Castle Diary: The Journal of Tobias Burgess

In Castle Diary, Richard Platt dismantles romanticized notions of the Middle Ages by grounding the narrative in the era’s harsh realities. Through the eyes of 11-year-old Toby Burgess, the daily grind of castle life is revealed to be a constant struggle against physical discomfort, pre-modern medicine, and unglamorous labor. The book argues that survival in the 13th century, even for the nobility, depended on enduring conditions that modern readers would find challenging, replacing myths of chivalric grandeur with a more authentic portrait of the past.

In the medieval world, the types and degrees of challenges an individual faced largely depended upon factors outside of their control. For example, noblewomen faced restrictive social norms that limited their career options and opportunities for social advancement: “[Their] only choices were to marry, to seek service with a wealthier noble-woman, or to become a nun” (98). The working class, especially villeins, had even fewer options and rights. These peasants were legally bound to the feudal estate on which they were born, “could be punished for leaving it,” and were required to “give their labor and part of their crops to the nobleman who owned the land” their entire lives (96). These details appear in the appendix rather than the novel, reflecting how the narrator’s youth and social status shield him from many of the hardships his contemporaries face. As Platt reveals in “Toby’s World,” many of the challenges of medieval life were created or worsened by the rigid social structure of feudalism that assigned each person a role at birth. 

Health was another area in which medieval people experienced difficulty, as the period’s medicine was based on theories now considered obsolete. When Toby falls ill with a fever after a grand banquet, his family summons a physician called Doctor Leach. Instead of examining his patient’s physical symptoms, the doctor consults astrological charts and diagnoses an imbalance of the body’s humors. He declares, “The boy is melancholic, and Earth fights Fire for control of his body” (66). His prescribed cure is bloodletting, a painful procedure that leaves Toby feeling “sicker than ever” (68). This episode highlights the prevalence of illness in the medieval world as well as the inadequacies of the available healthcare.

Even the daily routine was filled with discomfort. The food Toby eats is a far cry from the constant feasting of popular imagination. He is disgusted by the salt fish served on numerous Church-mandated days. Furthermore, the castle itself offers little comfort. The stone keep is frigid in the winter, making schooling a miserable experience. As his friend Mark jokes, the Chaplain seems to beat the students more often in winter just to warm himself up. The fact that Toby is literate and educated is itself a privilege, but his education is lacking by modern standards because it focuses on memorization over critical thinking skills. 

Toby’s journal argues that medieval life was defined less by adventure and more by the challenge of simple endurance, allowing young readers to appreciate the resilience and challenges of those in the medieval era that are often obscured by fantastical portraits of the period.