Diaries

[Mandryka]

Many thanks for this very full response, Mandryka.

What I mean by your passive-aggressive stance can be gleaned by contrasting your two messages - one was full of half-references to who knows what, to a Daily Mail article from 2009, to your interesting opinions, scarcely alluded to in your intial piece, about the types of actor that you believe should be cast, why and how the Back Drops version of the diaries (which Back Drops wasn't apparently, we now learn) is in your view 'sanitised' etc. Each great claim required fleshing out, required that someone should ask you for clarification, rather than your offering it up at the first attempt. I know quite a bit about this because I've been accused of doing it by irritated friends in the past

I hope that I have explained it all adequately; your initial post irritated the pants off me but your reply is exemplary. Many thanks

I may have caught something off an old lecturer of mine whose tactic was to throw in an incredibly contentious statement at the end of a lecture/tutorial, then leave us to stew for a week until the next time we saw him - when we were full of outraged questions of the 'how could you say that?' variety. It didn't take me long to realise that he did it deliberately, just to get our minds working and sharpen our counter-arguing skills. Not that I do it deliberately, but it obviously made a big impression on me.

[Anna]

Your insight is fascinating Mandryka re Orton/Halliwell but as for Cosima Wagner's diaries, as mentioned by Richard above, yes, some moving entries, historically interesting, but not someone you could warm to surely?

[Mandryka]

Your insight is fascinating Mandryka re Orton/Halliwell but as for Cosima Wagner's diaries, as mentioned by Richard above, yes, some moving entries, historically interesting, but not someone you could warm to surely?

I can't say I warmed to Cosima much, though I did rather admire the relationship she had with RW: in many ways, an exemplary couple, doing everything together (including reading Schopenhauer 'for relaxation').

[VodkaDilc]

Alan Bennett's Untold Stories includes a substantial collection of diaries from 1996 - 2004. To quote the back cover of the book: "At times heart-rending and at others extremely funny".

I also recall enjoying Lindsay Anderson's diaries.

[Anna]

Kilvert's Diaries. Who amongst us has not had a sense of unease just occasionally, - for example, the state of near-ecstasy in which Kilvert writes of receiving the caresses of the seven-year-old Carrie Britton, his pushing ivy leaves through keyholes and his description of himself as a sleek otter, like a New Foundland dog? Perhaps some diaries are better left unpublished

[Mandryka]

Kilvert's Diaries. Who amongst us has not had a sense of unease just occasionally, - for example, the state of near-ecstasy in which Kilvert writes of receiving the caresses of the seven-year-old Carrie Britton, his pushing ivy leaves through keyholes and his description of himself as a sleek otter, like a New Foundland dog? Perhaps some diaries are better left unpublished

Never read them. Weren't they dramatised on television many years ago? Always struck me as unlikely to be racy.

[amateur51]

Alan Bennett's Untold Stories includes a substantial collection of diaries from 1996 - 2004. To quote the back cover of the book: "At times heart-rending and at others extremely funny".

I also recall enjoying Lindsay Anderson's diaries.

Alan Bennett's diary extracts have become an annual treat in London Review of Books usually published early in the year.

[amateur51]

Kilvert's Diaries. Who amongst us has not had a sense of unease just occasionally, - for example, the state of near-ecstasy in which Kilvert writes of receiving the caresses of the seven-year-old Carrie Britton, his pushing ivy leaves through keyholes and his description of himself as a sleek otter, like a New Foundland dog? Perhaps some diaries are better left unpublished

Crikey, Anna!

There's only one otter of which one is allowed to make mention on these 'ere boards

[salymap]

I love diaries and family memoirs. Vita Sackville-West, the Sitwells, Alan Clarke [!]. I own a lightweight but interesting wartime diary written by Godfrey Winn just after WW2. He was primarily a magazine writer when I was young but he manages, with his diary of his time in the Merchant Navy, to paint a vivid picture of the times we lived through. Lots more I have read but can't remember

[Mary Chambers]

I own a lightweight but interesting wartime diary written by Godfrey Winn just after WW2. He was primarily a magazine writer when I was young but he manages, with his diary of his time in the Merchant Navy, to paint a vivid picture of the times we lived through.

Godfrey Winn, Beverly Nichols, two familiar names from wartime/postwar journalism. Beverly Nichols' anti-war book Cry Havoc, written in 1937, had a big effect on me as a teenager in the 1950s.

To get back to the topic....I enjoy Parson Woodforde's Diary of a Country Parson, from the second half of the 18thC.