A Damsel in Distress

By: P. G. Wodehouse

Narrated by: John Rayburn

The writing of P. G. Wodehouse put him among the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. He began his post-collegiate career working in a bank. Very dissatisfied with the job, he began writing magazine articles when he had any spare time. What an outstanding professional decision that turned out to be.

Wodehouse wrote a novel, The Potholders, in 1902, but it led to collections of short stories that began a year later. He wound up creating several comic characters, with the most famous being stories featuring Bertie Wooster, who had a sort of lopsided way of approaching life. This led to many convoluted adventures that should more aptly be called misadventures. Somehow, Bertie’s faithful valet, Jeeves, was always around to steer him to more normal ways of handling the hilarious mishaps that were a regular part of a haphazard lifestyle. The duo was featured in over 30 of the more than 300 tales penned by Wodehouse, many of them originally in magazines.

Wodehouse also wrote scripts for stage and screenplays and was still writing right up until his death in 1975, a joyous output that stretched out to nearly three quarters of a century. What you’re about to hear, A Damsel in Distress, is a prime example of the Wodehouse trademark of elaborate quirks of hilarity. Listen and enjoy.

Originally published in 1919.

Public Domain (P)2021 John D. Rayburn

bad narrator

cannot even get thru chapter 1. not even sure what the story is about

Terrible narrator.

I couldn’t get past the Introduction. The narrator pronounced the author’s name as WOAD-house, not WOOD-house. He lost me at that point. Highly NOT recommended.

Listen to this book with a different narrator

This same exact book is available with a number of different narrators. This one lists over 60 years of radio experience - no offense to the narrator, but he should have stopped a few decades ago.

The story itself is quite enjoyable. There's no Jeeves, but it's a classic P.G. Wodehouse tale of difficult romance, multiple plot twists, and entertaining turns of phrase. There were, unfortunately, a few cases of fat shaming... not all of P.G. Wodehouse's stories age well.