When I started transcribing my grandmother's diaries many years ago, I looked forward to finding out what she thought about matters of national and international import, and to some juicy family gossip. I was to be sorely disillusioned as there was precious little of either. I soon learnt that what interested her above all was her state of health, that of her three sisters and her brother, and to a lesser extent, that of her daughters, and to an even lesser extent, that of her grandchildren! It gradually dawned on me that, for my grandmother, the diary was above all a discipline, a means of giving some structure to the passing days. As far as I can tell, she never missed a single day, just as, I am prepared to bet, she never looked back on what she had written. It is not that she derived any pleasure from what she wrote, but she would have felt worse if she hadn't written anything at all.
My sister and cousins have left accounts of Gran that show her in a very different light, as someone warm, friendly, vivacious and even slightly rakish; it just goes to show that one should not rush to judge anyone on the strength of any one source.
My memory is so unreliable that I would not even try to add to the reminiscences provided by others in the family;. Instead, I would like to attempt a more distanced view of Gran, confining myself to the picture that emerges from her diaries.
Insofar as I can tell, she was born, brought up and lived as a member of the upper-middle class, with overtones of the military! She started life against the background of 19th century Anglo-Irish society and died, two world wars later, in the same year as the May 1968 riots in Paris. She was, I think it is fair to say, largely sheltered from the social upheavals of the mid-twentieth century in a way that her children were not. That does not mean that she was unaware of the changes sweeping through the country, simply that she did not record them in her diary which, as I have suggested, served another purpose. Nor does it mean that she did not know what it meant to scrimp and save. Indeed, the evidence suggests that she was far better at keeping to a budget than her impoverished yet profligate grandson. It just goes to show that thrift is as much a matter of temperament as of circumstances!
My sister and cousins have left accounts of Gran that show her in a very different light, as someone warm, friendly, vivacious and even slightly rakish; it just goes to show that one should not rush to judge anyone on the strength of any one source.
My memory is so unreliable that I would not even try to add to the reminiscences provided by others in the family;. Instead, I would like to attempt a more distanced view of Gran, confining myself to the picture that emerges from her diaries.
Insofar as I can tell, she was born, brought up and lived as a member of the upper-middle class, with overtones of the military! She started life against the background of 19th century Anglo-Irish society and died, two world wars later, in the same year as the May 1968 riots in Paris. She was, I think it is fair to say, largely sheltered from the social upheavals of the mid-twentieth century in a way that her children were not. That does not mean that she was unaware of the changes sweeping through the country, simply that she did not record them in her diary which, as I have suggested, served another purpose. Nor does it mean that she did not know what it meant to scrimp and save. Indeed, the evidence suggests that she was far better at keeping to a budget than her impoverished yet profligate grandson. It just goes to show that thrift is as much a matter of temperament as of circumstances!
It's interesting why people keep diaries! I've only ever managed about three weeks before I get bored, but you kept a diary for years - can you remember the reason? We have a mutual friend on Skye who still keeps hers, and I know she often re-reads as well as using them as a helpful memorandum. I'm sure you are right about Gran persisting as a matter of discipline. She took on the diaries from our grandfather when he was dying, and perhaps felt it to be some link with him which was also a duty? In extreme old age it became her grasp on reality, I think, like cleaning her teeth - if I have cleaned my teeth and written up my diary I must still be alive! I wish you remembered Gran more clearly, who was often unwittingly extremely funny.
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