Who's A Journal For?

I was listening to a recent episode of the popular podcast 'The Rest is Politics' when host, Rory Stewart, mentioned his recent reading of his grandmother’s diary from the 1920s. It focused on the year before his grandmother married his grandfather and, by his admission, was “astonishingly frank." Interestingly, both his mother and aunt did not approve of him reading it. But to his mind, given she had died some 50 years ago, his reading of it was acceptable.

This really got me thinking on the question of who we write our journals for, and the importance of audience in journal writing. I thought I’d write a little post explaining some of my thoughts on why we should consider these questions as 'journaling' people, and how we might write based off our chosen intentions.

Whilst it is of course important to journal with yourself at the forefront, I think we do need to have our intended audience in the back of our minds when we write. To my mind, there are three categories of audience for journals and diaries: yourself, your loved ones, and the public.

A quick scan of the Reddit forum ‘r/journaling’ shows that many people journal purely for themselves, with one user claiming, “I’d die if someone ever read that."  People use their journals for deep reflections, emotional regulation, and the therapeutic benefits this all brings. We evoke this as a key selling point of our own journals. One historical example of someone who practiced this philosophy was the English novelist, Fanny Burney. She started journaling at the age of 15 and continued for the next 72 years. Her entries were a chance to confess “every thought”, “open my whole heart." The intended audience was, at least from the outset, “Nobody." One wonders if Rory Stewart’s grandmother also felt the same – she does not seem to have made her intentions clear. Even her closest relatives were unsure.

One might suggest that if we are using journals as a purely personal outlet, we need to make our wishes clear to our loved ones about what should happen to them, and whether they should be kept or destroyed after our passing. The lesson, of course, is that after we are gone, our privacy is no longer ours but belongs to others. A written journal handed down to family is, at least, in some kind of safekeeping. (Even Fanny Burney extended the audience of her journal within her lifetime to include her friends and sister). I shudder at the fate of digital records, siphoned into the hands of faceless corporations. 

This brings me on to our next audience. A journal can of course be written for loved ones. Our instructive Reddit forum shows that people clearly write with this intention. One user notes, “I will say I’m cognisant of the fact that I hope my descendants will read it one day. While I am honest and even sometimes admit things I wouldn’t say out loud, my descendants are in the back of my mind as the audience, which undoubtably colours what I write."  This user hits the nail on the head when it comes to writing intentionally for a specific audience – it will change the way you write (you will be less honest), and your journal will be less useful as a therapeutic outlet. But that doesn’t mean it’s not worth writing one. Go into the less 'salacious' details of your life, record life’s key events, use it as a scrapbook or plan out your future goals. Did you go to the theatre at the weekend? Stick your ticket in the journal and write down what you thought of the performance. I can guarantee your loved ones will appreciate this in the near and far future. The lesson here is that the small details are the important ones – these are the ones that add colour and flavour to your entries, particularly if your audience is broader. These details will lend vividness to your life when it becomes the subject of another’s reading.

I can think of two examples from my own life where my wife and I have used a journal for this purpose. One was when my wife noted down (in one of our notebooks) a recent walking holiday we went on, we read these entries back (two years later) and it was amazing the small details we had both forgotten: the emotion she felt when visiting the graveyard of one of her favourite poets, John Clare, in the village of Helpston; how we stumbled (serendipitously) on the village of Fotheringhay, only to find out that this was where Mary Queen of Scots was executed in 1587; and the fact that my wife, in full holiday-mode, had ordered “triple cooked chips” as an addition to every meal.  It was truly incredible reading these details and entries back. A foothold into a plain of memories I thought I'd forgotten. 

The second example is related to a recent hobby I’ve picked up – sourdough bread baking... call me a hipster all you want. I’ve started using our Undated Journal to record each bake I do, noting the recipe and methods I’ve used, and any notes on the bake that I think are important. Whilst of course, the main reason for this is to help me track what works best and improve my baking, I also love the idea of passing this journal down to my children. Given, too, that a sourdough starter lasts centuries and is often passed down through generations, for me this adds significance to my record keeping. The idea of passing down these two items gives me great pleasure – I’m image happily my great grandchild using my entries to help them make their loaves of bread.

This brings us on to the last audience I want to consider – the public audience. While we might not think of our entries being relevant in this sphere, it’s important to remember that our entries form an important record of history, not just for the great and the good (like Fanny Burney), but for everyone. I’m reminded here of a great, recent work of history, by Emma Griffin, Liberty’s Dawn: A People’s History of the Industrial Revolution. Griffin used the published and unpublished autobiographies of working people to explain and explore the impact of industrialisation on the lives of ordinary people in the 19th century. What this tells us, once again, is that stories become an instructive and emotive tie to an otherwise distant past.

When we think about the public audience, this of course raises the issue of privacy again, and an individual’s right to privacy in posterity. You might say that if someone journals with a public audience in mind, it might be less useful for them personally, and less insightful for the reader: the work of a more censorious hand – a knowing editorial gloss dividing author and reader. One is reminded of the volumes of political memoirs released year after year which contain nothing interesting and are merely used as a guise for self-promotion.

This is not always the case, however, the lawyer and biographer, James Boswell is a notable example of the opposite. His journals, which he kept for 33 years, are candid and exhilarating – worth an afternoon reading if you haven’t before. They detail amazing details about 18th century London, the life of a “rake” in the city (some of the inclusions are shockingly sordid), and, of course, details about one of the world’s most famous literary figures – Samuel Johnson.

The publishing history of these is also interesting. Boswell left instructions in his will for his journals to be published, but requested that any defamatory content be edited out. Boswell was particularly worried about the deleterious effects publication in his own lifetime, but wanted the journals in the public domain after his death, as he had it, to ‘store up entertainment for his afterlife’. After his death this plan was never executed and his family suppressed publication for over 130 years. They were eventually published in the 1920s after a scholar tracked them down in an Irish castle and have been invaluable to historians and readers ever since. I think the lesson here, of course, is that absolute honesty creates the best record, but in so doing one must accept the risk of exposure particularly when you are gone. It nods, too, to the ways in which a text takes on a life of its own once released into the world; it is as much subject to the sway of personal and societal forces as the writer would have been.  

We are reminded again, by Boswell’s example, that whether you write your journal for yourself or an audience, your privacy is not always of your choosing. This is what Rory Stewart’s reading of his grandmother’s journal shows – no one can control their posthumous narrative. All we can do is decide early what the intention of our journal writing is. If you intend your journal to be just for yourself, write honestly, always with yourself at the forefront, and make sure your loved one know your intentions for the entries when you are gone. If your audience is broader, intended for your loved ones or further afield, make sure you note down the small idiosyncrasies which makes your life what it is. And, of course, ensure you disclose only what you’re content to share.  

BY GEORGE ISBISTER, FOUNDER