Bobbie Wickham

Roberta “Bobbie” Wickham is a lively, red-haired friend whose inventions can turn Bertie’s quiet visit into a test of nerve.

Who they are

Roberta “Bobbie” Wickham has an irrepressible gift for making a plan sound like innocent fun until Bertie finds himself carrying it out. She first appears in “Something Squishy” (US 1924, UK 1925), later collected in Mr Mulliner Speaking; “Jeeves and the Yule-tide Spirit” brought her into Bertie’s stories in 1927. Her red hair becomes one of Bertie’s shorthand signals for a temperament he ought to treat with more caution. Yet a reader need not reduce Bobbie to an omen. She is quick, confident and alert to opportunities that Bertie may not recognise until his own part in them has become inconvenient.

The short-story form suits her because a small practical joke can overturn a settled social situation very quickly. Bertie narrates the cost to his own dignity with characteristic charm, while Bobbie’s confidence keeps the initiative in her hands. At a country house, a private joke becomes harder to contain because relatives, hosts and guests each hold a different part of the story. The longer Jeeves in the Offing gives her another substantial setting. The printed texts, rather than a general impression of “the red-haired girl,” tell us which incidents belong to which volume.

Personality and relationships

Lady Wickham is her mother. Bertie and Jeeves know that Bobbie’s cheerful requests are not automatically harmless; Tuppy Glossop also belongs to the earlier web of jokes remembered by Bertie. The relationships are funny because different people have different estimates of the risk. Bertie may believe he is in command of a minor errand. Jeeves may have read the whole room. Bobbie, meanwhile, can be several moves ahead of the man who volunteered. The reader is allowed to admire the ingenuity and sympathise with the volunteer at once.

Jeeves in the Offing brings Bobbie and Bertie into a larger country-house problem, alongside Roderick Glossop. It is a good example of a recurring character acquiring a different scale of narrative without ceasing to be recognisable. A profile should not infer her presence in every Jeeves novel merely because Bertie remembers her. The linked trail identifies the Mulliner collection, a Jeeves collection and the later novel, while the story index can be used to inspect individual shorter appearances and variant titles.

Best books and memorable moments

Meet Bobbie Wickham in “Something Squishy” in Mr Mulliner Speaking for the first encounter, then “Jeeves and the Yule-tide Spirit” in Very Good, Jeeves for Bertie’s point of view. If you want a novel-length return, take Jeeves in the Offing. The collection has other adventures with their own casts; buying it for Bobbie is also a chance to encounter the breadth of Bertie’s early predicaments. Read the page’s regional edition notes before assuming the exact table of contents of a modern printing. The delight lies in the moment a request becomes a commitment.

Nina Botting is credited as Bobbie Wickham in one ITV Jeeves and Wooster episode. Tracy Reed played her in the earlier The World of Wooster. They are separate television productions, and an episode may recombine material from the printed tales. The book route remains the way to locate her first story.

Begin with Mr Mulliner Speaking or Very Good, Jeeves.

On screen

Nina Botting played Bobbie in ITV’s Jeeves and Wooster; Tracy Reed portrayed her in The World of Wooster. Cast and production record. Compare Wodehouse screen, stage and radio versions.

World

Her wit and confidence make her a recurring source of social experiments that Bertie may misunderstand until too late.

Connections

Bertie and Jeeves encounter her in the early story cycle and later at country houses; Lady Wickham is her mother.

First appearance

Bobbie first appears in “Something Squishy” (US 1924; UK 1925), later collected in Mr Mulliner Speaking; her Jeeves stories follow.