Paul Francis Jennings (20 June 1918 – 26 December 1989) was an English humourist and author. After his Catholic education, Jennings served in World War II. For many years he wrote a column, ''Oddly Enough,'' in British newspaper ''
The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...
''. Many collections of his work were published, including ''The Jenguin Pennings'' (whose title is a
spoonerism
A spoonerism is an occurrence in speech in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched (see metathesis) between two words in a phrase. These are named after the Oxford don and ordained minister William Archibald Spooner, w ...
) by
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.Leamington Spa
Royal Leamington Spa, commonly known as Leamington Spa or simply Leamington (), is a spa town and civil parish in Warwickshire, England. Originally a small village called Leamington Priors, it grew into a spa town in the 18th century following ...
. His parents were William Benedict and Gertrude Mary Jennings. He was educated at King Henry VIII school in Coventry and at the
Douai
Douai (, , ,; pcd, Doï; nl, Dowaai; formerly spelled Douay or Doway in English) is a city in the Nord département in northern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department. Located on the river Scarpe some from Lille and from Arras, D ...
Catholic school in Woolhampton, Berkshire.
Career
Jennings served in the
Royal Signals
The Royal Corps of Signals (often simply known as the Royal Signals – abbreviated to R SIGNALS or R SIGS) is one of the combat support arms of the British Army. Signals units are among the first into action, providing the battlefield communi ...
during the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. In 1943 his piece "Moses was a Sanitary Officer" was published in '' Lilliput'' magazine.''The Paul Jennings Reader'', Bloomsbury, 1990 Freelance work for ''
Punch
Punch commonly refers to:
* Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist
* Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice
Punch may also refer to:
Places
* Pun ...
'' and ''
The Spectator
''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world.
It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''The ...
'' soon followed. Leaving the army with the rank of Lieutenant, he briefly worked as a scriptwriter for the
Central Office of Information
The Central Office of Information (COI) was the UK government's marketing and communications agency. Its Chief Executive reported to the Minister for the Cabinet Office. It was a non-ministerial department, and became an executive agency and a t ...
and then spent two years as an advertising copywriter; throughout this period his freelance work continued to be published.
In 1949 he joined ''
The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...
'', contributing a fortnightly column entitled "Oddly Enough" until 1966, when he was succeeded by
Michael Frayn
Michael Frayn, FRSL (; born 8 September 1933) is an English playwright and novelist. He is best known as the author of the farce ''Noises Off'' and the dramas ''Copenhagen'' and ''Democracy''. His novels, such as '' Towards the End of the Mo ...
, who was an admirer of his work. After leaving ''The Observer'', he continued to write until his death, mainly seeing print in ''Punch'', ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'' and the ''
Telegraph magazine
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally.
It was fou ...
.''
Style
His columns constitute several hundred 700-word essays. In general his pieces take the form of whimsical ponderings; some are based in real-life incidents, often involving his friend Harblow.
For instance, one of his pieces, "How to Spiel Halma", concerns their attempts to establish the rules of
halma
Halma (from the Greek word ἅλμα meaning "jump") is a strategy board game invented in 1883 or 1884 by George Howard Monks, an American thoracic surgeon at Harvard Medical School. His inspiration was the English game ''Hoppity'' which was ...
from the instructions in a German set using their extremely limited knowledge of the language.
His pieces are sometimes poems, and sometimes written in novel forms of language, such as the
Romance
Romance (from Vulgar Latin , "in the Roman language", i.e., "Latin") may refer to:
Common meanings
* Romance (love), emotional attraction towards another person and the courtship behaviors undertaken to express the feelings
* Romance languages, ...
-eschewing Anglish, or that of a toy 19-letter ''pipewipen'' (
typewriter
A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...
). Other articles were extended flights of fancy, such as "The Unthinkable Carrier" based on the idea of cutting Britain free of the Earth's crust so that it could float around the oceans and guarantee world peace, with the
Isle of Wight
The Isle of Wight ( ) is a county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the largest and second-most populous island of England. Referred to as 'The Island' by residents, the Isle of ...
kept in place by a tow chain. In a late 1950s piece, "Sleep for Sale", he prefigured the concept of the
capsule hotel
Capsule hotel ( ja, カプセルホテル, kapuseru hoteru), also known in the Western world as a pod hotel, is a type of hotel developed in Japan that features many small bed-sized rooms known as capsules. Capsule hotels provide cheap, basic o ...
("Over to you, capitalists. But remember, I thought of it first."). Several of his pieces touched on the invented philosophical movement of
Resistentialism
Resistentialism is a jocular theory to describe "seemingly spiteful behavior manifested by inanimate objects", where objects that cause problems (like lost keys or a runaway bouncy ball) are said to exhibit a high degree of malice toward humans. ...
, a concept that probably owes some of its force to the contempt that Jennings—a devout Catholic—felt for the intellectual fashion he was parodying.
Jennings was an admirer of
James Thurber
James Grover Thurber (December 8, 1894 – November 2, 1961) was an American cartoonist, writer, humorist, journalist and playwright. He was best known for his cartoons and short stories, published mainly in ''The New Yorker'' and collected in ...
, who attended a dinner party at Jennings' house and subsequently wrote of the conversation in a 1955 ''
New Yorker
New Yorker or ''variant'' primarily refers to:
* A resident of the State of New York
** Demographics of New York (state)
* A resident of New York City
** List of people from New York City
* ''The New Yorker'', a magazine founded in 1925
* ''The New ...
'' piece.Jennings states that Thurber subsequently put incidents from the dinner into a New Yorker piece, including a discussion about writers' ages and a remark about people who might find it relaxing "to wash a Venetian blind". These can be found in: James Thurber, ''The moribundant life, or, grow old along with whom?'',
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
, 23 September 1955. Collected in: ''Alarms and Diversions'', Penguin, 1957. Thurber mentions London but no names. The 1957 collection adds "two years ago" to the mention of the party.
Bibliography
''Oddly Enough'' collections
* ''Oddly Enough'' ( Reinhardt and Evans, 1950)
* ''Even Oddlier'' (Reinhardt, 1952)
* ''Oddly Bodlikins'' (Reinhardt, 1953)
* ''Next to Oddliness'' (Reinhardt, 1955)
* ''Model Oddlies'' (Reinhardt, 1956)
* ''Gladly Oddly'' (Reinhardt, 1958)
* ''Idly Oddly'' (Reinhardt, 1959)
* ''I said Oddly, Diddle I?'' (Reinhardt, 1961)
* ''Oodles of Oddlies'' (Reinhardt, 1963)
* ''Oddly Ad Lib'' (Reinhardt, 1965)
* ''I Was Joking, Of Course'' (Reinhardt, 1968)
* ''It's an Odd Thing, But...'' ( Reinhardt, 1971)
General collections
* ''The Jenguin Pennings'' (
Penguin
Penguins (order (biology), order List of Sphenisciformes by population, Sphenisciformes , family (biology), family Spheniscidae ) are a group of Water bird, aquatic flightless birds. They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere: on ...
, 1963)
* ''A Precsription for Foreing Travel'' (sic) (Guinness, 1966)The 12-page booklet is a verse parody of European brochure-speak, produced as an advertisement for Guinness. On the back is printed 'Designed for Guinness by S.H.Benson Ltd. Written by Paul Jennings. Illustrated by John Astrop. Printed in Great Britain by W.S.Cowell Ltd. 587/66' It was the last of a series of advertising booklets, with different authors and illustrators each year, sent by Guinness to doctors each Christmas from 1933 to 1939 and 1950 to 1966.
* ''I Must Have Imagined It'' (M Joseph, 1977)
* ''Pun Fun'' (Hamlyn, 1980)
* ''Golden Oddlies'' (Methuen, 1983)
* ''The Paul Jennings Reader'' (
Bloomsbury
Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural, intellectual, and educational institutions.
Bloomsbury is home of the British Museum, the largest mus ...
, 1990) (posthumous)
Books on British life
* ''The Living Village'' (Hodder and Stoughton, 1968)
* ''Just a Few Lines: Guinness Trains of Thought'' (London: Guinness Superlatives, 1969; ). About the
Colne Valley
The Colne Valley is a steep sided valley on the east flank of the Pennine Hills in the English county of West Yorkshire. It takes its name from the River Colne which rises above the town of Marsden and flows eastward towards Huddersfield.
...
Graham Finlayson
Graham Scott Finlayson (1932–1999)Dunlop; illustrated by
Edward Bawden
Edward Bawden, (10 March 1903 – 21 November 1989) was an English painter, illustrator and graphic artist, known for his prints, book covers, posters, and garden metalwork furniture. Bawden taught at the Royal College of Art, where he had be ...
; not commercially issued. .
* ''And Now for Something Exactly the Same'' ( Gollancz, 1977). A novel.
As editor
* ''The English Difference'' (Aurelia Enterprises, 1974) (co-edited with John Gorham)
* ''The Book of Nonsense'' (Macdonald, 1977)
* ''A Feast of Days'' (Macdonald, 1982)
* ''My Favourite Railway Stories'' (Lutterworth Press, 1982)
Personal life
Jennings married Celia Blom, daughter of music critic and lexicographer
Eric Blom
Eric Walter Blom (20 August 188811 April 1959) was a Swiss-born British-naturalised music lexicographer, music critic and writer. He is best known as the editor of the 5th edition of ''Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1954).
Biogr ...
, in 1951. The couple lived in
East Bergholt
East Bergholt is a village in the Babergh District of Suffolk, England, just north of the Essex border.
The nearest town and railway station is Manningtree, Essex. East Bergholt is north of Colchester and south of Ipswich. Schools include Eas ...
, Suffolk, England, and had six children. A keen chorister, Jennings sang with the Oriana Madrigal Society and the London Philharmonia Chorus. In later years he was an active member of the church choir at St Thomas of Canterbury church in Woodbridge. Jennings died on 26 December 1989.