Our Hidden Lives

hile I was in Edinburgh, I read 'Our Hidden Lives' by Simon Garfield. He has edited together extracts from five diaries between May 1945 and July 1948, written by ordinary people in different parts of the country as part of the Mass Observation project.

The period chosen covers some momentous changes: the end of World War Two, the first atomic bombs, additional rationing imposed after the end of the war, women leaving the workforce in large numbers as soldiers return, the growing threat of the Cold War and the unwelcome introduction of the Welfare State. There is a startling amount of anti-semitism that is not shaken by discovering the extent of the Holocaust.

The writers talk of future events they consider to be many lifetimes away - humans returning alive from a journey to the moon, the end of coal supplies in Britain - and about issues still prevalent today - the rise of crime, rude behaviour, the extinction of tigers. They write poetry and wonder why they don't get higher scores in the allotment competions. One thinks it quite reasonable to ask shops for a book that contains all the prime numbers "up to, say, five million".

At times there is an air of self-consciousness, but mostly we see far into the details of these writers' lives, and the result is far more interesting than if solidified into a dry, third-person history book. It's a privilege to be allowed to read this, and I look forward to the paperback version of Simon Garfield's follow-up, 'We Are At War'.

The Mass Observation Archive is still running, and looking for volunteers. They seem to focus more on specific themes than general diaries. The current directive covers sex, public libraries and hurricanes in the USA.