WODEHOUSE, P.G. Young Men in Spats.

With Two Stories Omitted from the US Edition

WODEHOUSE, P.G. Young Men in Spats. London: Herbert Jenkins Limited. 1936.

8vo. Publisher’s teal cloth, lettered and decorated in black to boards and spine, top-edge green, illustrated dust-jacket by Gilbert Wilkinson priced at 7/6 to spine; pp. 312, [8 (publisher’s advertisements)]; dust-jacket with chips to corners of flaps, wear to edges, three amateur tape repairs to verso of dust-jacket spine folds, slight warping to boards, a few spots to edges of textblock; slight offsetting and light spotting to endpapers, contemporary gift inscription to front free endpaper; otherwise a very good copy.

First edition in book form, first printing of a collection of eleven stories recounting the adventures of the Drones Club set, featuring familiar Wodehouse characters such as Mr Mulliner and Freddie Widgeon.

The Drones Club was modelled on Buck’s Club in Mayfair, founded in 1919 by young officers after the First World War. The term ‘drone’, referring to a male bee that does no work and lives off others, neatly captured the stereotype of wealthy, idle young gentlemen of the post-war era.

These stories were first serialised in the UK in various issues of The Strand in May 1931 and between March 1934 to April 1936. In the US, they appeared in Cosmopolitan, The Red Book, and This Week from 1933 to 1936. They were first collected in book form in the UK on 3 April 1936, followed by the US edition on 24 July 1936. The UK edition contains two stories omitted from the US edition: ‘Tried in the Furnace’ and ‘Trouble Down at Tudsleigh’.

Mcllvaine A55a.

SKU: 2126292