Setting

The time setting of the short story “Diary of an Interesting Year” by Helen Simpson is clear from the very beginning. The action takes place in the year 2040 and it spreads over the course of about a year, from the month of February until November. Note that the events take place in a not-so-distant future after an event called “the Big Melt” (l. 32), which is most likely connected to global warming and its after…

...

Physical setting

The physical setting reveals that the action takes place somewhere in Britain. The narrator mentions places like “London” (l. 8), “Shropshire” (l. 148), and “Cheshire” (l. 148), but there is no clear indication regarding the exact city or town the narrator lives …

...

Social setting

The social setting mainly focuses on the aftermath of global warming and on the way society copes with its consequences. First, we get to know a society in which the fear of contracting a disease prevents people from getting close to each other:

The pavements were swimming in it, and of course the hospitals are down, so there’s nothing to be done about the cholera. Didn’t get too close to th…