One thing I did enjoy about Stephenson's Quicksilver was the fact that he clearly learned much about his setting from Pepys' diary, and rewarded the chap by making him (and his celebrated bladder-stone) a recurring character in the novel.

I'm afraid now that I mis-imagined him as being much older than I should have, though; when I started to read Pepys' diary (I found him through friendfriends, no kidding) I read a biographical blurb about him, and came away with the misunderstanding that he was in his middle years when he started journaling... whoopsie. Maybe it's just easier imagining the archaic diction of these entries coming from the pen of a cranky oldster.