Jorrocks’s Jaunts and Jollities

work by Surtees

Also known as: “Jorrocks’s Jaunts and Jollities; or, The Hunting, Shooting, Racing, Driving, Sailing, Eating, Eccentric and Extravagant Exploits of that Renowned Sporting Citizen, Mr. John Jorrocks, of St. Botolph Lane and Great Coram Street”

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In full:: Jorrocks’s Jaunts and Jollities; or, The Hunting, Shooting, Racing, Driving, Sailing, Eating, Eccentric and Extravagant Exploits of That Renowned Sporting Citizen, Mr. John Jorrocks, of St. Botolph Lane and Great Coram Street

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Jorrocks’s Jaunts and Jollities, series of picaresque comic tales by Robert Smith Surtees, originally published as individual stories in his New Sporting Magazine between 1831 and 1834 and collected in book form in 1838.

The ebullient Jorrocks is a vulgar Cockney grocer, a city man who loves the sporting life in the country. He is surrounded by a variety of eccentric characters as comic as he is. The adventures of Jorrocks continued in two novels: Handley Cross (1843; expanded edition, 1854) and Hillingdon Hall (1845). A revised and enlarged version of Jorrocks’s Jaunts and Jollities was published posthumously in 1869.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Kathleen Kuiper.