The Diary of Samuel Pepys: 1660 [Paperback]

Samuel Pepys (Author), William A. Armstrong (Author), William Matthews (Author, Editor), Robert Latham (Author, Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1995 | Series: Diary of Samuel Pepys

The first volume of the complete Diary of Samuel Pepys in its most authoritative and acclaimed edition. This complete edition of the Diary of Samuel Pepys comprises eleven volumes -- nine volumes of text and footnotes (with an introduction of 120 pages in Volume I), a tenth volume of commentary (The Companion) and an eleventh volume of Index. Each of the first eight volumes contains one whole calendar year of the diary, from January to December. The ninth volume runs from January 1668 to May 1669. The Diary was first published in abbreviated form in 1825. A succession of new editions, re-issues and selections, published in the Victorian era, made the Diary one of the best-known books, and Pepys one of the best-known figures, of English history. But in none of these versions -- not even in the Wheatley, which for long stood as the standard edition -- was there a reliable, still less a full text, and in none of them was there a commentary with any claim to completeness. This edition was in preparation for many years, and remains the first in which the entire Diary is printed and in which an attempt has been made at systematic comment on it. The primary aim of the principal editors was to see that the Diary was presented in a manner suitable to the historical and literary importance of its contents. At the same time they had in mind the interests of the wide public of English-speaking people to whom the diarist himself, rather than the importance of what he wrote, is what matters.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'The Latham-Matthews transcription of Pepys' Diary is one of the glories of contemporary English publishing.' The Times 'The pleasure of Pepys -- of reading him -- is his own pleasure in experience! Pepys' Diary is the cheerful self-report, not of the man eminent in naval history, not of the historical witness, but of the unobjectionable hedonist.' Guardian 'Here, in one of the finest feats in all the long history of scholarship, is Pepys' Diary, once and for all. Exegi monumentum aere perennius.' Observer 'The editors have achieved the impossible! one can now read the Diary perfectly easily, month by month, year by year! here at last is a really learned edition where the learning is put at the disposal of the layman.' New Statesman 'It isn't often that one encounters a publication -- especially of this magnitude -- which achieves complete perfection, but there is no doubt that this does.' Sir Arthur Bryant

About the Author

Robert Latham, cbe, ma, fba -- Fellow and Pepys Librarian, Magdalene College, Cambridge, and formerly reader in History, Royal Holloway College, University of London. William Matthews, ma, ph.d, d.lett -- Late Professor of English, University of California, Los Angeles, and Fellow of Birkbeck College, University of London.

Product Details

• Paperback: 350 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins (December 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0004990218
• ISBN-13: 978-0004990217
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,189,424 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge., May 8, 2011

By 

John the Reader "John" (Orlando, FL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Diary of Samuel Pepys: 1660 (Paperback)

Walter Isaacson said that Ben Franklin was the Founding Father `that winks at us'.

Samuel Pepys was the first historical robust rascal I read that had a wicked, witty sense of humor that shines clear through the centuries, so that I felt he was winking at us too. Separated by a hundred years, these two huge men are joined by a sense of fun, by enjoying and living their significant lives to the very utmost. It shows in their actions as well as their writings - and no one is sure why Samuel wrote his diaries in such great and often unflattering detail, and in a code he designed himself - and in the obvious esteem their peers held these two public servants.

When we lived in London for about seven years my wife and two sons would often explore the city, and often took along one of the `complete' diaries with us and revisited - as one still can - many of naughty Samuel's favorite flirting, drinking and eating spots. As recently as 2009 my family was able to float down the Thames to an Inn that Pepys often visited and were still able to sit at windows on wooden benches and eat "whitebait and brown bread" as he did.

Spanning the several decades of his significant career in the creation of the British Navy, through England's own revolution and shortly lived Republic and the eventual return of the Monarch that Pepys served so well, the diaries (and there are several volumes) detail his day to day life in great personal detail that draw strong mind pictures of those dramatic times. The reader can "see" him hiding his wheel of Parmesan Cheese by burying it in the Admiralty yard, reporting to the King on the Great Fire of London, surveying and establishing His Majesty's Dockyards at Chatham and Sheerness.

Pepys offers the reader deep insight to parts of a rich, full life of many contributions and public service, of scandal and intrigue, of plots and flirting - a fascinating history.