Back in the Jug Agane

Molesworth #4

by Geoffrey Willans, Ronald Searle

I need hardly tell you the esential thing about a football i.e. nobody need tell me to get rid of it. i do not want it in the first place. Wot is the use of having a soaking wet piece of leather pushed at you? Give me a hadock every time, at least you can eat it. Poor Nigel Molesworth is back at St Custard's, being snarled at by Grimes and forced to endure the good old footer season. But despite the distractions of hideous Molesworth 2 and weedy fotherington-tomas, he will still share all his secrets to passing exams and being a grown up. But what's this? A resolution to be good? And to luv gurls? Is this the end of the Nigel Molesworth known and loved by millions - or will he be bored by teatime?

Genres: Humor, Childrens, Fiction

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1959

About the author

Herbert Geoffrey Willans was an English author and journalist, is best known as the co-creator, with the illustrator Ronald Searle, of Nigel Molesworth, the "goriller of 3b and curse of St. Custard's".

He was educated at Blundells School, Tiverton, and became a schoolmaster there. Molesworth first appeared in Punch in the 1940s and was the protagonist and narrator of five books, beginning with 1953's Down with Skool!, and followed by How to be Topp, Wizz for Atomms and, posthumously, Back in the Jug Agane and the anthology, The Compleet Molesworth. Comic misspellings, erratic capitalisation and 1950s public schoolboy slang are threads running through all the books.

According to Ronald Searle in his obituary:
"His cunning was more refined than Bunter...Willans was delighted that schoolmasters, far from feeling publicly disrobed, were in fact giving away his books as end of school prizes."

Willans co-wrote the screenplay for the 1959 film The Bridal Path, which starred George Cole, but died at the age of 47 before the film was released. He also wrote a number of other, mostly humorous, books, including The Dog's Ear Book (also with Searle), My Uncle Harry (an exploration of the British gentlemen's club), Fasten Your Lapstraps! (an account of the early days of intercontinental flight), and Admiral on Horseback (a rather serious one about the navy). He was a keen amateur botanist, and spent so long in the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew that the staff gave him a key.

A review in The Times newspaper describes The Whistling Arrow as having a futuristic aeroplane as the 'heroine'. "It is his apparent strength in writing about planes and the people that flew them." The reviewer compares it with one of Evelyn Waugh's earlier novels.

Reviews

[Michael C · Rating 5 out of 5]

only realised later in life why this book was deliberately misspelled. As a kid I couldn't get it. Guess it's for adults, wouldn't be allowed today. Brilliant stuff. Drawings immense.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

It puts you in the mind of a naughty little boy. and all his escapades. It’s silly and funny but there were some moments that I can only describe as racism.. still written in the silly, funny way but doesn’t that make it worse? I don’t know.. maybe it’s just showing us the mind of this boy who isn’t very bright, warts and all and adds to the build of his character? But he’s also quite lovable so I feel like it could be normalising “casual racism”. However I think it was written quite a long time ago too, when casual racism was the norm.

[Rhys · Rating 3 out of 5]

The final title in the 'Molesworth' sequence and this is perhaps the most offbeat volume of all. It's brilliantly funny and inventive, but I feel I have overdosed just a little too much on molesworth's idiosyncratic narrative technique. My advice is not to read all four volumes one after the other if you want to remain sane, presuming you still are sane, which you probably aren't.

[Joyce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Making plans for nigel

[Sue Foster · Rating 4 out of 5]

School classic

By the creator of classic St Trinians girls school made into films in the 1950s Here is the school boys lead by the narrator Molesworth 1 the older brother.
The text is written with bad spelling but easy to.read. FIRST read it in the early 1970s and still able to make you chuckle.
A nice read foe the young at heart.

[D'face · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recommended by Slightly Foxed

This was funny in places and the drawings are entertaining but the text is hard going with all the deliberate misspellings making it a challenging read. Molesworth is a public school boy who imagines the life of his masters and exaggerates the torment of his school life.

[Harry · Rating 5 out of 5]

In which Nigel Molesworth, the Curse of St Custards, the Goriller of 3b, gives us his guide to exams, Gurls, Xmas and a plan on how to be good. His break down of the three types of Gurls into ones who stare, ones who play hockey and ones who are tough should be on the curriculum for all boys of a certain age, hem, hem.

[Mrs Mallott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thought I'd better revisit this what with getting a job in a private school and all.

[Robert Day · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnificent books!

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

As we reach the final volume of Molesworth's education (hem, hem) the New Elizabethan embraces the brave new world of atomic energy and jet power. And gurls..! (chiz, chiz)

[Steve Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read many many years ago. I remember these books being funny

[Steve]

Funny