The Small Bachelor: Summary & Reading Guide

George Finch takes on a formidable New York household

George Finch is a shy young artist in Prohibition-era New York, though the question of his artistic talent is best left to the reader’s judgment. He falls for Molly Waddington. Her stepmother has a very different idea of an acceptable match, and George’s attempts to make progress draw in an entire company of helpers, meddlers and people with private interests. I love the contrast between the modest scale of George’s ambition and the elaborate forces summoned against it. He wants to marry Molly; the social world around her behaves as if the future of civilization depends upon preventing that simple arrangement.

Molly’s stepmother is a splendidly practical obstacle because she can do more than disapprove. She has a household and a position from which to direct other people. Sigsbee H. Waddington, her husband, has his own wish to escape towards the open spaces of the West. George’s courtship becomes part of a larger domestic argument about who gets to decide what a family will do. Molly’s preference matters, but it must be expressed amid louder voices. Wodehouse lets the romance stand at the centre without requiring the lovers to carry every scene by themselves.

J. Hamilton Beamish writes self-improvement booklets and is disposed to offer the sort of advice that sounds unanswerable until actual people try to use it. Mullett the butler and his pickpocket girlfriend Fanny bring quite another set of skills to the situation. Officer Garroway’s poetic inclinations add a welcome detour from the expected behaviour of a policeman. These are not interchangeable comic extras. Each has a reason to turn up, a distinct manner of interpreting a problem, and a capacity to make the central romance harder or easier by acting on that interpretation.

The Greenwich Village setting allows Wodehouse to put a young artist among wealth, servants, police and the oddities of New York life. Prohibition supplies an additional social absurdity, though the novel does not depend on historical instruction about it. George is not a brilliant professional whose success could force Mrs Waddington to reverse her judgment. That is part of the point: the man’s worth in this romance has to be established through his behaviour, not through a conventional certificate of income or talent. His mildness is both a source of embarrassment and a reason to root for him.

The Small Bachelor has an unusually visible theatrical ancestry. It grew from the latter part of the Kern, Bolton and Wodehouse musical Oh, Lady! Lady!, rather than springing from a wholly separate plot. The novel was serialised in American and British magazines before its 1927 book editions. Methuen published it in the UK on 28 April; George H. Doran issued the American book on 17 June. These are original book publications, not dates of the musical. Remembering the connection explains the abundance of entrances, coincidences and contrasting supporting players without making the prose feel like a transcript of a performance.

There is also a 1927 silent film adapted from the Liberty magazine serial. That is a specific screen branch of the work, and a useful reminder that stage, serial, book and film need their own labels. A reader interested in adaptation history can trace those steps in order. A first-time reader need only know that Wodehouse was comfortable building a comedy in which people repeatedly interrupt one another at exactly the wrong or right moment. The page’s On screen section records the film without implying that the adaptation reproduces the book word for word.

The title makes George sound diminutive, and he often appears disadvantaged beside people with stronger wills. Yet Wodehouse gives him enough persistence to justify following the struggle. Beamish’s theories and the Waddingtons’ plans sound more authoritative than George’s desire, but neither can account for the particular feelings of George and Molly. That gap between sweeping advice and an individual case keeps the story moving. I return for the procession of characters who confidently know what ought to be done and for the small bachelor who refuses to leave the scene simply because they have said so.

If your Wodehouse reading has stayed within English country houses, this is a welcome New York evening. Begin with George and Molly, then enjoy the supporting cast as each adds a new complication. The book belongs among the standalones, even though its musical source and silent film connect it to the author’s work in other media. Its pleasure lies in a shy hero, a clear romantic wish and a spectacular amount of interference. Read it slowly enough to hear the different voices; a Beamish maxim or a Waddington decree is funniest when measured against what happens next.

The supporting players give the novel its pace. Mullett and Fanny operate with a different sense of opportunity from Beamish, whose pamphlets offer confident rules for living. Officer Garroway brings poetry into official duty, while Sigsbee dreams of an entirely different landscape. Their varied interests ensure that George’s small, sincere objective keeps being viewed through somebody else’s extravagant frame. It is this busy difference of scale that makes the courtship linger in my memory.