Doug Quixote

Annotations and comments

Doug Quixote has posted 15 annotations/comments since 23 October 2016.

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Third Reading

About Friday 3 June 1664

Doug Quixote  •  Link

A confusing sentence?

The key is here:
"The hyphen in the L&M text is a 'double hyphen,' which indicates that it represents Pepys' text."
Michael Robinson, 2007 entry).

Noting that Pepys' shorthand omitted nearly all punctuation, what we have is the editors' best
guesses.

If you punctuate:

". . . so as I would not have the buying of an acre of land bought by the -- ;Duke of York and Mr. Coventry for aught I see being the only two that do anything like men."

Insert the words "Tangiers Committee" where the double hyphen is, (and where Pepys left a gap) as MR suggests.

A less likely alternative, doing the text less violence, is the possibility that "the" is actually meant to read "them" in the shorthand.

Second Reading

About Thursday 13 February 1661/62

Doug Quixote  •  Link

At the risk of adding to a discussion 17 years in the past, the "do" issue argued out here would have appealed to Jonathan Swift, whose Big-Enders fought a war with the Little-Enders over which end of an egg should be cut . . . (Gullivers Travels)

About Wednesday 6 February 1660/61

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Cap in hand - a translation from Ovid's Latin by Golding, 1567 (Golding was Edward De Vere's uncle, and Latin tutor - De Vere was then 17 years old) and the same phrase used by Shakespeare in Henry V . . . how many coincidences does it take to amount to a certainty?

About Monday 23 July 1660

Doug Quixote  •  Link

"in consideration of ...". A Deed under seal does not need consideration for it to be enforceable, and Sam objects to his nice neatly drawn up and engrossed Deed having to suffer an interlineation.

But it's pretty obvious that there is in fact consideration, Pepys promising to pay and Barlow promising not to assert his right to the post. Belt and braces approach from Barlow . . . and SP sensibly allows it.

About Tuesday 7 February 1659/60

Doug Quixote  •  Link

King Edward I's witticism "A man does good business when he rids himself of a turd" dates to about 1290. (Referring to Scotland, as he handed over local control to a subordinate :) )

About Friday 16 January 1662/63

Doug Quixote  •  Link

As regards Captain Brewer, though as noted he was a master painter this does not preclude him from being a military officer. Remember the context for Pepys' older contemporaries: the entire country had been in civil war from 1642 (21 years before this diary entry) until 1650 or thereabouts. A master painter would be as logical a choice for an officer as any other in those circumstances, and the custom was and is to call an ex-officer by his onetime rank.

About Friday 24 October 1662

Doug Quixote  •  Link

"Double standard for the Queen"? Yes, but the double standard was actually between the monarch (male or female) and the consort. Henry V111 executed two wives and their supposed lovers, for it is and was high treason to have intercourse with the Queen and the Princess of Wales. But Elizabeth 1 had many lovers (not all documented) and Catherine the Great of Russia had even more and varied sexual activities . . .

Thus it was not a male/female double standard but a monarch/consort double standard.

I wonder what might have happened had Mary 11 (a joint sovereign with William 111) had had lovers?

Any views on that?

About Monday 15 February 1668/69

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Wikipedia claim that Jasmine was first recorded in English to mean a colour in 1925 (!). If Pepys meant that palest yellow colour - which the context suggests - then Wikipedia's claim is 256 years out.

I note also above pepfie's comment from 2012 that the 17th Earl of Oxford first introduced scented gloves to England in about 1576. And that Shakespeare frequently mentioned them . . . hardly surprising given that Oxford is the prime candidate for true authorship of Shakespeare's works.

About Monday 23 March 1667/68

Doug Quixote  •  Link

The discussion regarding Shylock is given an entirely different slant if Edward De Vere (who went to Italy and Venice in particular for nearly a year) was in fact the Bard. He met and dealt with Jews and those who loved to hate them. The plays set in Italy make a great deal more sense if De Vere the 17th Earl of Oxford was the author.

About Friday 29 November 1667

Doug Quixote  •  Link

And people wonder why we read Pepys' diary! This entry is so excellent for its honesty and how well it is written. It would be easy to say "Woken by loud knocking noises this morning; turned out to be only the chimney sweeps."

Don Quixote indeed!

About Saturday 16 November 1667

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Further to the prospect of impeaching the Duke of York, his offices of State included being Lord High Admiral. The defeat of the Navy in the recent war would give grounds for believing that his efforts were not up to scratch. If the detractors perceived a cooling between him and the King, his position was no longer sacrosanct.

About Wednesday 23 October 1667

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Credentials: in a stratified society like 17th century England, how one dressed indicated one's standing in society. If a suitably dressed person presented himself and stated that he was an officer of the Navy Board, that would gain him access just about anywhere.

(And woe betide anyone caught out impersonating one of their betters!)

About Tuesday 22 October 1667

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Noteworthy is that Wheatley (the Diary's editor, ca 1900) had long since given up censoring out Pepys references to his wife's menses. He even lets through other references which earlier in his editorship would have been the victim of his ellipses. But not all.

Victorian prudishness extended to Shakespeare (viz Bowdler), and they probably tried to do the same to the Bible - all that begetting and laying must have set them wincing . . .

About Wednesday 16 October 1667

Doug Quixote  •  Link

Greetings. I've revisited this blog recently and as a lurker caught up with every entry since virtual day one. My heartfelt thanks to you all for the annotations.

As regards the issue of a standing army, the country was then just two decades on from the Civil War between Parliament and King, with not one but two standing armies raging about the kingdom. The people are entitled to be a little concerned about a standing army in 1667.