What COVID diaries have in common with Samuel Pepys' 17th-century plague diaries
The UK’s former chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance’s diaries have been a key source of evidence, exposing the chaos within government at the time.
- The UK’s former chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance’s diaries have been a key source of evidence, exposing the chaos within government at the time.
- In my PhD research, I’ve been exploring the COVID diaries of ordinary people, as well as diaries kept during the Great Plague of London in 1665-66.
- I’ve been looking specifically at 13 COVID diaries donated to the Borthwick Institute for Archives and the East Riding Archives, both in Yorkshire.
- I have been reading Pepys’s diaries alongside the modern COVID diaries, and have been struck by the common themes in how people navigated their pandemic experiences.
Recording statistics
- Throughout the COVID pandemic, statistics of cases and deaths were everywhere, and were key to how we judged the impact of the virus.
- All of the modern and historical diaries I have looked at include these statistics – some sparingly, others with meticulous regularity.
The blame game
- As cases rose, restrictions were enforced and the effects of plague and COVID loomed large in the lives of our diarists, narratives shifted to confusion and blame.
- And in spite to well people, would breathe in the faces … of well people going by.
- In the heighth of it, how bold people there were to go in sport to one another’s burials.
- And in spite to well people, would breathe in the faces … of well people going by.
Staying positive
- A more optimistic theme to emerge in the diaries was the ability to find positivity amid the chaos.
- Pepys and modern diarists were thankful for the blessings of health, family and security.
- They praised those who went the extra mile to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on those around them, despite the risk to their own health.
- It must be awful to live ten floors up in a high rise block with two children, and not be allowed out except for once per day.
- But by exploring the innermost thoughts of people with an element of shared experience, we see that fundamental aspects of the human condition endure.
- When faced with uncertainty and upheaval, our instincts are to record, find answers, and reclaim joy.
Mary Rehman receives funding from University of Hull Doctoral College