Florence Craye

Lady Florence Craye is a fictional character who appears in P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves stories and novels. Lady Florence, the daughter of Percy Craye, Earl of Worplesdon and elder sister to Edwin, a nasty little runtish type of lad, is the sometime fiancee of Bertie Wooster. At the opening of the story "Jeeves Takes Charge", which relates how Jeeves first came to be employed by Bertie, the latter is (unusually for him, as later stories show) quite enthusiastic about this state of affairs, citing Florence's "wonderful profile," repeatedly, and even undertaking to read a book titled "Types of Ethical Theory," which she has foisted upon him. However, the friendly relations soon deteriorate, as Bertie discovers that she was a little too controlling for his liking, and had dark plans afoot to try to make him read Nietzsche.

"The root of the trouble was that she was one of those intellectual girls, steeped to the gills in serious purpose, who are unable to see a male soul without wanting to get behind it and shove." - Joy in the Morning

It is later revealed that her staff refer to Lady Florence as "Lady Caligula". In all subsequent stories, Florence is regarded by Bertie as a dangerous threat to his happy bachelor life, and on multiple occasions he also attempts to detach from her such friends of his who fall prey to her overbearing charms. She is described as tall, willowy, blond, and "seen from the side, most awfully good-looking," but her manner is forceful and spectacularly icy whenever her will is crossed. A little of this seems to go a long way with most of Bertie's saner friends.

Lady Florence Craye is the author of one literary novel, Spindrift, which receives some critical applause, and evidently allows her admittance to the Bloomsbury Group. Bertie is unimpressed by the book, while Jeeves delicately characterizes it as a "somewhat immature production," but it is apparently reasonably well received in literary circles, as Bertie states that Florence is "like ham and eggs with the boys with the bulging foreheads round Bloomsbury way." In the television series, Jeeves' opinion of the book is left in no doubt when he uses its pages to line the hat of Bertie's Abraham Lincoln costume. One of Florence's admirers, Percy Gorringe, adapts "Spindrift" for the stage; the production promptly flops. Florence's literary endeavours are referenced in several books, notably in a scene in "Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit", when she induces Bertie to take her to a garish nightclub for research purposes, and then manages to get him arrested when the club is raided.

...
Wikipedia