The Diary of a Nobody

Further Reading

Faber & Faber Book of Diaries, edited by Simon Brett (London: Faber & Faber, 1987). An unintentionally funny compendium of diaries by people from all backgrounds – the famous through to the ‘nobodies’ – including Samuel Pepys, John Evelyn, the Revd James Woodforde et al, and presented on a day-by-day basis. Many entries are so Pooterish they could have been out-takes from The Diary of a Nobody.

Tony Joseph, George Grossmith, Biography of a Savoyard (Bristol: Tony Joseph, 1982). Not a heavyweight biography, but suitable enough for its subject although more useful for Gilbert & Sullivan historians than Diary of a Nobody lovers.

J. B. Priestley, English Humour (London: Heinemann, 1976). A readable and lucid commentary on English humour throughout the ages with an extract from The Diary of a Nobody.

David Thorns, Suburbia (London: Paladin, 1972). One of many good accounts of how the strange English landscape called suburbia arose, particularly during Victorian times.

Keith Waterhouse, The Collected Letters of a Nobody (London: Michael Joseph, 1986). In The Diary of a Nobody Pooter alludes to writing some twenty letters, none of which we see. Waterhouse takes this as his cue and writes these letters as Pooter may have done. He also creates many more, corresponding with the manager of the local railway line about the excessive number of trains passing by that aren’t listed in Bradshaw’s timetable, to Jerome K. Jerome urging him not to publish an account of a boating holiday, to a variety of tradesmen, neighbours, Cummings and Gowing, and of course to the editor of the Blackfriars Bi-Weekly News complaining about the misspelling of his name. The funniest are those involving Lupin. At one stage Waterhouse’s Pooter writes to a Dr Hector M’Gallum at Freshfields Asylum for Idiots & Imbeciles ‘on behalf of a friend’ who has a ‘highly-strung’ son: ‘Is there any pill… that may be obtained which could be given to the boy to quieten him down?’

——, Mrs. Pooter’s Diary (London: Michael Joseph, 1983). Waterhouse believes we know too little about Carrie – what she thinks of her husband, his awkwardness, bad jokes, dead-end job, lack of ambition and incorrigible friends. What does she do all day while he’s at the office? In Waterhouse’s ingenious book she keeps a diary based largely on plot lines hinted at but not followed through in The Diary of a Nobody.

THE DIARY OF A NOBODY originally appeared in Punch, and is re-published by permission of the publishers, Messrs Bradbury and Agnew. The Diary has been since considerably added to. The excellent title was suggested by our mutual friend