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buddhafish 's review for:
The Diary of a Nobody
by Weedon Grossmith, George Grossmith
[18th book of 2021. Artist for this review is Weedon Grossmith, who illustrates the novel.]
3.5. This seems like a fairly suitable read for the point I’m at now, lifting the restraints I put on myself early this year regarding reading, mostly ensuring that I read novels from 1800-1930. I’ve read a lot of Victorian fiction this year, more than I would normally. The Diary of a Nobody is a comic novel, a satire of the 19th century, first published in 1892. People usually talk about a “biting satire” and though this bites, it bites the playfulness of a puppy; it is good-natured, it laughs at itself as well as the century it is coming from. In a way, it reads like a novel ahead of its time.
The humour is fairly mild but the novel appears to know it’s mild—I feel like the Grossmith brothers were laughing at Pooter [the narrator] as much as the reader is supposed to. There were some humorous parts, and many puns. My close friends will know the fastest way to lose my respect is to begin punning around me. Some incidents brought a smile to my face. There is one scene where Pooter makes some remark about a woman’s portrait on the wall and the man says that it is his wife’s sister, painted after death. Pooter attempts to save the awkwardness by remarking of a gentleman’s portrait, “Who is this jovial looking gentleman? Life doesn’t seem to trouble him much”, to which the man says, “No, it doesn’t. He is dead too—my brother.
The humour, whether it is truly funny or not, drives this piece. It is an epistolary novel, portrayed through Pooter’s diaries. Pooter is actually quite a great character (though his charm, and indeed the charm of the whole novel wears thin a little before the end), he believes he is remarkably funny, intelligent and witty. He often, before quoting things he has said throughout the day, reports how quick he was, or how clever he is. Of course, we laugh at him and pity him. I won’t quote any of the jokes, they aren’t brilliantly funny enough to survive their punchlines being ruined.
My rating is purely personal, then. It is a light, satirical little novel about middle-class England and I am glad to have read it. I only wanted more. It is mostly plotless, made from sketches more than anything, and never reaches a deeper or more philosophical level than its face value. Having said that, it is the portrait of an “ordinary” life and Pooter is a “nobody”, another human being bumbling through life as best as they can. We used do an exercise with books we were studying to find the “emotional core”, if we could find the whole core of the novel distilled into just a few lines. I think I found it when Pooter writes this: I always feel people are happier who live a simple unsophisticated life. I believe I am happy because I am not ambitious. I don’t necessarily disagree with Pooter on this point.
3.5. This seems like a fairly suitable read for the point I’m at now, lifting the restraints I put on myself early this year regarding reading, mostly ensuring that I read novels from 1800-1930. I’ve read a lot of Victorian fiction this year, more than I would normally. The Diary of a Nobody is a comic novel, a satire of the 19th century, first published in 1892. People usually talk about a “biting satire” and though this bites, it bites the playfulness of a puppy; it is good-natured, it laughs at itself as well as the century it is coming from. In a way, it reads like a novel ahead of its time.
The humour is fairly mild but the novel appears to know it’s mild—I feel like the Grossmith brothers were laughing at Pooter [the narrator] as much as the reader is supposed to. There were some humorous parts, and many puns. My close friends will know the fastest way to lose my respect is to begin punning around me. Some incidents brought a smile to my face. There is one scene where Pooter makes some remark about a woman’s portrait on the wall and the man says that it is his wife’s sister, painted after death. Pooter attempts to save the awkwardness by remarking of a gentleman’s portrait, “Who is this jovial looking gentleman? Life doesn’t seem to trouble him much”, to which the man says, “No, it doesn’t. He is dead too—my brother.
The humour, whether it is truly funny or not, drives this piece. It is an epistolary novel, portrayed through Pooter’s diaries. Pooter is actually quite a great character (though his charm, and indeed the charm of the whole novel wears thin a little before the end), he believes he is remarkably funny, intelligent and witty. He often, before quoting things he has said throughout the day, reports how quick he was, or how clever he is. Of course, we laugh at him and pity him. I won’t quote any of the jokes, they aren’t brilliantly funny enough to survive their punchlines being ruined.
My rating is purely personal, then. It is a light, satirical little novel about middle-class England and I am glad to have read it. I only wanted more. It is mostly plotless, made from sketches more than anything, and never reaches a deeper or more philosophical level than its face value. Having said that, it is the portrait of an “ordinary” life and Pooter is a “nobody”, another human being bumbling through life as best as they can. We used do an exercise with books we were studying to find the “emotional core”, if we could find the whole core of the novel distilled into just a few lines. I think I found it when Pooter writes this: I always feel people are happier who live a simple unsophisticated life. I believe I am happy because I am not ambitious. I don’t necessarily disagree with Pooter on this point.