With midterms and papers beginning to pile up nearly halfway through the semester, a great way for students to take a break is to stop in the library and pick out a book to read for fun.
Easily found on the second floor of the library, more than 20 P.G. Wodehouse novels await curious readers. Even during the busiest weeks of college, students should be sure to take time out of their day from reading the Great Books to read the good ones.
The aforementioned “Pigs Have Wings” is my personal favorite. A bitter rivalry between two lords: Lord Emsworth and Sir Gregory Parsloe. A devoted butler with poor nerves. The practical joker and noble Gally. And most of all, a contest between the Empress of Blandings and Pride of Matchingham, two pigs. Combined, these make for a wonderful use of 20 minutes.
Lyricist, playwright, and novelist, Wodehouse wrote some of his best novels in the early 1900s, before World War II. Filled with dry, British wit, each novel guarantees a laugh every few pages. Whether it’s the romance between Jerry Vail, the hopeless romantic and self-supporting author, and Penny Donaldson, the daughter of a wealthy American, Mr. Donaldson of Long Island City, or the adventures of the eternally-unperturbed Psmith (the P is silent), readers are lifted away to the world of British lords and their beloved prize-winning pigs.
Reading good books serves as a superior substitute to the traditional ways of relaxing such as watching shows and scrolling through social media. Though TV shows, Twitter, and Tik Tok promise brainless entertainment, a Wodehouse novel satisfies the need to escape the dreadfully-dense chapters of Rousseau’s “Emile.” And unlike social media, it doesn’t turn brains to mush.
A Wodehouse novel also serves the purpose of lightening the load of the semester without at all changing your external circumstances. This is the essence of humor: to provide relief and joy in times of strife and to give you some zest for the challenges it may throw at you. Humor doesn’t change your life, but it can change the way in which you view it. Spending time with Wodehouse and the characters at Blandings will make you look at the challenges of life as a practical joke.
The beauty of Wodehouse’s novels is the joy you can feel despite it being so simple. Reading about a butler and his absent minded employer, Lord Emsworth, whose pastime is reading about pigs and avoiding his bossy sister, has a childlike ridiculousness to it. And yet, taking a break to read something absolutely ridiculous is both refreshing and sometimes necessary. The best TV show can’t convey the simple joy and absurdity of a Wodehouse novel.
Reading a Wodehouse novel also reminds us of the wonder we have as human beings. Though a joke may be completely absurd, and you’re not really sure why you’re laughing at something so simple as a detective who inserts “P” into his last name of Smith to distinguish himself, humor brings us back to the initial desire we have to wonder. Though one can wonder at the brilliance of Newman’s hypothesis about the development of doctrine, it’s also nice to wonder at the foibles of the British aristocracy and their occasional obsession with pigs.
This is to say, wonder is a result of our not fully understanding something, but grasping it enough to know it is good. The best kind of humor is one which inspires wonder.
It’s a hard sell to convince a student at Hillsdale to take time out of their busy day to read books outside of those required in class. But taking a long-view look of our lives might convince us that knowing and regularly reading a few authors who lighten the spirits is just as crucial as knowing Euclid’s first five postulates.
Emma Cummins is a junior studying politics. She is the assistant opinions editor.
