Author Biography

The Diary of Samuel Pepys

Introduction

The Diary of Samuel Pepys has been called a literary work like no other. Unlike other diarists of his time, Pepys had no aspirations for publication. This freed him up to paint a frank, uncensored portrait of life in London at the time of the Restoration. Throughout the work, which spans from 1660 to 1669, Pepys offers his firsthand perspective on the major events during the Restoration, including his own role in helping to bring Charles II back from exile to become king, and his aid in both the Great Plague of 1665 and the Great Fire of 1666. This coverage gives The Diary of Samuel Pepys a historic distinction as well as a literary one.

Pepys did his part to make sure that prying eyes could not read his work during his lifetime. He wrote The Diary of Samuel Pepys in a cryptic code, which was his own variation on an existing form of shorthand. Fearing that he was going blind from writing, Pepys stopped recording entries in his diary in 1669 and had his entire diary bound for his personal library, which he left to Magdalene College, Cambridge University—his alma mater. It wasn't rediscovered until 1819, more than one hundred fifty years later, at which point the Master of the College had a student decipher Pepys's codes. The first edition was edited by Lord Braybrooke and released in an abridged form in 1825 in two volumes. It has since been revised and enlarged to six volumes, ten volumes, and finally, eleven volumes—the complete diary.

This entry studies the abridged, one-volume Modern Library edition, released in 2001, which is widely available.

Author Biography

Samuel Pepys was born in London, England on February 23, 1633. One of eleven children, he ended up becoming the eldest of only three who survived to adulthood. Pepys grew up in a household of humble means. His mother was the sister of a butcher and his father was a poor tailor, barely able to collect money for his services. Pepys's one family asset was his father's first cousin, Edward Montagu, the first Earl of Sandwich, who would grow to become his close friend and patron.

In his pupil days, Pepys was sent to St. Paul's School in London. The English Civil War was well under way, and he witnessed the beheading of Charles I. In 1650, he went to Magdalene College at Cambridge University, where he received his bachelor's degree. In 1655, Pepys, then twenty-two, married fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Marchant de St. Michel, the daughter of a penniless Huguenot refugee.

After completing school Pepys worked as a secretary and domestic steward for his successful cousin. By 1659, Pepys was a minor clerk for the office of George Downing, an office that would have him carry letters to Montagu in the Baltic. One year later, in 1660, Pepys began The Diary of Samuel Pepys. That same year, Montagu hired Pepys to be the Admiral's secretary for a voyage. The journey turned out to be the historic voyage to Holland, where Charles II is escorted back to England for the restoration of the monarchy in England.

Upon his return to England, Pepys was hired as the Clerk of the Acts to the Navy Board, where he would take on such duties as justice of the peace; supervisor of naval supply distribution; and appointee to the Tangier Committee. Pepys moved up the ranks in the Royal Navy, and was on hand to assist with the two great disasters of the time, the Great Plague of 1665 and the Great Fire of London in 1666. In November, 1669, after fifteen years of a rocky but loving marriage, Elizabeth Pepys died of fever. In 1673, Pepys was made secretary to the Admiralty Commission, the administrative head of the naval department. Later that same year, he became an elected member of Parliament for Castle Rising, Norfolk. In this position, through legislation and personal intervention, he put an end to the flagrant corruption of the supply yards and even won allowances for thirty new ships. By 1685, Pepys was given a free hand to develop the royal Navy as he saw fit.

Pepys retired in 1689 and spent the remainder of his life writing the only piece of work he saw published, Memoires Relating to the State of the Royal Navy of England. He died on May 26, 1703, and was buried in St. Olave's Church, London, next to his wife.

Oh the miserable and calamitous spectacle!