The Diary of a Nobody

Book excerpt: The Diary of a Nobody, the spoof diary of Charles Pooter, a London clerk, first appeared as a book in 1892 and has never been out of print since. The hilariously trivial doings of the accident-prone Pooter, his wife Carrie and their troublesome son Lupin have inspired many writers since, including the authors of Bridget Jones’s Diary and The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole. The satirical novelist Evelyn Waugh called it “the funniest book in the world.” This enduring classic of Victorian social comedy is now available in a newly edited Broadview edition. This edition includes a critical introduction, comprehensive notes on the many historical allusions in the text, and a wide selection of relevant contemporary materials on the clerk’s life, suburbia, spiritualism, and domestic economy. A selection of Weedon Grossmith’s original illustrations also accompanies the novel.