0:00:05 > 0:00:08My name is Adam Nicolson. I'm a writer, and ever since
0:00:08 > 0:00:12I was a teenager, I have been gripped by the 17th century.
0:00:13 > 0:00:17It was Britain's most revolutionary century, when all
0:00:17 > 0:00:22the forces of modernity began to stir under the old order, slugging
0:00:22 > 0:00:27it out on the great battlegrounds of religion and politics.
0:00:29 > 0:00:31Two civil wars, one king almost blown up,
0:00:31 > 0:00:35another with his head cut off, the third simply got rid of.
0:00:37 > 0:00:41But more important than any of that was the factor which drove
0:00:41 > 0:00:46the revolutionary changes in this first truly modern century -
0:00:46 > 0:00:48writing.
0:00:51 > 0:00:52Writing was everywhere.
0:00:52 > 0:00:57Notebooks, chapbooks, account books, business correspondence, letters,
0:00:57 > 0:01:02diaries, pamphlets, newspapers, this was the century of the written word.
0:01:04 > 0:01:07It was the first great age of self-depiction.
0:01:07 > 0:01:11All kinds of people were learning to read and write, and through
0:01:11 > 0:01:16their writings, we can know them like never before in history.
0:01:17 > 0:01:21A woman sent to prison for her conscience.
0:01:21 > 0:01:25A sailor who wanted to share his adventures.
0:01:27 > 0:01:31A solitary genius who used his notebooks to unlock
0:01:31 > 0:01:33the secrets of the universe.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36Reading and writing allowed people to question what
0:01:36 > 0:01:39they had been told, to engage in fierce debate
0:01:39 > 0:01:43and to rewrite the rules of politics and self-expression.
0:01:43 > 0:01:46This was the beginning of the age we now live in,
0:01:46 > 0:01:49the moment we left the Middle Ages behind
0:01:49 > 0:01:52and set out on the track to modernity.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55That transformation is what fascinates me
0:01:55 > 0:01:56about the 17th century.
0:02:16 > 0:02:20The early 1600s were thick with their medieval inheritance.
0:02:22 > 0:02:25People used to kneel to their vicars, to the lord of the manor,
0:02:25 > 0:02:28even to their own fathers.
0:02:28 > 0:02:32This was a world dense with deference and hierarchy.
0:02:34 > 0:02:38But this traditional society was soon to be turned
0:02:38 > 0:02:41upside-down by a violent civil war,
0:02:41 > 0:02:44a conflict waged not between rival dynasties
0:02:44 > 0:02:48but between the supporters of King and Parliament.
0:02:48 > 0:02:52It was a bitter struggle over principles, liberties,
0:02:52 > 0:02:55and different ideas of God.
0:02:56 > 0:03:00It was, in other words, an ideological war,
0:03:00 > 0:03:03fought just as much with the pen as with the sword.
0:03:08 > 0:03:12There were two big revolutions in the 1600s, one political
0:03:12 > 0:03:16and one personal. Writing drove them both.
0:03:17 > 0:03:21Words became public weapons, promoting revolutionary ideas,
0:03:21 > 0:03:23allowing people to climb the social scale.
0:03:23 > 0:03:28At the same time, diaries and autobiographies, written at every
0:03:28 > 0:03:33level of society, started to reveal the innermost workings of the self.
0:03:33 > 0:03:38These are ordinary people, not the great poets and dramatists.
0:03:38 > 0:03:40And that is what I'm going to explore -
0:03:40 > 0:03:45the first generations in this country who could write their own stories.
0:03:56 > 0:04:00I'm going to tell the story through five different characters,
0:04:00 > 0:04:03each playing a different part in this literacy revolution.
0:04:04 > 0:04:08The first is a member of the gentry who turned his account books
0:04:08 > 0:04:11into a detailed diary.
0:04:13 > 0:04:16His name was John Oglander...
0:04:17 > 0:04:21..a man who was so booked into the way things used to be that that change,
0:04:21 > 0:04:25that social revolution, looked like nothing
0:04:25 > 0:04:27but threat, or even disaster.
0:04:46 > 0:04:49Oglander lived on the Isle of Wight,
0:04:49 > 0:04:52and was the owner of thousands of acres.
0:04:52 > 0:04:59He was born in 1585, already 57 when civil war broke out in 1642.
0:05:02 > 0:05:06Deeply conservative, he loathed change.
0:05:08 > 0:05:13The island sided with Parliament against the King.
0:05:13 > 0:05:17Almost alone, Oglander remained loyal to Charles I.
0:05:20 > 0:05:24Charles believed Parliament had the right to advise him,
0:05:24 > 0:05:27but not to call the shots.
0:05:27 > 0:05:31Many members of Parliament were worried about the King's religious policies -
0:05:31 > 0:05:34fearful he wanted to destroy the people's liberties
0:05:34 > 0:05:38and even restore the Roman Catholic faith.
0:05:38 > 0:05:42Oglander, as a royalist, found himself in the thick of it.
0:05:42 > 0:05:47His wife and children all apparently on the losing side.
0:05:52 > 0:05:53In the 15th century,
0:05:53 > 0:05:57literacy was only widespread among the aristocracy and the clergy.
0:05:59 > 0:06:03But the invention of the printing press and the need to be able
0:06:03 > 0:06:07to read the Bible triggered a literacy revolution.
0:06:07 > 0:06:13For the first time, ordinary people started to write about their lives.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17John Oglander was one of them.
0:06:17 > 0:06:20Oglander wrote down every detail of that life, who he employed,
0:06:20 > 0:06:23what he paid them, his assets, his debts.
0:06:23 > 0:06:27And all of that went down into what he called his "books of accounts".
0:06:27 > 0:06:30And five of these precious, leather-bound volumes have been
0:06:30 > 0:06:34treasured ever since by the Oglander family.
0:06:37 > 0:06:41Now this is a portrait of Sir John Oglander.
0:06:41 > 0:06:46There he is, resplendent in his pink silk and his lace collar.
0:06:46 > 0:06:51Which looks a bit like a strawberry blancmange with nice raspberries bespattered on it.
0:06:51 > 0:06:55You may think so, but this will be his very expensively-purchased silk,
0:06:55 > 0:06:58- made by a good tailor... - I'll have you know!
0:06:58 > 0:07:01- I think they called them doublets, didn't they?- Yeah.
0:07:04 > 0:07:06Oglander loved to budget.
0:07:10 > 0:07:14"Sir John Oglander's book of accounts, December 20th 1642.
0:07:16 > 0:07:21- "John Curtis, my butler's bill." - Yes.- "15 and six pence.
0:07:22 > 0:07:26"For 10lbs of raisins, two and six pence."
0:07:28 > 0:07:31It's rather like keeping all your accounts from Tesco's.
0:07:33 > 0:07:39Like his ancestors, Oglander was making an audit of his money and his estate.
0:07:39 > 0:07:45But unlike those ancestors, he also began to make an account of his own self,
0:07:45 > 0:07:53of his own doubts, ambitions and life experiences, noted down on any available space.
0:07:53 > 0:07:57Essentially, he was writing one of the first diaries.
0:07:58 > 0:08:04"My son William's second son was born on the 15th March 1642."
0:08:04 > 0:08:07He says this is a book of accounts,
0:08:07 > 0:08:12but immediately launches off into stories about his children.
0:08:12 > 0:08:16Look, here is a page where he has cut half of it out.
0:08:16 > 0:08:18What's going on there?
0:08:18 > 0:08:22It was an uncomfortable time, and I think he must have gone back
0:08:22 > 0:08:28to his books and cut out bits that he felt, perhaps, were too risky to write.
0:08:28 > 0:08:32He must have lived in real fear, because that's how it was.
0:08:32 > 0:08:36It was a terrifying time and you didn't know when the dreadful knock
0:08:36 > 0:08:40on the door was going to come and you were going to be whisked away.
0:08:40 > 0:08:45So he's taken a knife and gone jaggedly, cut, cut, cut, cut, cut.
0:08:45 > 0:08:48That must have had something pretty dangerous?
0:08:48 > 0:08:51There must have been something on those pages that he really was
0:08:51 > 0:08:56frightened that the wrong people might read... Well, his life was at risk.
0:08:59 > 0:09:02What an incredible document that is.
0:09:02 > 0:09:07A book of accounts, but something much, much more than that.
0:09:07 > 0:09:10A whole life poured between its covers.
0:09:18 > 0:09:21So this is where he lived, Nunwell.
0:09:21 > 0:09:24This part of it here is where the family would have lived -
0:09:24 > 0:09:29John Oglander and his wife and children - the grand, upmarket bit of it.
0:09:29 > 0:09:33But round here, this is the working end of Nunwell.
0:09:33 > 0:09:37This is where his 13 servants, all his dairy maids, his bailiffs, coachmen,
0:09:37 > 0:09:42this is their world and to me, it's completely dripping in 17th-century atmosphere.
0:09:42 > 0:09:47There would have been a dairy here, a brewery, a still room,
0:09:47 > 0:09:52all kinds of rooms to store the produce of the farm with the huge estate he was drawing in.
0:09:55 > 0:09:59But the Civil War had already brought changes to the island.
0:09:59 > 0:10:01Oglander complained,
0:10:01 > 0:10:05"We have here a thing called a Parliamentary committee,
0:10:05 > 0:10:10"which overruled Deputy Lieutenants and also Justices of the Peace.
0:10:10 > 0:10:16"First, Ringwood the pedlar, Maynard the apothecary,
0:10:16 > 0:10:21"Matthews the baker, Wavell and Legge, farmers.
0:10:21 > 0:10:24"These men ruled the whole island
0:10:24 > 0:10:28"and did whatsoever they thought good in their own eyes.
0:10:28 > 0:10:36"These men had no tradition of ruling, no titles, yet they now had power."
0:10:36 > 0:10:41How did he react to the deep changes of the 17th century?
0:10:41 > 0:10:44I think the key change, obviously, was the Civil War
0:10:44 > 0:10:46and he reacts extremely badly to it.
0:10:46 > 0:10:53And the whole of the 17th century seems threatening to him. He is, in a way, under siege?
0:10:53 > 0:11:00Yes, I think that's right. And the more that he looks at the past, the more attractive it can seem.
0:11:00 > 0:11:04He thinks of a golden age in the Elizabethan period,
0:11:04 > 0:11:07and he then later on thinks even the 1620s were a golden age.
0:11:07 > 0:11:11- It comes creeping up behind him. - It comes creeping up behind him.
0:11:11 > 0:11:15But what about writing? What part does writing play in that?
0:11:15 > 0:11:18I think this is an interesting problem, isn't it?
0:11:18 > 0:11:20I suppose he probably starts writing - we don't know -
0:11:20 > 0:11:23but he probably starts writing mainly with practical
0:11:23 > 0:11:29purpose in mind, to control this environment, financially, and control his life financially.
0:11:29 > 0:11:32But obviously it does become a coping mechanism for him.
0:11:32 > 0:11:36Writing provides a little private world in which everything is all right?
0:11:36 > 0:11:39- Yes, it does indeed. - Well, I end up loving him.
0:11:39 > 0:11:41I think it's unavoidable, isn't it?
0:11:41 > 0:11:48- If only because he's so concerned with himself.- Exactly.
0:11:48 > 0:11:52- There's nothing more lovable than a true egotist.- No, that's right.
0:11:59 > 0:12:01Oglander was concerned for himself,
0:12:01 > 0:12:06but also for his growing family of four boys and three girls.
0:12:06 > 0:12:11He looked forward to his eldest, George, taking over the family estate,
0:12:11 > 0:12:13but right now, George had other ideas.
0:12:13 > 0:12:19He was 22 and off to France for a holiday with his cousin.
0:12:19 > 0:12:23George was adored by his father.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27I have a copy here of what he wrote about him in his book,
0:12:27 > 0:12:30where he called him, "Tall, strong of body and very well-made,
0:12:30 > 0:12:36"a handsome gentleman of a good nature and loving disposition..."
0:12:36 > 0:12:41Very clever, very hard-working, everything a father could dream of.
0:12:45 > 0:12:47'The journey would take about ten hours
0:12:47 > 0:12:50'on a ship which the Oglanders chartered.
0:12:53 > 0:12:55'With many tears from his mother and sister,
0:12:55 > 0:12:57'he set off for Normandy.'
0:13:01 > 0:13:03So George has gone to France,
0:13:03 > 0:13:06but his father is in a terrible state of nerves.
0:13:06 > 0:13:10He's totting up all his expenses for the year here.
0:13:10 > 0:13:12Huge amounts given to George.
0:13:12 > 0:13:16£54 to spend on his lovely holiday.
0:13:16 > 0:13:20The man who is taking him there, "Paid to John Barkham for carrying George into France,
0:13:20 > 0:13:23"£1, 15 shillings."
0:13:23 > 0:13:27But the really frightening part of it for him
0:13:27 > 0:13:34is the total - £747, three shillings and five pence.
0:13:34 > 0:13:35Gentlemen all over England
0:13:35 > 0:13:38would have been doing their accounts like this,
0:13:38 > 0:13:40but very, very few of them
0:13:40 > 0:13:42would do what Oglander did next,
0:13:42 > 0:13:45and that is get a needle,
0:13:45 > 0:13:47prick his finger,
0:13:47 > 0:13:49and write in his own blood,
0:13:49 > 0:13:52"Sir John Oglander, with his own blood,
0:13:52 > 0:13:56"his blood, grieving at his great expenses."
0:13:56 > 0:13:59Well, I have a needle here
0:13:59 > 0:14:02and I think I might do what Oglander did.
0:14:04 > 0:14:07Ow! Ee!
0:14:07 > 0:14:08Ah! It's quite painful.
0:14:11 > 0:14:16It IS the most extraordinary thing to do.
0:14:16 > 0:14:18It's like you're writing
0:14:18 > 0:14:20your life onto the page.
0:14:22 > 0:14:27It's as if, if you want to do it with passion,
0:14:27 > 0:14:31this is the only ink that will do.
0:14:31 > 0:14:33I could get into this!
0:14:33 > 0:14:34HE LAUGHS
0:14:38 > 0:14:40Great.
0:14:40 > 0:14:42Look at that.
0:14:42 > 0:14:43From the heart.
0:14:52 > 0:14:55Oglander hoped the strain of running the estate
0:14:55 > 0:14:58would be reduced when George returned.
0:14:58 > 0:15:02His son had come of age and would inherit.
0:15:02 > 0:15:06The father's dreams of passing his estate on to the next generation
0:15:06 > 0:15:09were almost there.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11He wrote, "He should succeed me
0:15:11 > 0:15:13"in the affairs of the country
0:15:13 > 0:15:15"and purchase my ease
0:15:15 > 0:15:18"by undertaking the burden on his own shoulders."
0:15:31 > 0:15:35In July, 1632, just about a month after George had left,
0:15:35 > 0:15:40his father was at a meeting in Newport at the magistrates' court.
0:15:40 > 0:15:43But something happened that morning
0:15:43 > 0:15:45which really changed his whole existence.
0:15:45 > 0:15:52"I heard a murmuring and a sadness amongst the gentlemen and clergy.
0:15:52 > 0:15:56"And amongst the rest, Mr Price of Colborne
0:15:56 > 0:16:02"told me he hoped that ill news that was come to town was not true.
0:16:02 > 0:16:04"I, then being more suspicious,
0:16:04 > 0:16:07"demanded whether he's heard any ill news
0:16:07 > 0:16:09"of any of my family."
0:16:14 > 0:16:15'And sure enough,
0:16:15 > 0:16:19'his suspicions were well-founded.
0:16:19 > 0:16:22'"The mayor came up to him and whispered in his ear
0:16:22 > 0:16:25'"that he'd heard of some more disturbing news.
0:16:25 > 0:16:29'"That my eldest son, George, was very sick
0:16:29 > 0:16:31'"if not dead.
0:16:34 > 0:16:36'"What a case I was in.
0:16:36 > 0:16:38'"And so deeply strooken
0:16:38 > 0:16:41'"insomuch as I have much ado to get home."'
0:16:43 > 0:16:45Deeply strooken, he struggled back
0:16:45 > 0:16:47to Nunwell on his horse.
0:17:02 > 0:17:04At the end of his description
0:17:04 > 0:17:07of this most terrible event in his life,
0:17:07 > 0:17:09he added this and it is written, as he says,
0:17:09 > 0:17:14in his tears, in a silvery-grey script.
0:17:14 > 0:17:18"With my tears instead of ink, I write these last lines.
0:17:18 > 0:17:22"George, my beloved George, is dead.
0:17:22 > 0:17:26"And with him, most of my terrestrial comforts."
0:17:26 > 0:17:29And above it, in the margin, maybe a little later,
0:17:29 > 0:17:32but this time in his own blood,
0:17:32 > 0:17:33he wrote,
0:17:33 > 0:17:38"Oh, my son, George, my son, George. Would my life
0:17:38 > 0:17:41"could have excused thine."
0:17:43 > 0:17:48It's an incredibly moving statement, that,
0:17:48 > 0:17:50and it's as if
0:17:50 > 0:17:53no time at all has passed between
0:17:53 > 0:17:56him writing it and now.
0:17:56 > 0:17:58I feel his grief
0:17:58 > 0:18:01coming up off the page.
0:18:05 > 0:18:09'The margins of the account book had become a diary
0:18:09 > 0:18:13'where Oglander wrote down his most intimate thoughts and feelings.
0:18:13 > 0:18:16'To make sense of his loss,
0:18:16 > 0:18:20'he confides again and again in his trusted book.'
0:18:25 > 0:18:26Sir John never recovered
0:18:26 > 0:18:29from the death of his beloved son, George,
0:18:29 > 0:18:32and he had a little effigy made of him, here in the Oglander Chapel,
0:18:32 > 0:18:34in Brading.
0:18:34 > 0:18:37Surrounded by their ancestors,
0:18:37 > 0:18:39because George had been the great hope for the future.
0:18:39 > 0:18:42After the Civil War,
0:18:42 > 0:18:45really when Oglander's world fell apart,
0:18:45 > 0:18:48he had his own effigy made to go on his tomb here.
0:18:48 > 0:18:52Dressed in a completely medieval way,
0:18:52 > 0:18:53medieval armour,
0:18:53 > 0:18:57even his legs crossed in the way that Crusader knights
0:18:57 > 0:18:59used to cross their legs on these tombs.
0:19:04 > 0:19:06'That is the story of Sir John Oglander.
0:19:06 > 0:19:12'A bereft father and the victim of truly cataclysmic political change
0:19:12 > 0:19:15'in the middle of the century.
0:19:15 > 0:19:18'He'd been dethroned by shopkeepers who'd learnt to write
0:19:18 > 0:19:22'and so, to rule.'
0:19:22 > 0:19:25The most modern thing about him was his writing.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28An account book used as a diary,
0:19:28 > 0:19:32where he wrote down his emotional credits and debits.
0:19:32 > 0:19:35This IS the writing revolution in action.
0:19:49 > 0:19:51CHURCH BELLS PEAL
0:19:51 > 0:19:56There was one area of 17th-century life where this new literacy wave
0:19:56 > 0:19:59was to have powerful and lasting consequences.
0:19:59 > 0:20:02And that was religion.
0:20:02 > 0:20:06Literacy, and the access it gave to the words
0:20:06 > 0:20:08of the Bible, allowed people
0:20:08 > 0:20:11to enjoy a new direct relationship to God.
0:20:14 > 0:20:17And nowhere is this spirit of liberation clearer
0:20:17 > 0:20:21than in Cumbria, where my second character lived.
0:20:21 > 0:20:23Margaret Fell,
0:20:23 > 0:20:26who found herself swept up in one of the most radical
0:20:26 > 0:20:28of the new Protestant groups,
0:20:28 > 0:20:30the Quakers.
0:20:31 > 0:20:34Quaker beliefs threatened inherited ideas.
0:20:34 > 0:20:38Through the power of the word, they were going to change society.
0:20:38 > 0:20:42And Margaret Fell, one of the leading Quaker writers,
0:20:42 > 0:20:46bombarded England with letters and pamphlets
0:20:46 > 0:20:49promoting the new Quaker gospel
0:20:49 > 0:20:51of equality and tolerance.
0:20:51 > 0:20:54For her, written words were not,
0:20:54 > 0:20:56as they were for Oglander,
0:20:56 > 0:20:58a private refuge,
0:20:58 > 0:21:00but the instrument of revolution.
0:21:05 > 0:21:10# King of peace, I will love thee... #
0:21:10 > 0:21:13One Sunday, Margaret Fell, with her three children,
0:21:13 > 0:21:16was singing hymns at her local church.
0:21:16 > 0:21:19In walked George Fox,
0:21:19 > 0:21:21a renegade Quaker preacher.
0:21:21 > 0:21:25His views had already got him jailed for blasphemy.
0:21:28 > 0:21:31'He stood up on a pew.'
0:21:31 > 0:21:33"Do I have the liberty to speak?"
0:21:35 > 0:21:38Well, the minister who was in the pulpit there, gave George Fox
0:21:38 > 0:21:40the liberty to speak.
0:21:40 > 0:21:42And the words he said
0:21:42 > 0:21:45completely changed Margaret Fell's life.
0:21:45 > 0:21:48They were all about how the established church,
0:21:48 > 0:21:50the Church of England, was not the true church.
0:21:50 > 0:21:53It was full of falsehood for George Fox.
0:21:53 > 0:21:55And instead, true religion
0:21:55 > 0:22:00should attend to the words of Christ himself.
0:22:00 > 0:22:04'Fox was suggesting that people should ignore the clergy
0:22:04 > 0:22:08'and interpret the Bible for themselves.
0:22:09 > 0:22:12'The church service disintegrated
0:22:12 > 0:22:14'as the constables tried to throw him out.
0:22:14 > 0:22:16'But Margaret was captivated.
0:22:21 > 0:22:23'I have a copy of a passionate letter
0:22:23 > 0:22:28'Margaret wrote to Fox once she was back home at Swarthmoor Hall.'
0:22:28 > 0:22:33The geometry of her whole world had shifted.
0:22:33 > 0:22:36And she wrote Fox an extraordinary letter.
0:22:36 > 0:22:38It's almost a love letter, or a letter in which
0:22:38 > 0:22:42the language of love is completely fused
0:22:42 > 0:22:45with the language of religion.
0:22:45 > 0:22:47"My own dear heart,
0:22:47 > 0:22:51"thou knowest that we have received thee into our hearts,
0:22:51 > 0:22:55"and shall live with thee eternally,
0:22:55 > 0:22:58"and it is our life and joy to be with thee.
0:22:58 > 0:23:00"And so, my dear heart,
0:23:00 > 0:23:03"let not the power of darkness
0:23:03 > 0:23:06"separate thy bodily presence from us."
0:23:11 > 0:23:14Margaret Fell had found her calling.
0:23:14 > 0:23:17She joined with Fox and became
0:23:17 > 0:23:19one of the founders of the Quaker movement,
0:23:19 > 0:23:22with her home, Swarthmoor, as its base.
0:23:22 > 0:23:25And at the rebellious heart of the movement
0:23:25 > 0:23:27was writing.
0:23:28 > 0:23:31Pamphlets were sent out, sparking political debate
0:23:31 > 0:23:33up and down the country.
0:23:33 > 0:23:36Margaret argued for freedom of assembly,
0:23:36 > 0:23:38free speech, a free press,
0:23:38 > 0:23:41and the rights of women as preachers.
0:23:41 > 0:23:43This type of writing stirred up
0:23:43 > 0:23:46a whole new conversation
0:23:46 > 0:23:49about what kind of society people wanted to live in.
0:23:51 > 0:23:53But this impassioned writing
0:23:53 > 0:23:55was not without its critics.
0:23:55 > 0:23:57Margaret and her fellow Quakers
0:23:57 > 0:23:59were seen as radicals
0:23:59 > 0:24:02who threatened to destabilise the country.
0:24:08 > 0:24:12'What Margaret wrote brought down the wrath of the establishment
0:24:12 > 0:24:14'on her head.
0:24:15 > 0:24:17'In 1664,
0:24:17 > 0:24:20'Margaret Fell, mother and leader of the Quaker movement,
0:24:20 > 0:24:24'was sentenced to life imprisonment.
0:24:26 > 0:24:30'She had refused to swear allegiance to the king.
0:24:32 > 0:24:35'She was one of 6,000 Quakers
0:24:35 > 0:24:38'who were imprisoned in that decade.
0:24:38 > 0:24:42'Her wealth couldn't protect her from the squalor of incarceration.
0:24:42 > 0:24:46'The cells were filthy, rat-ridden
0:24:46 > 0:24:47'and disease-filled.
0:24:47 > 0:24:49'Sometimes thick with smoke.
0:24:54 > 0:24:57'Margaret's response to imprisonment was typically defiant.
0:24:57 > 0:25:00'She went straight to the top.'
0:25:04 > 0:25:06"King Charles," her letter begins,
0:25:06 > 0:25:11which is not how anybody in the 17th century would ever address a king,
0:25:11 > 0:25:13and she says to him that he has
0:25:13 > 0:25:17kept her here in prison "three long winters,
0:25:17 > 0:25:21"in a place not fit for people to lie in."
0:25:23 > 0:25:26'Her only consolation was being visited by
0:25:26 > 0:25:29'her children, who had to cross Morecambe Sands
0:25:29 > 0:25:30'at low tide to reach her.'
0:25:33 > 0:25:37Anybody put into a place like this
0:25:37 > 0:25:39is, by definition, deprived
0:25:39 > 0:25:43of instruments of command and control.
0:25:43 > 0:25:46But Margaret Fell had one thing -
0:25:46 > 0:25:50her pen, and her pen WAS her sword.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55'After four long years, her complaints were answered
0:25:55 > 0:25:57'and she was released.'
0:26:02 > 0:26:05For 50 years, Margaret Fell devoted herself to the Quaker cause.
0:26:05 > 0:26:07Through her writing,
0:26:07 > 0:26:10she fostered the Quaker movement,
0:26:10 > 0:26:13turning it into a national network.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16'On her death in April 1702,
0:26:16 > 0:26:18'she was buried here in her beloved Cumbria
0:26:18 > 0:26:21'at Sunbrick Burial Ground.'
0:26:23 > 0:26:25It's an extraordinary place.
0:26:25 > 0:26:28There are more than 200 Quakers buried here,
0:26:28 > 0:26:31but there's not a single sign that there's a single body
0:26:31 > 0:26:32under this turf.
0:26:32 > 0:26:35In the 17th century, no Quaker wanted a gravestone
0:26:35 > 0:26:38because that was too individualistic a thing.
0:26:42 > 0:26:48'Margaret Fell was convinced of the Quaker idea that all people were equal.
0:26:48 > 0:26:53'Her burial in a communal graveyard confirmed this belief.'
0:26:53 > 0:26:57Through her pamphlets and letters and the writing of other Quakers,
0:26:57 > 0:27:01these ideas sowed the seeds of religious freedom
0:27:01 > 0:27:05that would in time become central to British society.
0:27:16 > 0:27:19But not everyone was ready to join the battle lines.
0:27:19 > 0:27:23My third character works yet another variation
0:27:23 > 0:27:26on this relationship between writing and revolution.
0:27:32 > 0:27:35Harry Oxenden was a small-time Kentish squire
0:27:35 > 0:27:38who had no time for public life,
0:27:38 > 0:27:40nor for the Civil War,
0:27:40 > 0:27:42which the rest of his family was involved in.
0:27:42 > 0:27:45Like many 17th-century gents,
0:27:45 > 0:27:48his life was devoted to the letter.
0:27:48 > 0:27:51He loved writing letters
0:27:51 > 0:27:54and kept both every scrap he wrote
0:27:54 > 0:27:57and everything written to him, making careful copies
0:27:57 > 0:28:00of the letters he sent out.
0:28:10 > 0:28:14He made himself the centre of a complex social network.
0:28:14 > 0:28:16And he kept everything private
0:28:16 > 0:28:19by devising his own private code.
0:28:22 > 0:28:25'Harry was totally embedded in a new letter-writing system.
0:28:27 > 0:28:31'The Royal Mail was opened up to general use in 1635.
0:28:31 > 0:28:36'This was encouraging people to use writing to stay in touch.
0:28:36 > 0:28:40'But Harry was using a more informal system.'
0:28:43 > 0:28:45Everyone, from a baronet, to a small squire,
0:28:45 > 0:28:49to a draper, to a highwayman,
0:28:49 > 0:28:52was sending all kinds of messages and letters to each other
0:28:52 > 0:28:54up and down these lanes.
0:28:54 > 0:28:57And they sent them with young servants, who they called
0:28:57 > 0:28:59"little mercuries."
0:28:59 > 0:29:01Almost like e-mail.
0:29:01 > 0:29:03But with boys rather than electricity.
0:29:07 > 0:29:10'They borrowed money from each other,
0:29:10 > 0:29:12'they offered each other advice,
0:29:12 > 0:29:14'and they gave each other presents.
0:29:14 > 0:29:18'They sent each other medicines and cooking tips.
0:29:18 > 0:29:24'"The asparagus must be but a little more than scalded."
0:29:24 > 0:29:27'An aunt sent her niece a tisane
0:29:27 > 0:29:30'to ease the painfulness of her cough.
0:29:30 > 0:29:33'Lanes were alive with family traffic.'
0:29:50 > 0:29:53So this is Maydeacon. It's Harry Oxenden's house,
0:29:53 > 0:29:56an incredibly beautiful place
0:29:56 > 0:29:58in this lovely valley in the North Downs.
0:29:58 > 0:30:00It was his father's house,
0:30:00 > 0:30:03but when he came to live here, he made it even more beautiful,
0:30:03 > 0:30:06planting gardens, orchards,
0:30:06 > 0:30:09fruit trees, improving the house itself.
0:30:09 > 0:30:11This is where he wrote all his letters.
0:30:11 > 0:30:15This is where he stored that huge pile of letters
0:30:15 > 0:30:17which have remained in his collection.
0:30:26 > 0:30:28It was the early 1640s.
0:30:28 > 0:30:31Religious and political tensions were escalating.
0:30:31 > 0:30:35At Westminster, the quarrel between Charles I and those
0:30:35 > 0:30:37who wanted to limit his kingly authority
0:30:37 > 0:30:39was intensifying
0:30:39 > 0:30:42and civil war was on the horizon.
0:30:48 > 0:30:50News travelled the country in pamphlets spewing
0:30:50 > 0:30:53out of the printing presses on both sides.
0:30:53 > 0:30:58'The letters sent down to the country carried the latest intelligence.
0:30:59 > 0:31:02'Harry stayed down here at Maydeacon,
0:31:02 > 0:31:04'apparently completely oblivious
0:31:04 > 0:31:09'to the great events that were just kicking off in London.'
0:31:09 > 0:31:11But his best friend, and cousin,
0:31:11 > 0:31:12Henry Oxenden was up there,
0:31:12 > 0:31:16keeping tabs on exactly what was going on.
0:31:16 > 0:31:21And writing to Harry, down here, luxuriating in Kent.
0:31:21 > 0:31:26What was he doing? Didn't he realise this was the great crisis of the country?
0:31:26 > 0:31:27So this is a letter
0:31:27 > 0:31:29from Henry to Harry
0:31:29 > 0:31:32in January, 1641.
0:31:33 > 0:31:36"Were you but here to hear the drums,
0:31:36 > 0:31:39"see the war-like postures
0:31:39 > 0:31:42"and the glittering armour up and down the town,
0:31:42 > 0:31:45"and behold our poor, bleeding liberties
0:31:45 > 0:31:46"at stake,
0:31:46 > 0:31:50"it would rouse your spirits, if you have any left
0:31:50 > 0:31:53"from that deep, drowsy lethargy
0:31:53 > 0:31:55"you are now overwhelmed in."
0:32:02 > 0:32:05But there's one thing Harry did not tell his cousin in London.
0:32:05 > 0:32:09The reason he was staying down here was that he'd fallen
0:32:09 > 0:32:12very deeply in love.
0:32:14 > 0:32:18'He had suddenly fallen uncontrollably
0:32:18 > 0:32:21'for a 17-year-old girl, Kate Culling,
0:32:21 > 0:32:25'the daughter of a humble yeoman farmer,
0:32:25 > 0:32:28'well below his own status as a gent.
0:32:28 > 0:32:31'In the 17th century,
0:32:31 > 0:32:34'status was still everything to the gentry
0:32:34 > 0:32:37'and his letter-writing neighbours were horrified.'
0:32:40 > 0:32:41Harry was now 33
0:32:41 > 0:32:44and I think probably for the first time in his life,
0:32:44 > 0:32:46he was in love.
0:32:46 > 0:32:49And he didn't know what to do about it,
0:32:49 > 0:32:51this terrible affliction that had arrived in his life.
0:32:51 > 0:32:53And so he wrote to a cousin a letter
0:32:53 > 0:32:55about the various remedies he'd attempted,
0:32:55 > 0:32:58including fierce exercise.
0:32:59 > 0:33:05"I've tried to cure myself by exercise and diet and fasting.
0:33:05 > 0:33:09"I've endeavoured to hinder it in its first growing. In the bargain
0:33:09 > 0:33:12"I have kept a whole quarter of a year out of her company.
0:33:12 > 0:33:16"I've endeavoured to call to mind the weakness of most women,
0:33:16 > 0:33:22"their pride, their dissimulation, their uncertainty."
0:33:22 > 0:33:24HE SIGHS
0:33:26 > 0:33:28Harry soon married Kate and, from that moment on,
0:33:28 > 0:33:32his finances were not looking pretty. Oh, no!
0:33:35 > 0:33:38Harry had fallen into debt and had to spend an increasing
0:33:38 > 0:33:42amount of time in London, away from the girl he loved.
0:33:43 > 0:33:46Daily life in the capital was full of drama.
0:33:46 > 0:33:48His cousin Henry described the turmoil.
0:33:51 > 0:33:53"Soldiers were on the streets of London
0:33:53 > 0:33:57"and cannon drawn up outside the Palace of the Archbishop at Lambeth.
0:33:57 > 0:34:00"Crowds surged along the embankment and quays by the Thames."
0:34:03 > 0:34:06As Parliament grew stronger, the king fled to Nottingham
0:34:06 > 0:34:08and raised an army.
0:34:08 > 0:34:13The two sides slugged it out in a bitter and bloody war.
0:34:13 > 0:34:18In the end, the Royalists were defeated and in 1649,
0:34:18 > 0:34:20Charles I was beheaded.
0:34:23 > 0:34:27For Harry, married to a farmer's daughter and with no money,
0:34:27 > 0:34:30his social network collapsed.
0:34:30 > 0:34:33He dropped out of the gentry class.
0:34:33 > 0:34:36The letter writers of East Kent now ignored him.
0:34:36 > 0:34:41The network he'd created and that had supported him slipped away.
0:34:44 > 0:34:48When Harry was away in London, the only contact the couple had
0:34:48 > 0:34:52were their letters, and they wrote to each other all the time.
0:34:54 > 0:34:57He says, "I sent thee a letter by the Friday post last
0:34:57 > 0:35:00"and another by the Tuesday post."
0:35:00 > 0:35:03And he'd just had a letter from her that Wednesday evening.
0:35:03 > 0:35:07But the very intriguing thing about these letters is that
0:35:07 > 0:35:12a lot of them, scattered all through them, are little pieces of code.
0:35:14 > 0:35:17Code would keep these letters private from the couriers.
0:35:17 > 0:35:20In the 17th century, letters weren't sealed up.
0:35:20 > 0:35:23Anyone carrying them could read them.
0:35:23 > 0:35:27And when Oxenden is getting very private with the girl he loves,
0:35:27 > 0:35:31private about how she is, how he is, about their money,
0:35:31 > 0:35:36about their desperate affairs, he doesn't want anyone to know.
0:35:36 > 0:35:39Now, the trouble is, I can't read a word of it.
0:35:39 > 0:35:43And I need to because the key phrases are the ones
0:35:43 > 0:35:45that can't be read.
0:35:48 > 0:35:53When few people could read or write, writing itself was a kind of code,
0:35:53 > 0:35:56indecipherable to the mass of the population.
0:35:56 > 0:35:59But as literacy spread,
0:35:59 > 0:36:02those secrets started to become accessible.
0:36:02 > 0:36:06Suddenly, you had to take precautions.
0:36:06 > 0:36:09How could you guarantee the wrong people didn't read
0:36:09 > 0:36:13and capture the very thoughts which your own literacy
0:36:13 > 0:36:15had allowed you to express on paper?
0:36:17 > 0:36:22It's a pretty simple cipher that we come across all over the place
0:36:22 > 0:36:25in correspondence in the period. This is a nice one.
0:36:25 > 0:36:26It's a pretty simple one.
0:36:26 > 0:36:31At first glance, as you yourself experienced, it throws you.
0:36:31 > 0:36:33You can't quite get the key things.
0:36:33 > 0:36:37So he'll basically take names out, personal names,
0:36:37 > 0:36:42anything sensitive, in this case not surprisingly, about money.
0:36:42 > 0:36:44Things about money tend to go into code.
0:36:44 > 0:36:48So it's a straight substitution for one of his symbols
0:36:48 > 0:36:51- for a letter of the alphabet? - Exactly. So a substitution cipher
0:36:51 > 0:36:54where every single time the letter A appears,
0:36:54 > 0:36:57its equivalent in code will appear.
0:36:57 > 0:36:59At first, it takes a while.
0:36:59 > 0:37:02It's amazing how quickly the mind remembers.
0:37:02 > 0:37:05It's like learning, you know, a new alphabet all over again,
0:37:05 > 0:37:07but it happens very quickly.
0:37:07 > 0:37:12So it's actually M-O-N...
0:37:12 > 0:37:14- E-Y.- Is it?
0:37:14 > 0:37:19- Is that money? Money?- I think it is.
0:37:19 > 0:37:23You start to make your way through and pretty quickly, like,
0:37:23 > 0:37:27- "for, without money..."- Yes, money.
0:37:27 > 0:37:31"..nothing is to be had of the best friends.
0:37:31 > 0:37:35"And that is a certain truth as any I know."
0:37:37 > 0:37:39So, that's his world falling apart.
0:37:39 > 0:37:43People he could previously have relied on, his neighbours,
0:37:43 > 0:37:48and relations, are not standing by him in his hour of need.
0:37:48 > 0:37:53Now, how common was code in the 17th century?
0:37:53 > 0:37:56How usual was that for someone to be doing something like that?
0:37:56 > 0:37:57There were lots of reasons
0:37:57 > 0:38:01why people would want to keep things secret from other people.
0:38:01 > 0:38:05Say they wanted to express their love, and that love was something
0:38:05 > 0:38:08they either wanted to keep between them and the beloved
0:38:08 > 0:38:10or it was a love that wasn't supposed to be shared,
0:38:10 > 0:38:12it wasn't suppose to be known, it was the illicit.
0:38:12 > 0:38:15Another thing, of course,
0:38:15 > 0:38:18is let's think they wanted to express a religious belief.
0:38:18 > 0:38:20Let's say it was a Catholic belief
0:38:20 > 0:38:22and they were living in a Protestant country.
0:38:22 > 0:38:25Probably the most widespread use of ciphers and codes,
0:38:25 > 0:38:29which is a political secret, a plot, a plot against a ruler,
0:38:29 > 0:38:32and you and your fellow plotters want to communicate with each other
0:38:32 > 0:38:35without being found out. They start really simple.
0:38:35 > 0:38:38Maybe the easiest is if you know a foreign language
0:38:38 > 0:38:42and those around you don't, or probably don't,
0:38:42 > 0:38:45just throw the odd French word in, throw the odd Greek word in.
0:38:45 > 0:38:48- Pepys does that, doesn't he? - Pepys does that all the time.
0:38:48 > 0:38:51But Pepys is a good example because Pepys also, particularly
0:38:51 > 0:38:54when he's talking about sex - it's money for Oxenden,
0:38:54 > 0:39:00it's sex for Pepys - he uses a similar code where he will say,
0:39:00 > 0:39:05you know, "I invited the neighbour girl over and asked her to...
0:39:05 > 0:39:09"XYZ, 6, 7, 12," etc.
0:39:09 > 0:39:15And he knows what he asked her to do. But the prying eyes would not know.
0:39:15 > 0:39:17I think that's one of the ways in which you can see
0:39:17 > 0:39:2217th-century communication as the beginning of modern communication.
0:39:22 > 0:39:26We talk about it as a period with a communications revolution.
0:39:26 > 0:39:28And I think that's clearly the case.
0:39:28 > 0:39:31This all comes after the invention of printing.
0:39:31 > 0:39:34You get more and more literacy.
0:39:34 > 0:39:36That, in a way, is a great development
0:39:36 > 0:39:39and but it also makes for less privacy.
0:39:39 > 0:39:42I think people had to assume by the 17th century that
0:39:42 > 0:39:47all of their written documents were probably being read by others,
0:39:47 > 0:39:49or capable of being read by others.
0:39:49 > 0:39:53And there's very little they could do about that except turn to
0:39:53 > 0:39:55secret communication and to code.
0:39:57 > 0:40:01Harry Oxenden used writing to promote his social connections.
0:40:02 > 0:40:05But his own private world of Kentish friends
0:40:05 > 0:40:08and relations eventually abandoned him.
0:40:08 > 0:40:12As his money ran out, his social status fell,
0:40:12 > 0:40:14and the letters stopped coming.
0:40:22 > 0:40:26The life of my fourth character, Thomas Tryon,
0:40:26 > 0:40:28followed a very different track.
0:40:28 > 0:40:33As Oxenden went down the scale, Tryon was about to go up it.
0:40:34 > 0:40:38A simple country boy, he had the nous to see
0:40:38 > 0:40:40that for poor people like him,
0:40:40 > 0:40:44writing could be an escape route to a better life.
0:40:44 > 0:40:48Writing could push you up the social scale.
0:41:05 > 0:41:11Thomas Tryon was a shepherd who was born in Gloucestershire
0:41:11 > 0:41:14in about 1643.
0:41:14 > 0:41:17He was the son of a plasterer...
0:41:17 > 0:41:19and tiler.
0:41:20 > 0:41:24But...he became a more successful shepherd than me.
0:41:25 > 0:41:28He'd been to school very briefly when he was about five
0:41:28 > 0:41:31but he soon realised when he was a shepherd that
0:41:31 > 0:41:34if he was going to get anywhere,
0:41:34 > 0:41:36he had to teach himself to read and write.
0:41:36 > 0:41:41Here he said, "When I was 13 years old, I couldn't read,
0:41:41 > 0:41:45"then thinking of the vast usefulness of reading,
0:41:45 > 0:41:47"I bought me a primer
0:41:47 > 0:41:51"and got now one and then another to teach me to spell.
0:41:51 > 0:41:55"And having by this time got two sheep of my own,
0:41:55 > 0:42:00"I applied myself to him and agreed with him to give him
0:42:00 > 0:42:06"one of my sheep to teach me to make the letters and join them together."
0:42:06 > 0:42:11So, here is a young shepherd boy trading in one of his sheep
0:42:11 > 0:42:14for the skills of literacy.
0:42:14 > 0:42:19It's an extraordinary and classic 17th-century bargain.
0:42:19 > 0:42:22A sheep for the ability to read and write.
0:42:24 > 0:42:27By the time he was 18, his skill in writing
0:42:27 > 0:42:30and reading set his ambitions higher.
0:42:30 > 0:42:35He sold his flock for £3, said goodbye to Bibury,
0:42:35 > 0:42:37and used the proceeds to go to London,
0:42:37 > 0:42:42and apprenticed himself to a hatter near Fleet Street.
0:42:42 > 0:42:46Thomas Tryon was a total self-starter and self-improver.
0:42:46 > 0:42:50And reading and writing were completely central to that ambition.
0:42:50 > 0:42:53His writing allowed him to rise in society
0:42:53 > 0:42:57and it was as a gentleman that he had his portrait painted.
0:42:58 > 0:43:00He had arrived.
0:43:14 > 0:43:19Writing in itself has no moral colour. It can be pious,
0:43:19 > 0:43:26ribald, vulgar, refined, aggressive, private, loving,
0:43:26 > 0:43:30pompous, but that is also its great quality.
0:43:30 > 0:43:34Writing can be anything you want it to be.
0:43:34 > 0:43:40Writing is the great liberty train, the road to possibility on which
0:43:40 > 0:43:45increasing numbers of people in this country had decided to climb.
0:43:45 > 0:43:48This is a copy of Charles Soosby's copybook, which is
0:43:48 > 0:43:50in the Derbyshire Record Office.
0:43:50 > 0:43:53The Soosbys were a yeoman farmer family,
0:43:53 > 0:43:58and they've left an amazing archive of things like this,
0:43:58 > 0:44:01copybooks, where they have inscribed material.
0:44:01 > 0:44:05And, as you can see, it's a rather scrubby italic hand,
0:44:05 > 0:44:08but it's pretty clear. And this is from 1678.
0:44:09 > 0:44:11Can you read it?
0:44:11 > 0:44:18"Charles Soosby, his book, God give grace thereon to look
0:44:18 > 0:44:23"but not to look but understand,
0:44:23 > 0:44:28"for learning is better than either house or land."
0:44:28 > 0:44:34So this is the son of a yeoman farmer really bettering himself,
0:44:34 > 0:44:37or being bettered by his parents.
0:44:37 > 0:44:41What's wonderful about it is they have inscribed all
0:44:41 > 0:44:47kinds of little doodles and writing couplets all over the book.
0:44:47 > 0:44:48Where are the doodles?
0:44:48 > 0:44:51Here, look, we have "Rolande, a man."
0:44:51 > 0:44:53We've got more here.
0:44:53 > 0:44:55And a little "f" over there.
0:44:57 > 0:44:58And then as you go through...
0:44:58 > 0:45:00Oh, yes, look at that.
0:45:00 > 0:45:01..you see that they've written...
0:45:01 > 0:45:03They're just scribbling all over, really.
0:45:03 > 0:45:05Do you see here, it says, "to make".
0:45:05 > 0:45:08And he's written "to make" just there, hasn't he?
0:45:08 > 0:45:11As a practice, to learn to write.
0:45:11 > 0:45:14So, how do you turn that into a pen?
0:45:14 > 0:45:18- Right, take your knife.- Yes, I have a knife.- I'll have a go as well.
0:45:18 > 0:45:22What you need to do is make an incision
0:45:22 > 0:45:25through the middle of the quill.
0:45:27 > 0:45:29THEY LAUGH
0:45:29 > 0:45:32Well, weirdly enough, the effect isn't too disastrous.
0:45:32 > 0:45:36- But shall we... I think...- Shall I start again? It is disastrous!
0:45:36 > 0:45:38We've got lots of spares!
0:45:38 > 0:45:43OK, so I start about here... and go down.
0:45:43 > 0:45:46Go down through the middle. FEATHER SNAPS
0:45:46 > 0:45:48Have I trashed it?
0:45:48 > 0:45:53OK, but the actual tip now looks pretty well like a car crash.
0:45:53 > 0:45:56It's OK, that's going to come off.
0:45:56 > 0:45:58Hang on, let's have another go.
0:45:58 > 0:46:00HE SQUEAKS
0:46:01 > 0:46:04- There we go, that's brilliant. - Is that brilliant?- Yeah.
0:46:04 > 0:46:07Now what you need to do is make two half-moon cuts
0:46:07 > 0:46:12- on either side of this to bring the nib down.- Two half-moon cuts?!
0:46:12 > 0:46:14- Get real!- This is actually the difficult bit.
0:46:20 > 0:46:22- That's really good.- Ta-da!
0:46:26 > 0:46:28Fantastic. That looks like a nib.
0:46:30 > 0:46:32So how long would that last us, then?
0:46:32 > 0:46:35If I was spending a day writing, would that last me a day?
0:46:35 > 0:46:38I should think it would last you a day.
0:46:38 > 0:46:43So, over a year, a professional would get through hundreds.
0:46:43 > 0:46:46Yeah - in the Court of Chancery in the 17th century,
0:46:46 > 0:46:49each scribe is given an allowance of 300 quills a year.
0:46:49 > 0:46:51So, it's a complete palaver, isn't it?
0:46:51 > 0:46:54You have to get your paper from France or Italy,
0:46:54 > 0:46:58you have to go shoot your goose, you have to get its wing off,
0:46:58 > 0:47:03find the right feather - we're not just banging off e-mails and texts.
0:47:03 > 0:47:06This is a huge, elaborate process.
0:47:08 > 0:47:14- So I dip in...- Yep. - And it holds some in there.
0:47:15 > 0:47:16Beautiful.
0:47:18 > 0:47:25- This... Lovely. It really looks like 17th-century writing.- It does.
0:47:25 > 0:47:26Absolutely phenomenal.
0:47:36 > 0:47:39'My fifth and final character is a shape shifter.
0:47:39 > 0:47:42'Leonard Wheatcroft lived in Derbyshire
0:47:42 > 0:47:46'and was one of the first working men to write his autobiography.
0:47:46 > 0:47:50'The literacy revolution gave people like Leonard the chance to write
0:47:50 > 0:47:52'themselves new roles,
0:47:52 > 0:47:55'step into those characters and live those lives.'
0:47:58 > 0:48:01"Who am I?" had become an open question.
0:48:01 > 0:48:04And self-invention the essence of the future.
0:48:19 > 0:48:22He was a young man in love with writing in his late teens
0:48:22 > 0:48:24during the first civil war.
0:48:24 > 0:48:28A likely lad, one for the girls, naughty, curious, feckless,
0:48:28 > 0:48:31full of wit and charm, bad with money.
0:48:31 > 0:48:35'A tailor, an orchard planter, virginals tuner.
0:48:35 > 0:48:40'A soldier, a waterworks maker, a schoolteacher.
0:48:40 > 0:48:44'Taking a zigzag path through the lower end of society.'
0:48:51 > 0:48:55Leonard Wheatcroft was a village craftsmen.
0:48:55 > 0:49:00One of the personas he created for himself was Leonard the Bard.
0:49:01 > 0:49:05So this is one of his slightly naughty poems about seducing
0:49:05 > 0:49:07a girl, and he begins by addressing the girl himself.
0:49:07 > 0:49:12Thou hast a pretty hand and foot A leg of comely measure
0:49:12 > 0:49:17And another thing belonging to it In which I take most pleasure
0:49:17 > 0:49:20When she had heard herself thus praised
0:49:20 > 0:49:23The lass seemed somewhat willing
0:49:23 > 0:49:26The young man's fortunes being raised
0:49:26 > 0:49:28They straightway fell to billing
0:49:28 > 0:49:32"Sweetheart," quoth she, "I pray tell to me
0:49:32 > 0:49:35"When we two shall be married?"
0:49:35 > 0:49:39"Faith, not at all", he answered her,
0:49:39 > 0:49:42"Since this thou has miscarried."
0:49:42 > 0:49:44And it doesn't end well -
0:49:44 > 0:49:49When she had heard the words he said, she woefully lamented
0:49:49 > 0:49:55That she had lost her maidenhead She then too late repented.
0:49:57 > 0:50:01Well, it's not really much better than doggerel as poetry,
0:50:01 > 0:50:05but he called this book Here Is Mirth And Melody, and maybe
0:50:05 > 0:50:09these are just intended as the words for a song, to be sung in a pub.
0:50:09 > 0:50:14It also reveals him to be entirely typical of your average
0:50:14 > 0:50:2017th-century male, happily abusing young, innocent girls
0:50:20 > 0:50:21and having sex with them
0:50:21 > 0:50:25when all they were really interested in was marriage.
0:50:25 > 0:50:28I don't think this was a world of equal opportunity.
0:50:32 > 0:50:35Of course, he was hopeless at managing his money.
0:50:35 > 0:50:37He soon fell into terrible debt.
0:50:37 > 0:50:40There was one point where he said he had two brass pennies left
0:50:40 > 0:50:45to his name. But reduced to penury, what did this marvellous man do?
0:50:45 > 0:50:48He wrote a great song, The Beggar's Delight.
0:50:56 > 0:51:01# Beggar, beggar, beggar I'll be
0:51:01 > 0:51:07# None lived a life so merry as he
0:51:07 > 0:51:11# Beggar I was, and a beggar I am... #
0:51:12 > 0:51:16'Wheatcroft's creativity poured onto the page.
0:51:16 > 0:51:18'It was a fiesta of self-expression,
0:51:18 > 0:51:20'all meant for public consumption.'
0:51:24 > 0:51:29OK, everybody, as a follow on from the marvellous Wheatcroft song,
0:51:29 > 0:51:35we now have the Leonard Wheatcroft Pub Quiz.
0:51:37 > 0:51:41Why does a dog hold up one leg when he pisses?
0:51:43 > 0:51:48- Any answers?- Because if he held any more up, he'd fall over.
0:51:48 > 0:51:52Ha-ha! It's a very good answer! What else have we got here?
0:51:52 > 0:51:56Hmm. Why have men beards and women none?
0:51:58 > 0:51:59Not round here they haven't!
0:51:59 > 0:52:01LAUGHTER
0:52:06 > 0:52:08- No!- OK...
0:52:12 > 0:52:14You really don't want to know the answer to that.
0:52:22 > 0:52:25So, Maureen, what kind of man do you think he was?
0:52:25 > 0:52:29He seems kind of...chaotic, in a way.
0:52:29 > 0:52:30I think he was good company.
0:52:30 > 0:52:33Definitely good company.
0:52:33 > 0:52:37Well, as you said, he was a bad lad, so he was not all that
0:52:37 > 0:52:40reliable, as far as his wife and children were concerned.
0:52:40 > 0:52:42- But...- What was he after in life?
0:52:42 > 0:52:45I think he was a proud man, actually,
0:52:45 > 0:52:48and I think when he got into trouble and into debt, that shook him,
0:52:48 > 0:52:53and so although he carried on liking ale and liking singing
0:52:53 > 0:52:57and liking all those kind of competitive parish sports,
0:52:57 > 0:53:00he did settle down and do rather more serious work.
0:53:00 > 0:53:02What do you think of him as a writer?
0:53:05 > 0:53:07He's not entirely original,
0:53:07 > 0:53:11but he's actually quite vigorous, quite engaging.
0:53:11 > 0:53:14Full of local incident, local detail, local people's names,
0:53:14 > 0:53:19so as a document of social history, his book is full of really
0:53:19 > 0:53:22great information that you wouldn't get anywhere else.
0:53:22 > 0:53:25So what kind of role do you think he played in the village?
0:53:25 > 0:53:27Probably he was the person you went to
0:53:27 > 0:53:30if you needed something read, or if you needed something written.
0:53:30 > 0:53:32He was the words man.
0:53:32 > 0:53:35I think so, and he'll do you a Valentine, he'll do you, you know...
0:53:35 > 0:53:38You've got somebody you're trying to woo, he will write you a letter
0:53:38 > 0:53:40that might work.
0:53:40 > 0:53:45So if we think of 17th-century Ashover, how big a part do you think
0:53:45 > 0:53:49words played in the life of the people living here then?
0:53:49 > 0:53:54Increasingly, people are aware of and meeting up with printed words -
0:53:54 > 0:53:56when they go to fairs,
0:53:56 > 0:53:58there are ballad singers selling the words.
0:53:58 > 0:54:01For legal purposes and for official things,
0:54:01 > 0:54:05the midwife's oath is written down and you have to either read it
0:54:05 > 0:54:08or follow somebody reading it and read it back to them.
0:54:08 > 0:54:12Increasingly, reading was more and more of an asset.
0:54:12 > 0:54:16- Do you love Leonard? - I think he's terrific.
0:54:16 > 0:54:20I can see it in your eyes, you're in love with him. Shocking.
0:54:24 > 0:54:28'In 1660, the republic was abolished and the monarchy restored,
0:54:28 > 0:54:31'though with much reduced powers.
0:54:31 > 0:54:34'But Wheatcroft remained as keen as ever on self-promotion.
0:54:34 > 0:54:36'When he was 68,
0:54:36 > 0:54:39'he created yet another persona -
0:54:39 > 0:54:41'this time, it was Leonard the Hero.
0:54:41 > 0:54:45'He built a monument celebrating the arts
0:54:45 > 0:54:48'and himself as a champion of them.'
0:54:51 > 0:54:54And a neighbouring poet in a village just over there,
0:54:54 > 0:54:59a Mr Oldham, heard about this and wrote some verses in derision.
0:54:59 > 0:55:02And so some local gentlemen heard about this rivalry
0:55:02 > 0:55:07between the two of them and said, "Why don't you have a contest?"
0:55:07 > 0:55:10Like a sort of cockfight, almost, as the local poets.
0:55:10 > 0:55:14And the place to have it would be up here, on top of the hill.
0:55:18 > 0:55:22Leonard wrote a typically self-promoting account of it
0:55:22 > 0:55:24in his autobiography, and I've got a page of it here.
0:55:24 > 0:55:26This is what he says.
0:55:26 > 0:55:30"There did I challenge him to walk with me on to Parnassus Hill,
0:55:30 > 0:55:34"but we both missing our way we chanced to light on an alehouse,
0:55:34 > 0:55:37"and after we had drunk a while, we fell into discourse
0:55:37 > 0:55:41"concerning the nine muses, which he could not name, neither could he
0:55:41 > 0:55:46"tell from whence they came, or what they'd done, or what they might do.
0:55:46 > 0:55:50"So I, in the audience of all the company, gave them their right
0:55:50 > 0:55:55"names and all their right titles, whereupon they decked my head
0:55:55 > 0:55:57"round with laurel branches,
0:55:57 > 0:56:01"to the great vexation of my antagonist, Oldham."
0:56:07 > 0:56:09'At the back of his book,
0:56:09 > 0:56:13'he illustrates how the world really was turned upside down at this time.
0:56:14 > 0:56:16'Leonard Wheatcroft, yeomen craftsman,
0:56:16 > 0:56:19'drew himself an aristocratic coat of arms.
0:56:19 > 0:56:23'It describes all his shape changing, with images for each role
0:56:23 > 0:56:25'he took on in his life.'
0:56:27 > 0:56:29"My coat of arms," he says.
0:56:29 > 0:56:32And this is all part of - I can't see a damn thing in this -
0:56:32 > 0:56:36this is all part of him trying to be a gentleman,
0:56:36 > 0:56:39making himself have a coat of arms as a gentleman would.
0:56:39 > 0:56:43But there is some irony in it, because instead of swords,
0:56:43 > 0:56:47helmets and all those martial things that a real gent would have had,
0:56:47 > 0:56:50he puts the tools of his own trade in here,
0:56:50 > 0:56:54his tailor's shears, his measuring stick for laying out gardens,
0:56:54 > 0:56:57his bodkin from his tailor, and his thimble there,
0:56:57 > 0:57:02his golden thimble. And so this, really, is Leonard saying,
0:57:02 > 0:57:04almost at the end of his life,
0:57:04 > 0:57:07I have lived as good a life as I possibly could.
0:57:07 > 0:57:10I have lived a writing life.
0:57:10 > 0:57:14I have used writing to become the sort of man I wanted to be.
0:57:14 > 0:57:17And I, in some way, feel myself released
0:57:17 > 0:57:20into a kind of new liberty by that.
0:57:20 > 0:57:23That's what this writing revolution is all about.
0:57:23 > 0:57:28It's about the release of the person into new possibility.
0:57:33 > 0:57:37'Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief.
0:57:37 > 0:57:40'Whoever you were, writing could now change your life.
0:57:40 > 0:57:44'Enlarging it, extending it, enlightening it.'
0:57:50 > 0:57:53The 1600s was a century of liberties,
0:57:53 > 0:57:57none more important or lasting than the one conferred by literacy.
0:57:57 > 0:58:00Reading and writing allowed the people of Britain
0:58:00 > 0:58:04a vision of themselves that was essentially unconstrained, a life
0:58:04 > 0:58:09in which they could hope to read the truth and write their own futures.
0:58:09 > 0:58:11As a country and as a culture,
0:58:11 > 0:58:15Britain was moving into the modern, self-realising world.
0:58:19 > 0:58:23'In the next programme, I'm going to look at the way in which
0:58:23 > 0:58:24'this new world of the written
0:58:24 > 0:58:29'turned its gaze to man's understanding of the universe,
0:58:29 > 0:58:33'of God, nature and the structure of reality.'
0:58:52 > 0:58:56Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd