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I quite enjoyed this book. A very pleasant aspect of it was the way the narrator varied his tone throughout the various episodes. Sometimes. As with Mr Smith there was an appreciation of the sheer audacity of Smith’s exuberant projects combined with a delighted humour at his limitations (which no one noticed). Thus, he used French in his caff because it was the thing to do—no one was expected to actually know what the words meant.
There’s a lot of gentle fun following the adventures of Pupkin and his romance with Zena Pepperleigh. But the tone changes to a barely restrained contempt when dealing with her father Judge Pepperleigh and his horrible son the lazy, drunken, violent bully, Neil.
The judge himself apparently abuses his wife and violates his office when his son is tried for an egregious assault:
“My boy, you are innocent. You smashed in Peter McGinnis’s face, but you did it without criminal intent. You put a face on him, by Jehoshaphat! that he won’t lose for six months, but you did it without evil purpose or malign design. My boy, look up! Give me your hand! You leave this court without a stain upon your name.”
Apparently the judge is blind to all of his son’s faults. Despite all this the narrator does soften things just a bit at Neil’s fate:
“But the judge never knew, and now he never will. For if you could find it in the meanness of your soul to tell him, it would serve no purpose now except to break his heart, and there would rise up to rebuke you the pictured vision of an untended grave somewhere in the great silences of South Africa.“
There is a more gentle if not quite sympathetic approach to the failings of Dean Drone and Jefferson Thorpe.
I think it is this mix of feeling that makes the book so appealing—it is no nostalgic trip up memory lane. One is perhaps reminded of Mark Twain in spots though that author is frequently more acerbic than gentle.
I wouldn’t mind browsing through this little book again from time to time.
Thanks for nominating it Victoria.
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