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Heil Wodehouse?
Pelham
Grenville Wodehouse, Plum to his friends, was born in 1881 in Guilford,
England. After graduating from Dulwich
College, Wodehouse was unable to attend university owing to a turn in the
family finances. Instead he was forced
to take a job at the London branch of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. It was a job for which he was very ill
suited. So he turned to writing. In his
lifetime, he wrote over 90 books, numerous short stories, several plays and
musicals, the lyrics to dozens of songs, and even a few film scripts. He was hailed by his fellow writers as a
true master of his craft, and his fans hold him to be the greatest comic writer
of the 20th Century. Still,
his history is not without its dark side.
In the
late 1930s, Wodehouse and his wife were living in the town of Le Touquet,
France. They were still there when the
town was captured by the German army in 1940.
Wodehouse was sent to a series of internment camps, but was released on
June 21, 1941. He then made five broadcasts
from Berlin to America over the Nazi radio.
When the British public heard of this, they were outraged. Without even hearing the broadcasts, many
people called Wodehouse a traitor, a quisling, another “Lord Haw-Haw,” and a
Nazi sympathizer. Even today, many
people in Britain and elsewhere still believe Wodehouse betrayed his country,
but is it true? Could the kind-hearted
creator of Bertie Wooster and his manservant Jeeves really be a traitor?
The
charges made against Wodehouse in his lifetime are as follows: he and his wife
stayed in Le Touquet and did not attempt to escape; they entertained Germans in
their home in Le Touquet and later in hotels in Berlin and Paris; Wodehouse was
a Nazi sympathizer; he had collaborated with his German captors while interned;
he was released from his internment on the promise of doing Nazi propaganda; he
had broadcast the aforementioned propaganda; and he was put up in luxurious
hotels by the German throughout the remainder of the war (War 9). In 1999 new charges were laid in various
newspapers that he had been paid a monthly salary by the Germans equivalent in
modern currency to $5,600 (“Wodehouse Paid”).
The charge
of the Wodehouses having stayed in Le Touquet and not having attempted to
escape is not entirely true. The
Wodehouses did remain in Le Touquet, but so did many others (War
40). The Wodehouses’ reasons for
staying were threefold. To begin with,
they had made arrangements with the British Vice-Consul in Boulogne to give
them advance warning if it should be necessary to flee, but they were not given
such notice due to an underestimation of the rate of the German advance. Also, there were very strict laws regarding
the transportation of animals at the time, and the Wodehouses did not want
their Pekinese, Wonder, to have to go through the required six month
quarantine. Finally, they, like many
others who remained, believed fleeing would show a cowardly lack of faith in
the ability of the British troops to hold back the Germans (Society par. 5). It
is also important to remember that the Wodehouses did make two escape attempts
just before the German occupation, but they were foiled by car troubles on both
occasions(Cuessin 150).
The second
charge of having entertained Germans is completely false, and stems in large
part from a misinterpretation of one of Wodehouse’s broadcasts. In his first broadcast, Wodehouse said,
“there was scarcely an evening when two or three of them [the Germans] did not
drop in for a bath at my house and a beaming party on the porch afterwards”
(108). This of course led people to
believe Wodehouse had invited them in and was at the party with them. In fact, Wodehouse’s bathroom was
commandeered by German Labor Corps workers (War 43), and the reference
to a party was just a joke. Other than
this, there is no record of the Wodehouses having any Germans inside his house.
The charge
that Wodehouse was a Nazi sympathizer is also false. Just before his capture, Wodehouse burned some anti-German
writings at his wife’s insistence. If
these had not been destroyed, definite evidence would exist that Wodehouse was
not a Nazi sympathizer (War 43-4).
As it stands, none of Wodehouse’s writings directly show he was not
pro-Nazi, except possibly his short story “Buried Treasure,” in which he makes
some facetious comments about Hitler’s moustache(545). Still, there is strong evidence he was
anti-fascist. In his book The Code
of the Woosters, he wrote a very prominent anti-fascist passage. In it, Bertie Wooster is telling off the would-be
fascist Roderick Spode:
The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of half-wits to disfigure the London scene by going about in black shorts, you think you’re someone. You hear them shouting ‘Heil Spode!’ and you imagine it is the Voice of the People. That is where you make your bloomer. What the Voice of the People is saying is, ‘Look at that frightful ass Spode swanking about in footer bags! Did you ever in your puff see such a perfect perisher? (111-2; ch. 7)
The charge
of having collaborated with the Germans while interned is, perhaps, the hardest
to disprove. Major E. P. Cussen, who investigated the matter for MI5, listed
various rumors about Wodehouse from some of his fellow internees at Tost. They largely amounted to allegations that he
had offered his services to the Germans and that he had edited a pro-German
paper called The Camp. Wodehouse
replied that he had not offered his services to the Germans, and he did not
edit any paper for the Germans, but The Camp did contain a parody of his
works, written by someone who signed himself P. G. Roadhouse, which probably
accounted for that particular misunderstanding (152). Also, Wodehouse did condense one of his previously published
short stories for a newspaper of irreproachable British patriotism produced by
the prisoners in the internment camp at Tost called the Tost Times (War
46).
The charge
that Wodehouse was released on the promise of doing Nazi propaganda is
ludicrous. It was standard practice at
the time for the Germans to release prisoners at the age of 60, and Wodehouse
was released shortly before his 60th birthday (Plum 90). He was released a few months early because
the German Foreign Office believed doing so would pacify the Americans, who had
been demanding his release, and thereby delay America’s entry into World War
Two (War 62-5). In any case,
Wodehouse did not broadcast pro-Nazi propaganda. No one who heard the broadcasts or read their transcripts could
find any trace of pro-Nazi sentiment in them.
In fact, the American forces later used the broadcasts as examples of
anti-Nazi propaganda (“Persecution”).
Wodehouse was later asked to make further broadcasts, which would have
been propaganda, but he angrily refused (War 67-8).
The final
charge made during Wodehouse’s lifetime of his having lived a life of luxury
paid for by the Germans is also untrue.
The Wodehouses did stay in the luxurious Hotel Adlon, because they were
forced to do so, but they paid for it by themselves (War 72-3). The
money came from a variety of sources: the sale of Mrs. Wodehouse’s jewelry,
loans from friends, the sale of the movie rights from one of Wodehouse’s novels
to a Berlin film company, and from the sale of a short story to a French
newspaper. (“Innocence” 15). During
this time, they were forced to live simply and frugally owing to a lack of
funds. (War 72-3).
The more
recent charge, of Wodehouse having been paid by the Germans, is susceptible to
ready explanation. Wodehouse was given
580,00 French franks in October of 1943, which was in fact part of Wodehouse’s
own money, which the Germans had been holding.
In September of 1944, they were given an additional 560,000 franks,
which was the rest of their money held by the Germans. Finally, in June, July, and August of 1944,
Wodehouse was given a grad total of 300,000 franks, which were royalties from
his Spanish publisher that had to be paid through the Germans (“Innocence” 15).
Though all
the charges against Wodehouse can be dismissed, three questions still
remain. If Wodehouse was no Nazi
sympathizer, why did he make the broadcasts?
If the broadcasts were so innocuous, what caused the uproar in Britain? And, if he was innocent, why did neither he,
nor the British government make any serious attempt to establish his
innocence? These questions though more
complicated, are also answerable.
As to why
Wodehouse made the broadcasts, Ian Hay, a fellow writer and friend of
Wodehouse, wrote in a letter to the Daily Telegraph Wodehouse “is an
easy-going and kindly man, cut off from public opinion here … and he probably
broadcast because he saw no harm in the idea” (qtd. In War 16).
Wodehouse’s American fans had sent him numerous letters and food parcels, and
he had wanted to thank them and to know he was all right. While interred, he was not allowed to write
to anyone other than family, and this seemed to him to be a good way to get
word to his fans (Society paras. 10, 14).
Wodehouse had no way of knowing what kind of trouble the broadcasts
would bring him; he had spent the last year in an internment camp, and had no
way of knowing of the German atrocities, or current British public sentiment (War
50).
However,
not all of the British anti-Wodehouse sentiment was caused by the Berlin broadcasts;
some of it was caused by an interview Wodehouse gave to Henry W. Flannery, a
correspondent for CBS (War 55).
In it, Wodehouse said, “I’m living here at the Adlon – have a suite on
the third floor, a very nice one, too – and I come and go as I please.” He also said, “I’m wondering whether the
kind of people and the kind of England, I write about will live after the war –
whether England wins or not, I mean” (qtd. in War 56). These statements made it look as if, among
other things, Wodehouse was living in freedom and luxury in the enemy capital,
and as if he doubted the ability of Britain to win the war (War
56). In reality, the entire text of the
interview had been written by Flannery, and owing to his trusting nature,
Wodehouse read exactly what Flannery had written (War 58). Flannery of course, had written the script
with the intention of discrediting Wodehouse, because Flannery was vehemently
anti-Nazi, and believed Wodehouse to be “half-dupe and half-traitor” (War
57). Flannery later wrote a book
entitled Assignment to Berlin in which he openly accused Wodehouse of
having bought his freedom by making the broadcasts. The book itself has since been discredited, and Wodehouse himself
once wrote there is “not a word of truth in it” (Plum 92).
This was
not the first time Wodehouse’s trusting nature had led him to make incautious
statements, which led to trouble. In
1931, Wodehouse had a contract in Hollywood.
After it expired, he gave an interview to the Los Angeles Times
in which he said how nice it was he had been paid $2000 a week, but it was a
shame they hadn’t been able to use any of the stuff he had written. This caused the bankers who owned Hollywood
to push for reform in the film industry.
It also very nearly resulted in Wodehouse getting blacklisted from
Hollywood (Plum 128-9).
A good
part of the furor actually raised by the Berlin broadcasts was no doubt caused
by the BBC. At that time, the BBC had
an unsurpassed reputation for broadcasting the truth (War 12). However, on July 15, 1941 the BBC broadcast
a Postscript to its news broadcast by one William Connor, a newspaper columnist
who wrote for the Daily Mirror under the pseudonym of “Cassandra.” This broadcast was forced on the BBC by
the Duff Cooper’s Ministry of Information, Britain’s department of
propaganda. Still, as it was carried by
the BBC, it was given the same credibility as any of their factual broadcasts
would have been given (War 33). In it, Connor called Wodehouse a rich
playboy who had remained in Le Touquet to gamble, and was throwing a cocktail
party when the Germans arrested him.
Connor also claimed Wodehouse had bought his freedom by making the
broadcasts, and compared him to Judas (War 12-13). Despite the BBC’s innocence in the
“Cassandra” broadcast, they added further fire to the attacks against Wodehouse
by banning all his works, including his song lyrics, from broadcast (War
34).
In his
essay “In Defense of P. G. Wodehouse,” George Orwell attributed some of the
outcry to an ideological conflict. At
that time, there were strong left-wing sentiments among the British populace at
that time. The upper classes had been
to some degree discredited by pre-War appeasement polices. This caused many people to feel that the
rich were treacherous, and Wodehouse was a rich man. While he was rich, as a writer he was not politically powerful,
so he made an ideal target for those with left-wing sentiment (354). This theory seems to be born out by a letter
written to the London Times by Connor:
The readers of the Daily
Mirror are not yours, but as a sample of general public opinion they are far
more reliable than any mass readership index to which The Times may lay
claim. By pure reasons of circulation
they come from a representative slice of the community which outnumbers your
readership by 10 to 1. The people who
approve of what I said about P. G. Wodehouse are pre-eminently among the vast
masses of fighting men, factory workers, miners, and the ordinary common people
who are carrying the burden of this war. (qtd. in War 27)
It is
interesting to note that Connor eventually became convinced of Wodehouse’s
innocence, and was the only one of his detractors to apologize after the war (War
36). Wodehouse was cleared by the
French government (Plum 106-6), and Major Cussen, while investigating
the case for the British government, found no evidence of guilt (War
45). So, why did the British government
never publicly clear Wodehouse’s name, and why was Major Cussen’s file kept
secret until 1980? Wodehouse felt it was
probable the British government remained silent because if it admitted it was
wrong, it would open itself to a lawsuit (Plum 107).
In his
book Wodehouse at War, Ian Sproat came up with two different reasons for
the British government’s continuing silence.
Sproat at first had trouble getting a look at Major Cussen’s
report. He began to suspect the report
contained another name, which the government wished to keep secret. Sproat was unable to get a look at the
documents until he suggested the other name be blanked out. When he finally obtained the report, he
found that the name of another internee who had been released at the same time
as Wodehouse was the only thing missing.
Sproat was unsure as to whether this was an attempt to cover up the
treachery of this unknown individual, or just incompetence (103-4). Sproat also believed the information might
have been kept secret because departments of the British government tend to
stick together, and none of them wished to release any information they felt
could potentially make another department look bad (104).
Although
the British government remained silent, Wodehouse did make a few minor attempts
to clear his own name. While still
living in Germany, Wodehouse made three attempts to get the German government
to allow him to return home to explain his actions, but was refused because the
German Ministry of Propaganda felt his remaining in Germany made good
propaganda (War 70). Afterwards,
he made a few small attempts to clear his name by giving interviews, writing
letters to friendly publications, and allowing a friend to publish some of his
letters on the subject, but this was not enough (War 82-91).
The reason
Wodehouse made no further attempts to clear himself is probably because
Wodehouse was advised by Cussen and his publishers to remain silent on the
matter (War 92). These events
were very unpleasant for Wodehouse. He disliked getting himself involved in
unpleasant situations, and he knew that trying to clear his name would only
cause more unpleasantness (War 96).
With no
one pushing Wodehouse to prove his innocence, it is not surprising he made no
great attempt to clear himself. It
required the careful prodding of his friends or his wife to get Wodehouse to
undertake an unpleasant task. This is
rather well demonstrated by the incidents surrounding the song “Bill.” Wodehouse had originally written the song’s
lyrics in 1917 for the musical Oh, Lady, but they were subsequently cut
from the show. Later Jerry Kern, who
had written the musical score for the song, asked Wodehouse for permission to
use the song in the musical Show Boat, and Wodehouse said yes. Oscar Hammerstein, who did the lyrics for
the rest of the songs in Show Boat, changed “about three words,” claimed
part ownership, and got half the royalties for twenty years. Wodehouse himself never pressed the
matter. Guy Bolton, Wodehouse’s friend
and the writer of the book for Oh, Lady, had been given half of
Wodehouse’s royalties for the lyrics in exchange for half the royalties from
the book. Bolton made a fuss, which
caused Hammerstein to relinquish all rights to the song and give them $5,000 in
back payments (Plum 204-5).
A careful
study of the facts shows P. G. Wodehouse was not a traitor. He did not broadcast propaganda for the
Nazis. He was in no way sympathetic to
the ideologies of Nazism or fascism. He
was just an amiable and overly trusting man who was deceived into making
several incautious statements. These
statements were then blown out of all proportion by war-time paranoia and the
human need to find a scapegoat in times of crisis. The incident caused such ill feeling that Wodehouse never set
foot in England again. Still, though he
was never expressly cleared by the British government, there is one fact which
shows they eventually came to believe his innocence; in 1975, just before his
death, he was knighted. It is highly
doubtful that the British government would give the honor of knighthood to
anyone it seriously believed to be a traitor.
Though many people in Britain and elsewhere still believe his guilt, the works of P. G. Wodehouse are still enjoyed by thousands of readers worldwide, including the British Queen Mother. There are societies celebrating his works in the United States, the United Kingdom, India, the Netherlands, Russia, and other countries as well. Many of his books are still in print even 25 years after his death. Many of the great writers of the 20th Century, such as Douglas Adams, Isaac Asimov, Sax Rohmer, and George Orwell, have enjoyed and been influenced by his works. His Jeeves and Wooster saga is considered by some to be the 20th century English literature’s central achievement. Despite his follies, Wodehouse was, and still is, one of the greatest writers of the 20th century.
Cussen, E. P.
“Appendix Eight: Report by Major Cussen on behalf of M.I.5 and the
Home
Office.” Wodehouse at War. New York: Ticknor & Fields,
1981.
147-67.
Hall Jr., Robert A.
“The Persecution of P. G. Wodehouse.”
Journal of Historical Review
7.3:
345-51. Internet. http://www.vho.org/GB/Journals/JHR/7/3/Hall345-351.html (20 October
2000)
Orwell, George. “In Defense of P. G.
Wodehouse.” The Collected Essays,
Journalism,
and
Letters of George Orwell 3. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1968
“P. G. Wodehouse Paid by German Nazis.” United Press International. 17 September
1999.
P. G. Wodehouse Society (UK). “Information Sheet 10: Wodehouse’s Actions
During
the War
– Put in Context.” P. G. Wodehouse
Society (UK) Web Site. June 2000.
http://www.eclipse.co.uk/wodehouse/info_sheet_10.htm
(20 October 2000)
Sproat, Ian.
“In All Innocence: The Truth about P. G. Wodehouse and the Nazis.” Times
Literary
Supplement 29 October 1999: 14-15
---. Wodehouse at War. New York: Ticknor
& Fields, 1981
Wodehouse, Pelham Grenville. “Appendix One: The Berlin Broadcasts.” Wodehouse
at
War.
New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1981. 102-28.
---. “Buried Treasure.” The World of Mr. Mulliner. New York: Taplinger, 1972
---. Code
of the Woosters. New York: Vintage,
1975. 545-59.
---. Yours
Plum: The Letters of P. G. Wodehouse. Ed. Frances Donaldson. New York:
Heineman, 1990