ISBN: 0140059024
"What," inquired a Ginseng cola, "are the works of P.G. Wodehouse doing in a bookstore that supposedly is entirely devoted to issues of sustainability?"
"'Squite natural, really" intoned a Wheatgrass Frappe. "Wodehouse is a remedy that can be prescribed for any number of maladies."
A Blackberry Kefir with extra acidophilus answered. "It has been well said that 'If it's not fun, it's not sustainable'. It follows then that anything as fun and as funny as Wodehouse's writings must therefore be sustainable."
An Odwalla Earth Green Smoothie begged to differ. "You're not being logical at all. If Not-P implies Not-Q, then--"
"Kefir is quite correct." quoth Mr. Mulliner, a regular at the Grateful Compost Juice Bar. He sipped his Genesis organic carrot for effect, as was his custom during happy hour. "Wodehouse is nothing if not sustainable. The old bird did, after all, dash the stuff off by the ream, with a manual typewriter no less, for nigh on seventy years before he returned to the dust. Some may dismiss his longevity as a genetic fluke, but I am convinced that it was the lightness of his comic wit that preserved him to the ripe old age of ninety-three. As proof, I would have you consider the history of my nephew's father-in-law..."
What can I say? Warriors of sustainability must keep in touch with what it is in life that is worth fighting so hard to preserve or risk succumbing to joylessness. Bertie and Jeeves' tiffs about correct apparel for a proper English gentleman, Lord Emsworthy's preoccupation with the care of pigs, The innocence of the pre WWI era and the English countryside, Mr. Mulliner's storytelling-- These are a few of my favorite literary devices from Wodehouse. They keep me laughing and I hope you may find them as worthwhile as I do.
-mb
