Sarah Cowper's Diary, Volume 1

Language: English

Context and purpose

D/EP F29 is the first of seven diary volumes written by Cowper over a period of sixteen years. This first volume is comprised of entries written daily from 25 July 1700 through 31 December 1702, with the exception of 14-24 March 1702, when a fever rendered Cowper incapable of writing. The entries range from a few lines to almost a page in length.

On the opening flyleaf, the author situates herself within "a Protestant, elite tradition of writing" (Kugler, p.9); she quotes David Lloyd's claim that "Sir John Cheke preceptor to Edward the Sixth, was the first that brought a diary into use; and his pupil the next that practised it"(Lloyd, p.194). Cowper's diary is, in part, a religious journal, in which she notes church holy days and her monthly receiving of the sacrament, meditates on biblical passages and assesses her spiritual condition. Yet the diary also reflects Cowper's "thirty-year practice of compiling commonplace books", for she frequently copies into it poems, letters, stories and speeches, and she also indexes each of the diary volumes, just as she did her commonplace books (Kugler, p.7).

Unlike her earlier volumes, though, the diary allows for more explicitly personal expression, and Cowper repeatedly vents her views and emotions. Kugler claims that a variety of factors led the author to switch genres: "The combination of a desperately unhappy marriage, insecure social standing, a lifelong habit of reading and writing, and the crisis of Spencer's trial prompted Sarah Cowper to begin a diary in July 1700" (p.3). In her first diary volume, Cowper mentions several times her son's trial for suspected murder of a Quaker woman, and it is likely that the public scandal encouraged her to try a private means of expressing herself; however, whilst the trial may have been the immediate catalyst for the diary, in this first volume the author writes more frequently, and with more obvious passion, about her long-standing marital problems. Cowper unreservedly complains about her husband's stinginess (p.3), lack of respect for the church (p.20), and abuse of her, both verbal (p.13) and physical (p.185). One of the few times Sir William accedes to her wishes, she is so stunned that she marvels, "Sure 'tis an omen of my approaching death, or perhaps, happening in the reign of Queen Anne 'tis a sign the power of women will increase"(p.203). For the most part, they live in discord, and Cowper asserts, "Sure to live with Sir William and his tools must be the Emblem of Hell" (p.7). Sir William's "tools" are the domestic servants; his consistent undermining of her authority over them and his lack of concern about their immorality are recurring themes in the diary's first three volumes.

In light of Cowper's unhappy domestic situation, it is not surprising that she turns to the solitary activities of writing and reading. She notes that while some may think "writing so much, a very dull drudgery", she finds it "otherwise", arguing, "At worst, it may be allowed an employment as significant as any sort of work I can do"(p.67). That she also busies herself with the "diversion of reading" is apparent from her frequent references in the diary to books (p.12). Cowper writes of being edified by the Life of Bishop Ussher and Herbert's religious poems. She is less complimentary about secular works, stating after a preliminary glance at Cervantes'Don Quixote, "For fifty guineas I would not be hired to peruse it all over, for I fancy it would so stun me I should never read book more"(pp.97-98). Throughout her diary, Cowper demonstrates a keen interest in history; in the first volume, after reading an abstract of the Civil War from Jeremy Collier'sDictionary, she declares that both the Royalists and the Parliamentarians were "a pack of self ended knaves that disturbed honest people"(p.110)

In addition to reading other people's writings, Cowper also reviews her own, as is indicated by marginal notes amending entries from the vantage point of a later time (pp.75,113). The author herself appears to have been the primary audience for the diary during her life. Cowper notes that she records her husband's injustices on paper for her own "review and use", rather than telling them to others, because she has often observed that "the complainer is generally more blamed than the wrong doer" (p.160). Yet Cowper does seem to envision a posthumous readership. Like many contemporary female authors, she demonstrates an acute consciousness of audience while apologising for her work, observing, "If hereafter . . . [the diary volumes] come to be seen of others, it must needs to them be unintelligible stuff" (p.176). As yet, no evidence has emerged that points conclusively to anyone reading the diary immediately after Cowper's death.