1666: Plague, War, and Hellfire

April 3, 2017
British writer and television producer Rideal vividly reveals how one long, horrific year of calamities reduced England’s maritime reputation, treasury, and London’s medieval center to near-ruin while exposing the stark reality behind the early joy of the Glorious Restoration. Londoners ushered in 1666 with relief at the fading plague outbreak, but they endured a failing war against the Dutch and closed out the year recovering from the horrific four-day fire that ravaged the capital. Rideal effectively recreates the tense and confused atmosphere, employing clear prose and relevant background from such insightful sources as diarist Samuel Pepys and Puritan minister Thomas Vincent. Pleasure-seeking Charles II and his disaster-prone companions only make up part of the story; Rideal contextualizes the effects of each calamity on different economic classes, often punctuating her reports with surprising outcomes: the plague-exiled Isaac Newton took an autumnal rest under an apple tree, and hapless spy Aphra Behn was essentially abandoned by her government only to later become a popular playwright. The early promise of 1666 collapsed into ill-timed frivolity and financial insolvency one disaster at a time, but a resilient Christopher Wren–built city rose from literal ashes to recapture cultural and scientific glory. Rideal successfully illustrates how 1666 marks a turning point in post-Restoration England.