how doing this leads to complications and embarrassing farce. (Now there's a good topic for an essay.)

If you're curious about P.G. Wodehouse and you don't want to dig into the print, I highly recommend the Masterpiece Theatre serializations starring Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie. They are spot-on perfect.