The Private Life of the Diary

Diaries keep secrets; they harbour fantasies and fictional histories. They are substitute boyfriends, girlfriends, husband and wives and sometimes children. But in the 21st century, diary writing is on the wane: the dignified space of the private diary has been replaced by a culture of public blurting on social media. Taking its lead from the great twentieth century diarist, Virginia Woolf, this study of the diary as an art form moves backwards towards works of Woolf’s diary ancestor, Samuel Pepys. Together, Woolf and Pepys act as godparents of the diary form, drawing together several other diary-relatives: Sylvia Plath, George Orwell, James Boswell, Oscar Wilde, Alan Clark, Dorothy Wordsworth, Lord Byron, and Adrian Mole, among others.

Diaries are forms of autobiography and they record lives as they are lived, moment to moment. Interlacing the author’s own coming of age story with that of her journal, this book weaves together a story of the diary from nativity to death.

(William Collins 2020)

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Reviews for The Private Life of the Diary:

"A masterly study on the 'long historical habit' of diary writing... Bayley's book succeeds brilliantly in merging scholarship with imagination, and emotional depth with writerly flair." - Independent

"A delight for fans of Sylvia Plath as well as diary writers everywhere." - Woman's Way Ireland

"An elegant survey of diaries through history and why we keep them . . . Bayley is splendidly dismissive of blogs – sending boring screeds into "a blank universe" – and when she defined tweeting as "a sort of premature mental ejaculation" I wrote in the margin in Sylvia Plath-size letters with a Magic Marker: Brava, Sally!" - Roger Lewis, The Times

“A really lovely book. Easy to read, well structured and slightly whimsical… keeps you reaching for the next page.” - Goodreads

“This is a rare and wonderful read. Without any of the heaviness of the academic, it is a scholarly study by an outstanding Oxford University teacher… Her thoughts are wide-ranging and often original, expressed in prose that prances along.” - Amazon Review