A further BBC Radio 4 dramatisation of the famous diarist's writings, starring Kris Marshall and Katherine Jakeways as Mr & Mrs Pepys. Samuel Pepys was 26 when he began his diary, in January 1660. For the next ten years he faithfully recorded each day's events and confessed his innermost thoughts. In these BBC radio dramatisations, the sights and sounds of his world are vividly conjured. In these new instalments the diary focuses on events following the cataclysmic Great Fire of London in 1666. Duration: 1 hour 15 mins approx
Author
Samuel Pepys was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament, who is now most famous for his diary. Although Pepys had no maritime experience, he rose by patronage, hard work and his talent for administration, to be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under King James II. His influence and reforms at the Admiralty were important in the early professionalization of the Royal Navy. The detailed private diary he kept during 1660–1669 was first published in the nineteenth century, and is one of the most important primary sources for the English Restoration period. It provides a combination of personal revelation and eyewitness accounts of great events, such as the Great Plague of London, the Second Dutch War and the Great Fire of London. His surname is usually pronounced /'pi:ps/ ('peeps').
