Addison’s Spectator
Joseph Addison (ca. 1703-1712)
Painting by Godfrey Kneller
A
300-year-old Blog….
What a life! Open up a volume of this set of eight little
calf-bound books and enter a different world.
Imagine yourself as a “Gentleman”, whose main duty each day was to get
up and have yourself dressed by your faithful manservant, partake of a
leisurely breakfast, then decide how to occupy yourself?
“I know! I’ll take a nice walk. Into the fields. Lovely day, light wind
blowing from south southeast.
“Then, sit down and smoke my
pipe, and have a pot of tea. Darn—that
servant, Ralph, has misplaced my tobacco box.
The quality of servants these days is abysmal.
“It’s 2 p.m., and time for my
dinner. Today, I’m having a knuckle of teal
and bacon, and sprouts. (I must remember
to talk to cook—the sprouts aren’t quite up to it.)
“3 p.m. Time for my nap. *Yawn* I am absolutely exhausted!
“4 p.m. Off to the Coffee
House. Reading the news from abroad. Zounds!
The Grand Vizier has been strangled!
Mr. Nisby has an opinion on the whole thing in Instanbul. Charles XII of Sweden has been imprisoned
after Peter beat him at Poltava, and the Turks are up in arms. They are raising an army of 250,000. Interesting. Those Turks!
“6 p.m. Time for a visit to
my club. Mr. Nisby is holding forth
about the Turks, and the Grand Vizier.”
London in the days of Addison
Addison,
however, is not the lightweight fop you might imagine. These eight little volumes of The
Spectator are filled with bright and lively thoughts of a well educated
man.
For instance,
on Friday, January 4, 1712 he begins with a quote in Latin, then its
translation: “I look upon it as my Master-piece, that I have found out how a
young Fellow may know the Disposition and Behaviour of Harlots, and by early
knowing come to detest them.”
He launches into a tale
of a recent evening when he was walking near Covent Garden when he was touched
on the elbow by a slim young girl of about 17 “who with a pert air asked if I
was for a pint of wine.” Then he stands
there and beholds her comely beauty…. finest neck and bosom, most agreeable
shape... a woman exquisitely beautiful.
But then, before he can fall to her charms, he switches to tell the reader
about a scene from Fletcher’s Plays, in which a character admirably describes
the whole economy of Whoredom.
“Her Maiden-head will yield me, let me see
now;
She
is not fifteen they say: for her complexion---Cloe, Cloe, Cloe, here I have
her,……
The
body neatly built; she strikes a lute well,
Sings
most enticingly…
Her
Maiden-head will amount to some three hundred, or three hundred and fifty
crowns, ‘twill bear it handsomely.
Her
Father’s poor, some little share deducted,
To
buy him a hunting nag----”
In one entry, Addison describes the
plight of a woman who had many lovers but then had small pox and lost her
beauty.
Next he turns to a
discussion of the nature of John Milton’s poem, Paradise Lost, and in another bloviates about the elevated
intellectual value of English plays as opposed to Italian operas.
He decides to conduct an
experiment by staying awake for 24 hours and roaming all over London Covent
Garden , the hackney-coachmen, the chimney-sweepers, the fruit
wenches, and much more.
Addison introduces
himself to his reader in Volume 1, relating that he was born to a small
hereditary estate in England
Addison left university
when he became impatient with a thirst for knowledge, and traveled all over
Europe, and to Cairo
He then reports that his
life style is one of a SPECTATOR, as in
latter years he is everywhere, in most public places. He’s been seen sticking his head into a Round
of Politicians at Will’s. He smokes a pipe at Child’s, and overhears the
conversation at every table in the room.
He appears on Sunday
nights at St. James Coffee-house. His
face is likewise well known at The Grecian, the Cocoa-Tree and in the theatres
both at Drury Lane
He has made himself a
speculative statesman, soldier, merchant, artisan without ever meddling with
any practical part in life.
So, Addison
is the quintessential Spectator, and these little volumes bear that out.
The Spectator: Eight little volumes by Addison
Addison’s
Spectator—Daily Life in England
Spectator;
Daily entries 1711-1714, in Eight
Volumes by Joseph Addison 1744 London , England :
J. & R. Tonson in the Strand . Addison uses
his marvelous education to provide daily doses of wisdom and humor to his
readers over the years 1711 to 1714, in 635 entries. Originally published
daily, this 1744 version includes all 635.
Entries start with an apt quotation in Latin or Greek, followed by its
translation into English, and then a refreshing discourse that is delightful
after four centuries. It gives the
modern reader an interesting and entertaining picture of what Englishmen were
doing and thinking in the early 18th century. The daily diary of an Englishman
reproduced in Vol. IV shows how Addison uses
the mundane entries of a gentleman to teach readers a lesson. 2612 pp. 10 x
17.4 cm. Eight duodecimo volumes in calf with five-ribbed spines with gilt
design. Boards are worn, and three of eight have detached front or back boards,
or nearly so. (V.1 front board detached, pencil notes on front pastedown;
V.2 front hinge cracked; V. 4 front
hinge cracked, back cover nearly detached; V. 7 front board detached, back
board cracked.) Text blocks on all are
excellent. Thus overall, poor. (5277) $160.00 Printed matter.
There
were some 600,000 souls in London
If
you walked the streets of London
A
fire in 1666 had burned much of London
Besides
the smell of excrement and dead bodies, people wore the same clothes month in
and month out, and so there was plenty of body odor. Coal was used to heat every house and there
was thick smoke that made most days smoggy, and there was soot everywhere. Many people were coughing and hacking with
much tuberculosis. Of a thousand babies born, half would never live to be two
years old.
Down
in the neighborhood near the Tower were many butchers’ stalls and there they
threw out the intestines and other refuse of the animals they butchered, and
all that mess just rotted in the streets. People got their drinking water from
the Thames , which was also dark with excrement
and every other sort of pollution.
Crime
was everywhere, cheap gin was the drink of choice, and many stayed drunk on it
as long as they could find a penny to buy a pot of it.
Except
for The Spectator, London
An
English Gentleman’s Journal, 1712:
MONDAY,
eight o 'clock.--I put on my clothes
and walked into the parlour.
Nine
o 'clock, ditto--Tied my knee-strings and washed my hands.
Hours
ten, eleven, and twelve.--Smoked three pipes of Virginia
One
o 'clock in the afternoon.--Chid Ralph for mislaying my tobacco-box.
Two
o 'clock.--Sat down to dinner. Mem: Too many plums and no sewet.
From
three to four.--Took my afternoon's nap.
From
four to six.--Walked into the fields. Wind S.S.E.
From
six to ten.--At the club, Mr. Nisby's opinion about the peace.
Ten
o 'clock.--Went to bed, slept sound.
TUESDAY
(being holiday), eight o 'clock.--Rose
as usual.
Nine
o 'clock.--Washed hands and face, shaved, put on my double-soled shoes.
Ten,
eleven, twelve.--Took a walk to Islington.
One.--Took
a pot of Mother Cob's mild.
Between
two and three.--Returned: dined on a knuckle of teal and bacon. Mem.:
Sprouts wanting.
Three--Nap
as usual.
From
four to six.-Coffee-house. Read the news. A dish of twist. Grand Vizier
strangled.
[NOTE: Grand Vizier,
answers only to the Sultan in Ottoman Empire . Gürcü Ağa Yusuf Pasha (1711–1712) was GV in this case.]
From
six to ten.--At the club. Mr. Nisby's account of the great Turk.
Ten--Dream
of the Grand Vizier. Broken sleep.
WEDNESDAY,
eight o 'clock. --Tongue of my
shoe-buckle broke. Hands, but not face.
Nine.--Paid
off the butcher's bill. Mem.: To be allowed for the last leg of mutton.
Ten,
eleven.--At the Coffee-house. More work in the North. Stranger in a black wig
asked me how
stocks
went.
From
twelve to one.--Walked in the fields. Wind to the south.
From
one to two.--Smoked a pipe and a half.
Two.--Dined
as usual. Stomach good.
Three.--Nap
broke by the falling of a pewter dish.
Mem.:
Cookmaid in love, and grown careless.
From
four to six.--At the coffee-house. Advice from Smyma, that the Grand Vizier was
first of all strangled arid afterwards beheaded.
Six
o 'clock in the evening.--Was half-an-hour in the club before anybody else
came. Mr. Nisby of opinion, that the Grand Vizier was not strangled the sixth
instant.
Ten
at night. --Went to bed. Slept without waking till nine next morning.
THURSDAY,
nine o 'clock. --Stayed within till
two o'clock for Sir Timothy; who did not bring me my annuity according to his
promise.
Two
in the afternoon .--Sat down to dinner. Loss of appetite. Small-beer sour. Beef
overcorned.
Three.--Could
not take my nap.
Four
and five--Gave Ralph a box on the ear. Turned off my cookmaid. Sent a message
to Sir Timothy. Mem.: did not go to the club to-night. Went to bed at nine
o'clock.
FRIDAY.--Passed the morning in meditation upon Sir Timothy, who
was with me a quarter before twelve.
Twelve
o 'clock.--Bought a new head to my cane and tongue to my buckle. Drank a glass
of purl to recover appetite.
Purl -
drink
An
old-fashioned winter drink of warm ale flavoured with bitters and spiked with
whisky or brandy or mixed with sweetened milk and a measure of gin, whisky or
brandy.
This view shows eight well-worn little
duodecimo volumes of
The Spectator by Addison .
Two front covers are loose.
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