Samuel Pepys

Subject: Samuel Pepys
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 07 Aug 00 - 11:41 AM

I was recently turned towards Samuel Pepys by a woman who argued softly that the world ended as WW1 began... and as I could not refute her logic, I found myself purchasing a condensed version of his Diary. Is he considered a resonable resource? A most enjoyable man!

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 07 Aug 00 - 11:55 AM

One of my all time best friends (I tend to think that way about diarists).

He's one hell of a good source Thomas. How many people do we know who not only RAVE about the "new" ballad of Barb'ry Allen....but sleep with with the singer as well?!

Oh, and like him, she too was married.

His story of buying an expensive French Harp for his wife (knowing full well she wouldn't play it) and then moving it into HIS music room, is one of my all-time favourite "human nature" stories.

Finally, how could a Mudcatter not love a man who never went anywhere without his Flageolette in his pocket?

Rick

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Mick Lowe
Date: 07 Aug 00 - 06:04 PM

A good source for what Thomas?... he wasn't short of sauce, that's for certain.. though I too have only seen condensed extracts.. i.e. not had the priviledge to see the original or verify the work of whoever it was that cracked his code..

He touched on so much of what was everyday life for him which for us are significant milestones in history, his diaries are great for just dipping into and becoming absorbed into the world of the seventeenth century..

I can't help wondering what he would have done if armed with a laptop and had the internet at his disposal...

Mick

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 07 Aug 00 - 06:16 PM

Not always his flageolette Rick, sometimes he was just pleased to see'em. And so to bed...

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 07 Aug 00 - 09:52 PM

Jaysus! Only four of us? What about "Banish Misfortune"? What about those weekly "song circles"? How 'bout those Coffee Houses? What about all that fornicatin'?

How right you are Fionn, old Sam was happy to see a LOT of people....and he didn't mind his own company as well!

Rick

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Noreen
Date: 08 Aug 00 - 01:01 PM

While I am aware of Mr. Pepys as an authority and resource for stories of daily life at the time- fleeing from the fire of London after burying his cheese in the garden to save it, and his many dalliances, etc.- I didn't know of him as a musician and want to know more!

Is the condensed diary widely available, Thomas?

Noreen

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 08 Aug 00 - 01:21 PM

After Pepys gave up keeping his diary he started collecting broadside ballads and chapbooks/histories/garlands. His library is at Cambridge University and they have published many volumes based on his library. His broadside ballad collection, over 1700 of them, was published in 5 volumes in 1987, and all are listed in the broadside ballad index on my website (Mudcat's Links). Prior to that Roger Thompson published in 1976 'Saumel Pepys' Penny Merriments' which gives excerpts from some of the chapbooks, histories and garlands, and gives a complete listing of Pepys 3 volumes of them on pp. 297-302.

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Kim C
Date: 08 Aug 00 - 01:42 PM

It's been years since I read any Pepys, and I'm not sure what he has to do with WWI, but I can say that diaries from any time period are a great indicator of what was REALLY going on. Historians are usually concerned with dates and locations and who won and who lost, so the daily lives of the people tend to get buried under the "important" stuff. But it was the people who lived through it, and their stories are equally important.

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 08 Aug 00 - 01:43 PM

Noreen, the best value for money in the UK is probably a Book Club Associates (Guild Publishing) edition, "The Shorter Pepys" edited by Robert Latham and published about ten years ago. It's often in second-hand bookshops for about GPB5.00, or search secondhand books on the net, where dealers are now getting themselves well organised. Latham was joint editor of an edition of the full diary, published by Bell & Hyman in stages throughout the 1970s, in about a dozen volumes. Even the "Shorter" Pepys runs to 1,000 pages or more. The tragedy is that he ever stopped writing it. It would have been interesting to have his eye-witness account of the so-called Glorious Revolution, for instance.

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 08 Aug 00 - 11:12 PM

refresh!

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: WyoWoman
Date: 09 Aug 00 - 01:52 AM

What is a flageolette? It sounds like what those perfectly coifed and pulled together women we alternately despise and envy do in the privacy of the little girls' loo...

ww

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Noreen
Date: 09 Aug 00 - 04:31 AM

WyoWoman, a flageolet is a variety of kidney bean.

But I think the flageolet(te) that SP carried around with him was probably a tin whistle. :0-

Fionn- thanks for the info. I'll look out for it.

Noreen

Subject: RE: Samuel Pepys
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 09 Aug 00 - 12:57 PM

Hi Wyo. How are you doing?

Sam's Flageolette was pretty elaborate. More like a keyed flute than a tin whistle. He was a very valuable guy as well as a horny one!

Rick