The Diary of Samuel Pepys

The Diary of Samuel Pepys, one of the most famous and comprehensive memoirs ever written in English. In the nine years that Samuel Pepys kept his diary, 1660–69, he chronicled his life and times in extraordinary, vibrant detail. It was first published, in two volumes, in 1825. Various other editions were published over the years, most of them larger but all of them with significant omissions and bowdlerizations, until a complete edition, in nine volumes, appeared in 1970–83.

Pepys lived through a tumultuous period in British history. At the age of 15 he watched the execution of Charles I, and in the first year of his diary, he records his impressions of the proclamation of Charles II as king of England. The Restoration meant a relaxation of Oliver Cromwell’s Puritan rigidity. Organs could now be played in churches, and not only were the theaters opened again after prohibition, but as Pepys notes on January 3, 1661, “and here the first time that ever I saw women come upon the stage.” Pepys also writes at length about many other important events that occurred during the time of his diary, including the Great Plague of London in 1665 and the Great Fire of London in September 1666.

No less engaging are Pepys’s descriptions of his personal life. He enjoyed meeting friends in coffee houses and taverns, going to the theater, and especially playing and listening to music. He also had a weakness for women, as he noted in March 1666: “However, musique and women I cannot but give way to, whatever my business is.” Despite his devotion to pleasure, Pepys was meticulous and thorough in everything he did, from his work as a naval administrator to his pursuit of scientific knowledge and book collecting.

Pepys’s journal entries end in 1669 when he begins to suffer with eye trouble, which he thinks can at least partially be laid to keeping the daily diary, and about six months before the death of his wife. The diaries are an invaluable source for historians of the Restoration period, but the candor and vividness with which he writes make the diaries compelling reading for the more casual reader as well.