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Excerpts From the First Ever English Agony Aunt Column

Chuck Ansbacher | Wednesday 30 March, 2011 15:47

In an incredible find on the part of The Awl, what they claim to be the first every English Agony Aunt column has been dug up from the annals of printed history. Dating back to 1691, the column birthed what so many of us take for granted — the ability to deliver unqualified advice in a public forum, and be taken seriously.

That title was The Athenian Gazette: Or Casuistical Mercury, Resolving all the most Nice and Curious Questions proposed by the Ingenious of Either Sex.

Here’s how it worked: Say you were wondering, as many a good English citizen might, whether the Pope is the Antichrist. Delighted that there’s finally a group of eminent scholars you can ask, you send your question either to the Roterdam Coffee-House in Finch-lane or to the one in Stocks-Market. The illustrious “Athenian Society” (which was, basically, just Dunton and two of his pals) would then meet twice a week at Smith’s Coffeehouse to answer the questions, which they published from 1691 until 1697.

It was a new idea and not without its skeptics (one person wrote in to ask, “Why do you trouble your selves and the world with answering so many silly Questions?”). It also proved to be incredibly popular.

Unlike the serialized version of The Wire that tantalized the internet last week (and is very worth reading in full), this column was actually real! They’ve got lots of excerpts from the original Q and A, opening a window into the mind of a late 17th century Brit.

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