Diary of Samuel Pepys — Volume 11: June/july/august 1661
Diary of Samuel Pepys — Volume 11: June/july/august 1661
Translated by Mynors Bright
The year is 1661. Charles II has been on the throne for barely a year, and London is thrumming with the restless energy of a kingdom remade. Into this intoxicating, dangerous world steps Samuel Pepys, a young clerk at the Navy Board with grand ambitions and an unforgivably honest pen. This volume captures three summer months of his extraordinary diary: the dinners with influential men, the tedious Admiralty meetings, the theatre trips that leave him rapt, the anxious calculations of his career and finances, and the small humiliations and triumphs of daily life in Restoration England. Pepys writes about himself with a startling frankness that feels almost modern, admitting his vanities, his lusts, his insecurities. He gossips mercilessly, complains vividly, and observes everything. The result is not merely a historical document but a living, breathing portrait of a city and a moment in transition. For anyone curious about how people actually lived four centuries ago, here is the real thing: intimate,有时 funny, sometimes excruciating, always vivid.
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“Strange to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everybody.””
— Samuel Pepys
“The truth is, I do indulge myself a little the more in pleasure, knowing that this is the proper age of my life to do it; and, out of my observation that most men that do thrive in the world do forget to take pleasure during the time that they are getting their estate, but reserve that till they have got one, and then it is too late for them to enjoy it.””
— Samuel Pepys
“He that will not stoop for a pin will never be worth a pound.””
— Samuel Pepys
“And so to bed.””
— Samuel Pepys
“Great talk among people how some of the Fanatiques do say that the end of the world is at hand, and that next Tuesday is to be the day. Against which, whenever it shall be, good God fit us all!””
— Samuel Pepys
“I find it a hard matter to settle to business after so much leisure and pleasure.””
— Samuel Pepys
“Now public business takes up so much of my time that I must get time a Sundays or a nights to look after my own matters.””
— Samuel Pepys
“neighbour of ours, Mr. Hollworthy, a very able man, is also dead by a fall in the country from his horse, his foot hanging in the stirrup, and his brains beat out.””
— Samuel Pepys
“I saw the girl of the house, being very pretty, go into a chamber, and I went in after her and kissed her.””
— Samuel Pepys
