Acid for Wodehouse

A County Derry Irishman named William Connor, who writes for the London Daily Mirror under the pseudonym "Cassandra," sharpened his Celtic fangs last fortnight, grabbed a BBC mike, and proceeded to chew up Funnyman Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, who now broadcasts out of Berlin for Goebbels & Co. (TIME, July 7, 14). Strange stuff for staid old BBC were his scarifying comments:

"I have to tell you . . . of a rich man trying to make his last and greatest sale, that of his own country. It is a somber story of self-respect, of honor and decency being pawned to the Nazis for the price of a soft bed in a luxury hotel. It is a tale of laughter growing old and of the Judas whine of treachery taking its place. It is the record of P. G. Wodehouse, ending forty years of money-making fun with the worst joke he ever made in his life. . . .

"Mr. Wodehouse, you said the other day that you were 'quite unable to work up any kind of belligerent feeling about this war'? Do you know Dulwich, Mr. Wodehouse? It is the suburb of London where you went to school. . . . After a bombing near me, under 50 tons of rubble, lay human beings. . . . You should have been there, Mr. Wodehouse, you with your impartiality, your reasonableness, and perhaps even one of your famous little jokes."

Promptly came an assorted roar from the London press. While the Mirror screamed Right and the Times murmured Wrong, and Duff Cooper voiced approval of the broadcast, the public split neatly in three. Group One contended Wodehouse was an artist who shouldn't be held responsible; Group Two said Wodehouse was wrong indeed, but that attacks like Connor's were in execrable taste; Group Three was for more all-out acid-throwing instead of BBC's usual drawing-room argument.

Highly enjoyable to hefty, bespectacled William Connor was the national hubbub about his broadcast. In his office at the Mirror he continued to turn out vitriolic screeds in longhand, taking time out occasionally to blow a few toots on his mouth organ, an inspirational aid. Said he last week:

"I have never been so pleased over anything in my life. . . . The BBC is anathema to me. . . . There are Americans who still think English people are Bertie Woosters calling each other 'Milord' and I thought the Wodehouse broadcasts would be very helpful to people like Burton Wheeler."

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