Reawakening Peacock: a satirist for all seasons

When we set about launching P-Wave Classics, we wanted our first title to make a statement. Not in the usual, overblown sense of a 'mission' or a 'brand philosophy', but something simpler and more heartfelt: that great writing is timeless, and that laughter—especially the kind sharpened by insight—never loses its power.

Which is why we began with Headlong Hall and Nightmare Abbey, two short novels by the inimitable Thomas Love Peacock. First published in 1815 and 1818 respectively, these works are filled with whip-smart satire, delightfully absurd characters, and a clarity of thought and language that feel remarkably fresh. They take aim at fashionable thinking in all its forms, from doomsaying Malthusians and faddish craniologists to dreary utilitarians and swooning Romantic poets. Yet Peacock does not condemn so much as play with his subjects, gently skewering the excesses of ideologues and visionaries alike.

In that sense, his work is ripe for rediscovery today. We live in an age of strong opinions and stronger postures, where conviction often outruns comprehension. Peacock, with his lightness of touch and refusal to take anything entirely seriously, including himself, reminds us that satire can be a form of generosity. His characters may be absurd, but they are rarely cruel. And as we chuckle at their endless arguments, we begin to recognise a little of ourselves in their bluster.

But to bring these books back to life for a modern audience, it was clear that we needed to do more than simply reprint the text. We wanted to create an edition that was truly fit for the present day. That meant ensuring that no reader, whatever their background or education, would feel shut out from Peacock’s sparkling world of wit and ideas.

To do that, my starting point was the excellent notes by David Garnett in his 1948 collected edition of Peacock’s novels, and Raymond Wright’s 1969 Penguin English Library edition of Nightmare Abbey, both of which provided a solid foundation. But what struck me as I worked through their notes was how much the idea of “assumed cultural knowledge” has shifted in the decades since.

Garnett, in particular, was writing for a reader much closer to himself: white, British and probably educated at least to grammar school level, with a grounding in Latin and Greek, a familiarity with classical allusions, and a shared experience of British history, institutions and literature. In many ways, Garnett’s audience would have been more familiar to Peacock than to us. And the Britain of 1948, even reeling after the war, still bore many cultural continuities with the early 19th century.

Today, we live in a vastly different world. Our readers are more diverse, more global, and thankfully no longer tethered to the narrow cultural scripts of the past. But this also means that many of the sly references and classical nods in Peacock’s work risk going unrecognised. It became quickly apparent that more, and fuller, annotation was required; not to patronise, but to welcome. The goal was never to translate Peacock into modern terms, but rather to illuminate the world in which he wrote so that anyone could step into it.

For example, take this moment from Headlong Hall, where Mr. Foster, the Optimist, delivers a typically sweeping vision of future harmony:

“The precession of the equinoxes,” said Mr. Foster, “will gradually ameliorate the physical state of our planet, till the ecliptic shall again coincide with the equator, and the equal diffusion of light and heat over the whole surface of the earth typify the equal and happy existence of man, who will then have attained the final step of pure and perfect intelligence.”1

It’s both grand and absurd—an entire cosmological theory deployed to support a vision of perfect social harmony. Foster’s language is comically lofty, his optimism unchecked, and yet the passage remains striking. Without context, a modern reader might miss just how satirical this moment is. But with a little guidance, we see clearly that Peacock is sending up the very human tendency to extrapolate cosmic order from ideological enthusiasm.

And this is, in many ways, the point: these are books designed to be discussed, to be debated, to be enjoyed in all their eccentricity and erudition. But they should also be accessible. Not everyone has read The Dunciad, or knows who Godwin and Wollstonecraft were, or can identify the political factions of 1815 Britain. And that’s fine. These are not barriers to enjoyment—they are simply bits of context that, once explained, enrich the reading rather than gatekeeping it.

This is not a lament for a lost age of education, nor a sneer at modern curricula. The world changes. Cultures evolve. We are not worse off for having moved away from the classical education that Peacock took for granted; we are simply different. And in a hundred years’ time, someone will no doubt say the same about us.

What remains constant, though, is the need to laugh, and to question, and to marvel at how familiar human folly can be, even across centuries. Whether it’s the credulous enthusiasm of Mr. Cranium, or the melancholy self-importance of Scythrop, Peacock gives us a gallery of characters whose vanities and fixations feel eerily, hilariously current.

That’s why we chose Headlong Hall and Nightmare Abbey to launch P-Wave Classics. Not just because they’re short and sharp and very funny, but because they offer something rare: satire without cynicism, insight without superiority, and a generosity of spirit that speaks, still, to the better parts of ourselves.

And if you laugh out loud while reading them—even just once—we’ll consider our work done.

1. Shelley was a fervent advocate of social reform and held a deep belief in humanity's potential for intellectual and moral improvement. In works like Prometheus Unbound and Queen Mab, Shelley expresses his vision of an ideal society, free from oppression and inequality, with individuals attaining enlightenment and perfect happiness. In the notes to Queen Mab, he writes: “The north polar star, to which the axis of the earth, in its present state of obliquity, points. It is exceedingly probable, from many considerations, that this obliquity will gradually diminish, until the equator coincides with the ecliptic: the nights and days will then become equal on the earth throughout the year, and probably the seasons also. There is no great extravagance in presuming that the progress of the perpendicularity of the poles may be as rapid as the progress of intellect; or that there should be a perfect identity between the moral and physical improvement of the human species.”