Selected Writings

by Samuel Johnson

Thanks to Boswell’s monumental biography of Samuel Johnson, we remember Dr. Johnson today as a great wit and conversationalist, the rationalist epitome and the sage of the Enlightenment. He is more often quoted than read, his name invoked in party conversation on such diverse topics as marriage, sleep, deceit, mental concentration, and patriotism, to generally humorous effect. But in Johnson’s own day, he was best known as an essayist, critic, and a gifted writer possessed of great force of mind and wisdom. Writing a century after Johnson, Ruskin wrote of Johnson’s He “taught me to measure life, and distrust fortune…he saved me forever from false thoughts and futile speculations.” Peter Martin here presents “the heart of Johnson,” a selection of some of Johnson’s best moral and critical essays. At the center of this collection are the periodical essays from the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler. Also included are Johnson’s great moral fable, Rasselas; the Prefaces to the Dictionary and his edition of Shakespeare; and selections from Lives of the Poets. Together, these works―allied in their literary, social, and moral concerns―are the ones that continue to speak urgently to readers today.

Genres: Classics, Nonfiction, Essays, Poetry, Biography, Literature, Unfinished

571 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1968

About the author

People note British writer and lexicographer Samuel Johnson, known as "Doctor Johnson," for his Dictionary of the English Language (1755), for Lives of the Poets (1781), and for his series of essays, published under the titles The Rambler (1752) and The Idler (1758).

Samuel Johnson used the first consistent Universal Etymological English Dictionary , first published in 1721, of British lexicographer Nathan Bailey as a reference.

Beginning as a journalist on Grub street, this English author made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, novelist, literary critic, biographer, and editor. People described Johnson as "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history." James Boswell subjected him to Life of Samuel Johnson , one of the most celebrated biographies in English. This biography alongside other biographies, documented behavior and mannerisms of Johnson in such detail that they informed the posthumous diagnosis of Tourette syndrome (TS), a condition unknown to 18th-century physicians. He presented a tall and robust figure, but his odd gestures and tics confused some persons on their first encounters.

Johnson attended Pembroke college, Oxford for a year before his lack of funds compelled him to leave. After working as a teacher, he moved to London, where he began to write essays for The Gentleman's Magazine. His early works include the biography The Life of Richard Savage and the poem " The Vanity of Human Wishes ." Christian morality permeated works of Johnson, a devout and compassionate man. He, a conservative Anglican, nevertheless respected persons of other denominations that demonstrated a commitment to teachings of Christ.

After nine years of work, people in 1755 published his preeminent Dictionary of the English Language, bringing him popularity and success until the completion of the Oxford English Dictionary in 1905, a century and a half later. In the following years, he published essays, an influential annotated edition of plays of William Shakespeare, and the well-read novel Rasselas . In 1763, he befriended James Boswell, with whom he later travelled to Scotland; A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland , travel narrative of Johnson, described the journey. Towards the end of his life, he produced the massive and influential Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets , which includes biographies and evaluations of 17th- and 18th-century poets.

After a series of illnesses, Johnson died on the evening; people buried his body in Westminster abbey. In the years following death, people began to recognize a lasting effect of Samuel Johnson on literary criticism even as the only great critic of English literature.

Reviews

[Owen Hatherley · Rating 4 out of 5]

First attempt reading the big Dr, and such a weird bag of rubbish (all those awful Augustan 'imitations' of Horace or Juvenal, a lot of bloviating moralism) and brilliance (brutally intelligent essays on Shakespeare and on Scotland, unexpectedly firm anti-colonial and anti-racist convictions, prose best described as 'muscular').

[Jeff Crompton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have several anthologies of Johnson's writings; each has material not found in the others. Johnson's writing almost always rates five stars from me, so the rating is of this book as a collection. The best feature of this anthology is the excellent, informative introduction; the biggest weakness is that many of the selections are excerpts, rather than complete pieces.

But what's here is excellent. This time around, I particularly enjoyed the essays from The Idler, especially the portrait of Sober, the Idler - which is actually about Johnson himself.

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is truly beautiful prose. There was a tv programme years ago - I think it was a British cop show. They talked about "an LTT folder", which you could consult when you were unsure of the "line to take". The essays in this book are like an LTT folder. Solid practical and emotional advice delivered with great wit from a true connoisseur of morals for displaced post-modern moral midgets like myself. And SO beautifully written.

[Gille Liath · Rating 4 out of 5]

The trouble with Dr Johnson is that he is as sombre and pedantic in writing as he was, apparently, entertaining and amusing in person. It is not quite right to say, as Stevenson did, that if we had not had Boswell’s biography we should have had nothing worthwhile of him: he had a capacious mind and was an astute and sympathetic observer of humanity whether in London or the Gaelic Highlands; he was also an outstanding critic of poetry. His work is sometimes witty by his own definition, which is that of saying something which had not, perhaps, previously occurred to the hearer, but of which they immediately recognise the justice; but it is rarely witty by Pope’s yardstick, which is that wit expresses familiar ideas more aptly and neatly than they have been expressed before. His writing is heavy, it misses the seasoning of levity which need not interfere with seriousness of purpose; it has none of the ‘good things’ which Boswell reports from his conversation.

There is a short passage quoted here from Lives of the English Poets in which he discusses the defect of tediousness (not content with his great analytical intelligence, he aspired to the distinction of poet too). He says it is the worst defect a writer can have, and that it is impossible for the writer by his own judgement to assure himself he is not guilty of it. Perhaps that was the voice of his own artistic conscience.

It’s not so much that without Boswell we wouldn’t have anything of him; it’s that, without Boswell, we wouldn’t *want* anything of him. As it is he remains worth reading – if you are interested in what he is writing about. But he is not one of those whom you would read, regardless of the subject, just for the sake of keeping company with an entertaining mind.

[Lysergius · Rating 3 out of 5]

Samuel Johnson's writings are extensive and particular; as the editor of the first dictionary of the English language and a fine critic, his reputation was firmly established. An extremely quotable writer, my personal; favourite is, "Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young."