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How Fielding's heroine seduced the
world
By
Benjamin Secher, The Daily Telegraph - October 22, 2004
February 28, 1995
The Diary of Bridget Jones appears in The Independent newspaper. Invited to write a first-person column, a reluctant Helen Fielding proposed instead the fictional diary of a "girl who is the embodiment of the banana-skin
joke". The author later confesses she expected the "trivial" column to be dropped within weeks.
October 25, 1996
Bridget Jones's Diary: A Novel is published in hardback. Initial sales are unspectacular.
July 11, 1997
By the time the first paperback edition reached the shelves, phenomenal
word-of-mouth praise has raised demand. The title soars to the top of the bestseller list, and stays there. Over the following seven years, more than 10.5 million copies are sold across 35 countries. The film rights are snapped up by Working Title, the British production team behind Four Weddings and a
Funeral.
November 15, 1997
Bridget Jones's Diary reappears as a weekly column in The Daily Telegraph.
February 5, 1998
Bridget Jones's Diary is named Book of the Year at the British Book Awards
November 18, 1999
The long-awaited sequel, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, is published. Another massive hit, the book goes on to sell more than five million copies worldwide.
April 15, 2001
Bridget Jones's Diary opens at cinemas on both sides of the Atlantic. A critical success, the film also smashes UK box-office records with weekend takings of £5.5 million, and garners an Oscar nomination for its star Renée Zellweger.
December 2001
Reinvigorated by the successof the film, sales of the first book reach new heights. By the end of the year, it has become the best-selling adult fiction title of 2001.
November 12, 2004
Delayed by repeated script rewrites by Fielding, Andrew Davies and Richard Curtis, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason will finally open at cinemas nationwide. Although a rumoured third Bridget Jones novel never appeared, discussions about the next film are already under way.
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