WODEHOUSE, P.G. Uncle Fred in the Springtime.

Countering Diet Plan for Prize Pig

WODEHOUSE, P.G. Uncle Fred in the Springtime. Garden City: Doubleday, Doran & Co. 1939.

8vo. Publisher’s green cloth, lettered and decorated in brown to spine, top-edge green, fore-edge untrimmed, illustrated dust-jacket by ‘Peggy Bacon’ priced at $2.00 to front flap with publisher’s codes (‘2914–39’, ‘3026–38’ and ‘687–39’) as called for by McIlvaine; pp. [8], 292; small closed tears to jacket spine ends repaired with tape to verso, creasing of jacket spine ends, otherwise jacket remains bright, pushing to spine ends with slight discolouration of cloth to edges, minor offsetting to endpapers, otherwise internally clean; very good.

First edition in book form, first printing of the fifth full-length novel in Wodehouse’s Blandings Castle series.

Lord Emsworth is desperate to protect his prize-winning pig, the Empress of Blandings, from the slimming plans of the Duke of Dunstable. To keep her safe, Emsworth calls upon Uncle Fred to come to Blandings Castle and secretly ‘steal’ the pig to keep her safe. Meanwhile, Pongo, Fred’s nephew, is sinking deeper into gambling debt, while Horace Davenport finds himself in trouble with his fiancee. Luckily for both, Uncle Fred’s charming chaos arrives just in time to turn their fortunes around.

The story was first serialised in America in The Saturday Evening Post from 22 April to 27 May 1939, and was illustrated by James Williamson. It was first published in book form in the US on 18 August 1939, and the UK edition followed seven days later on 25 August.

Mcllvaine A6la.

SKU: 2126254