That was the worst of these Americans! Always getting divorced and causing unpleasantness

She choked. His lordship, a young man with a shrinking horror of the deeper emotions, whether exhibited in woman or man, writhed silently. That was the worst of these Americans! Always getting divorced and causing unpleasantness. How was a fellow to know?

P. G. Wodehouse, The little nugget (1913), 10

He had the unmistakable look of a man about to be present at a row between two women

Mt Pett, meanwhile, had been trailing in the rear with a hunted expression on his face. He had the unmistakable look of a man about to be present at a row between two women, and only a wet cat in a strange back yard bears itself with less jauntiness than a man faced by such a prospect. A millionaire several times over, Mr Pett would have cheerfully given much of his wealth to have been elsewhere at that moment.

P.G Wodehouse, Piccadilly Jim (1918), 57 

Women say this sort of thing carelessly, with no wish to wound; but that makes it none the less hard to bear

'Oh, I am glad you have begun to take an interest in cricket. It is simply a social necessity in England. Why you ever made such a fuss about taking it up I can't think. You used to be so fond of watching baseball, and cricket is just the same thing.'

A close observer would have marked a deepening of the look of pain on Mr Crocker's face. Women say this sort of thing carelessly, with no wish to wound; but that makes it none the less hard to bear. 

P.G Wodehouse, Piccadilly Jim (1918), 39-40

He had created a world that was complete, self-sufficient and almost faultless

The man and his work were one. Evelyn Waugh later described Wodehouse’s work as timeless, but it is also immutable. The comparative lack of development in his writing is one of its unique features: no other twentieth-century English writer of consequence evolved in his mature work as little as Wodehouse. He had created a world that was complete, self-sufficient and almost faultless.

R. McCrum, Wodehouse: a life (2004), 371

The moral test with which Wodehouse was confronted in June 1941 was one that was beyond him

The moral test with which Wodehouse was confronted in June 1941 was one that was beyond him. In addition to his upbringing, there was his temperamental preference for finding the easiest way out of a tricky situation – and his obsessive commitment to his writing. It is these two factors that colour his actions with the taint of irresponsibility. Combined with his failure to understand the nature of Nazism, they proved fatal to his reputation.

R. McCrum, Wodehouse: a life (2004), 305

Millions are to be grabbed out here and your only competition is idiots

Wodehouse was not alone in flirting with the studios. The talkies had triggered a new gold rush, anticipated by Herman Mankiewicz when in 1925, after a visit to the West Coast, he had cabled his friend Ben Hecht, saying: ‘Millions are to be grabbed out here and your only competition is idiots. Don’t let this get around.’ Post-war Hollywood was challenging New York, where the first big studios had been based. The movie-makers’ desperate need for Broadway talent, people who could supply dialogue and scenarios, inspired a westward stampede of playwrights and short story writers. The exodus from the East was, Wodehouse wrote later, ‘like one of those great race movements of the middle ages’.

R. McCrum, Wodehouse: a life (2004), 184

Change in to white flannels, play from midday to sundown, breaking only for a cold lunch and a pint or two in the pavilion

Every summer weekend during this opulent decade, young men from the City, or the Imperial Civil Service, or the newspaper and magazine world of Fleet Street and the Strand, would take the train to some nearby provincial town, Tunbridge Wells perhaps, or Stevenage. There, they would throw their heavy cricket bags onto the horse-drawn carriage awaiting them at the station, then rattle through leafy summer lanes to the ground, change in to white flannels, play from midday to sundown, breaking only for a cold lunch and a pint or two in the pavilion, before returning to the City in the fading light of summer.

R. McCrum, Wodehouse: a life (2004), 77

Say what you like about civilization, it comes in dashed handy in a crisis like this

Fortunately, the thing did not go beyond looks. Say what you like about civilization, it comes in dashed handy in a crisis like this. It may be a purely artificial code that keeps a father from hoofing his daughter's kisser when there are fellow guests at a house but at that moment I felt I could do with all the purely artificial codes that were going.

P.G. Wodehouse, Thank you, Jeeves (1934), 61

There are such things, I would have you remember, Voules, as strong letters to The Times

'Voules,' I was preparing to say, 'enough is enough. This police persecution must stop. It is monstrous and uncalled-for. We are not in Russia, Voules. There are such things, I would have you remember, Voules, as strong letters to The Times.' 

P.G. Wodehouse, Thank you, Jeeves (1934), 117

he had known more policemen by their first names than any other man in the metropolis

There were men in London - bookmakers, skittle sharps, jellied eel sellers on race courses, and men like that - who would not have known whom you were referring to if you had mentioned Einstein, butt they all knew Gally. He had been, till that institution passed beyond the veil, a man at whom the old Pelican Club pointed with pride, and he had known more policemen by their first names than any other man in the metropolis.

P.G. Wodehouse, Sunset at Blandings (1977), 22

From the heyday of Waugh and Wodehouse, the brandy habit has declined amongst the British

From the heyday of Waugh and Wodehouse, the brandy habit has declined amongst the British but it's now massive amongst hip hop types in America. Courvoisier and Hennessy are the favoured brands. So successful has this unlikely collaboration been that Max Beaulieu, from cognac-expert.com, thinks their should be a statue of Busta Rhymes in Cognac. You should Google Beaulieu’s interview with the writer Nicholas Faith just to hear Faith reciting rap lyrics in his patrician English accent [it's from 13:05]. I was going to quote some but there is an awful lot of swearing.

It’s a long way from Wodehouse.

H. Jeffreys, Empire of Booze (2016), 169

In the Guardian article version of this chapter, he quotes Ja Rule’s (of whom I have never heard): “Feel the rage as it stirs behind me, I don’t give a fuck as they don’t give a fuck about me. I keep drinking Hennessy, bustin’ at my enemies.”

It would be too little to say that his bearing was confident

It would be too little to say that his bearing was confident: he comported himself with the care-free jauntiness of an infant about to demolish a Noah's Ark with a tack-hammer.

P.G. Wodehouse, The adventures of Sally (1922), 158

The back of old envelopes never enter his life

Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down in a dapper little morocco-bound notebook. He was the sort of man who always has a pencil, and the back of old envelopes never enter his life

P.G. Wodehouse, The adventures of Sally (1922), 60

One who has read his Thomas Hardy and learned from that pessimistic author's works

It is not too much to say that at this point in his progress Lord Emsworth was feeling calm, confident and carefree; but a wise friend, one who has read his Thomas Hardy and learned from that pessimistic author's  works how often and how easily human enterprises are ruined by some unforeseen Act of God, would have warned him against any premature complacency. One never knew, he would have pointed out, around what corner fate might not be waiting with the stocking full of sand, 'Watch your step, Emsworth,' he would have said.

P.G. Wodehouse, A Pelican at Blandings (1969), 171

Gustave Flaubert ... would have described her as being mad as a wet hen.

She [Constance] was thinking of Alaric, Duke of Dunstable, and a stylist like Gustave Flaubert, with his flair for the mot juste, would have described her as being mad as a wet hen.

P.G. Wodehouse, A Pelican at Blandings (1969), 116

The martini which he proceeded to pour proved an agreeable surprise

The martini which he proceeded to pour proved an agreeable surprise. It did not bite like a serpent and sting like an adder, but it was not without a certain quiet authority, and he had taken it into his system and was feeling much invigorated, when the door opened and his sister Hermione appeared.

P.G. Wodehouse, Galahad at Blandings (1965), 204

Ever rising on stepping-stones of dead whiskies and sodas

Where most of his [Galahad's] contemporaries had reluctantly thrown in the towel and retired to Harrogate and Buxton to nurse their gout, he had gone blithely on, ever rising on stepping-stones of dead whiskies and sodas to higher things. He had discovered the prime grand secret of eternal youth - to keep the decanter circulating and never to go to bed before four in the morning. His eye was not dimmed nor his natural force abated, his heart was of gold and in the right place, and he was loved by all except the female members of his own family.

P.G. Wodehouse, Full Moon (1947), 65

One seems to hear the bugles blowing for the Crusades

[']I rather wish sometimes, Connie,' said Lady Julia meditatively, 'that you were a little less of the grande dame. It's wonderful to watch you in action, I admit - one seems to hear the bugles blowing for the Crusades and the tramp of the mailed feet of a hundred steel-clad ancestors - but there's no getting away from it that you do put people's backs up a bit.'

P.G Wodehouse, Heavy Weather (1933), 240-241

A public-house for each individual inhabitant

The ideal towards which the City Fathers of all English county towns strive is to provide a public-house for each individual inhabitant; and those of Market Blandings had not been supine in this matter. From where Beach stood, he could see no fewer than six such establishments.

P.G. Wodehouse, Heavy Weather (1933), 153

You have to be a mutton chop, not an earl

[A] Senior conservative, when at lunch, has little leisure for observing anything not immediately on the table in front of him. To attract attention in the dining-room of the Senior Conservative club between the hours of one and two-thirty, you have to be a mutton chop, not an earl.

P.G. Wodehouse, Something Fresh (1915), 38