Diary of Samuel Pepys — Volume 34: March/April 1664-65

Samuel Pepys’s diary offers a rare, day‑by‑day glimpse into life in Restoration London. As a senior clerk at the Admiralty, he records the bustle of government business alongside the more intimate moments of family and friendship, capturing the texture of a city still healing from civil war and plague.

In the March‑April entries of 1664‑65, Pepys juggles a promise to his wife, a modest sum for Easter clothing, and the inevitable marital tiffs that follow. He attends a lecture by Robert Hooke on the newly spotted comet, noting the excitement of early scientific debate, and pays his admission to the fledgling Royal Society, where discussions of French bread and experimental philosophy leave him both fascinated and a little out of depth. His pages also detail meetings with naval officials, negotiations over ship‑building costs, and the social choreography of dinner parties, markets, and late‑night coach rides.

These passages paint a vivid portrait of a man striving to balance public duty with private desire, while the surrounding world of commerce, learning, and emerging empire unfolds around him. Listeners will hear the cadence of 17th‑century speech and the timeless humor of everyday concerns, all set against the backdrop of a rapidly changing England.