The Mass-Observation project was set up in 1937 by Charles Madge, a poet and journalist and Tom Harrison, an anthropologist to 'record the voice of ordinary people'. They recruited volunteer 'observers' to report to them and in 1939 invited people to send them an account of their lives. Nella Last was one of 500 people who took up this offer. Her diaries to Mass-Observation, often written in pencil, provide the narrative of the play as it unfolds her life. Edited versions of her diary have been published: ''Nella Last's War'' edited by Richard Broad and Suzy Fleming appeared first in 1981 and has been more recently re-published by Profile Books in 2007. ''Housewife, 49'' is based on this book which covers the years 1939 to 1945. ''Nella Last's Peace'', which appeared in 2009, includes diary entries from her immediate post-war years. A third volume, ''Nella Last in the 1950s: Further diaries of Housewife, 49'', which includes material not published in ''Nella Last's War'', was published in 2010.
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