Samuel Johnson

by Walter Jackson Bate

A biographical study of the eighteenth-century lexicographer and critic combines narrative with psychological insights

Genres: Biography, History, Nonfiction, Memoir, Biography Memoir, Literature, Autobiography

688 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1977

About the author

Literary critic Walter Jackson Bate twice won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography, first for his work on the Romantic poet John Keats, and later for that on lexicographer Dr. Samuel Johnson.

Reviews

[Al · Rating 5 out of 5]

As other GR reviewers have noted, this is an exceptional biography of Samuel Johnson. Bate examines Johnson’s entire life and uses an incredible amount of detail from numerous contemporary sources, in addition to Boswell.

For me, the main attraction of this book is Bate’s critical examination of Johnson’s works, especially his writings as a moralist, in Part III, beginning with his poem, “The Vanity of Human Wishes,” followed by his essays in "The Rambler" and of course, "Rasselas". I have always like this poem, as it traces the condition of man, beginning with his vulnerability in a social milieu surrounded by his fellows, and moves to inward and psychological causes, in some ways anticipating Freud. Johnson emphasizes our self-deception, and points out at the end of the poem that our only source of hope is in religion. Bate writes that because Johnson wrote the poem using the tenth satire of Juvenal, this imposed a limitation on Johnson explicitly using Christ as the source of all hope. Later in this section, Bate minutely examines the poem’s structure and use of language, which illustrates how Johnson was an exceptional poet.

In examining Johnson’s essays, Bate explains how many of the essays were written (Johnson was a known procrastinator and wrote with exceptional speed), and how they are compared with the writings of Francis Bacon. Johnson’s essays easily provide quotable sentences which read like proverbs, examples of which are found in Boswell and in the 2 volume "Johnsonian Miscellanies". Johnson’s "Lives of Poets" (to include Savage), and his clear and illuminating criticism of Shakespeare are also examined in detail by Bate.

Throughout the book, Bate reminds us, through copious examples, that Johnson’s character was distinguishes by four main qualities: sometimes brutal honesty; exceptional courage; compassion for all; and an unrivaled sense of humor. The final chapter, “Iam Moriturus” is poignant and it was with real regret that I finished this book and left this great man.

[Bryan--The Bee’s Knees · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rounded up from 4 1/2 stars--somewhat repetitive and slow to start; still, if the principle purpose of a biography is to not only inform but to raise your interest toward further study of the subject's work, then Bate succeeds splendidly. What I knew about Samuel Johnson before reading this you could have fit inside a thimble--I'm amazed to discover something of the person that he was. Even if one's interest doesn't exactly veer in this direction, this is still an excellent treatment of a life

[iane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Samuel Johnson enjoyed doing ridiculous stunts; even into late life he would roll down a steep hill because he felt like it, enter a friend's party by climbing over the front gate, pretend to be a kangaroo, run a footrace during which he'd pick up his competitor and put him in a tree, and do inadvisable chemistry experiments that would nearly blow up his friends' backyard. Living a hand-to-mouth existence until his fifties, he would sometimes stay up all night walking around London with friends when he couldn't afford a night's shelter. He married once (to his friend Elizabeth Jervis, who was twenty years older) and had no children, and later in life his home was essentially the eighteenth-century equivalent of a punk house, filled with various friends marginalized by London society. He completed his groundbreaking English dictionary with only six assistants, all of whom he hired likely because they were even more broke than he was and desperately needed the work. (The dictionary had no real patronage but reached completion in only nine years; the first major French dictionary was created by an official forty-member academy and took forty-five years to finish.) He detested slavery, war, and the colonial American theft of Native land; if he were here today to express his opinions about America's founding sins, right-wing parents would probably try to ban his work from schools.

He resolved again and again, up until his last years, to start getting out of bed before noon. He tends to be misleadingly remembered as an intimidating judge of others' conduct, but his sometimes spiny reputation was mainly a reflection of his own barely contained struggles with self-esteem. He was so tormented by anxiety and self-doubt that at multiple points in his life he feared he might go mad. But out of these periods came a startlingly compassionate and enduring understanding of human nature, reflected in both his writing and his life.

I'd heard high praise of Walter Jackson Bate's biography, but having known almost nothing about Johnson's life before reading this book, I was shocked how fresh and contemporary Johnson's life felt in Bate's telling (now over forty years old). I laughed out loud dozens of times reading about Johnson's wit and antics. And the more pages I turned, the more convinced I became that if Johnson were dropped into the 2020s he would find his footing pretty easily. He comes across as a deeply curious, empathetic man with a capacious understanding of human experience.

In bringing Johnson to life, Bate gives his sources a heavy psychological reading. He makes speculative leaps that might cause biographers today discomfort, and some of the more overtly Freudian passages feel stale now. He's also so clearly on Johnson's side that I sometimes became suspicious of a hagiographic current in the book. But Bate presents his research and interpretation so thoughtfully, and his narrative control is so skillful, that his most audacious risk-taking works. He presents Johnson as a whole person. Johnson's fame seems to have waned in recent decades, but given how prevalent anxiety is among younger generations right now, I could see a lot of people in their teens and twenties (especially aspiring writers and artists) drawing great solace and strength from this telling of Johnson's life.

Bate's writing goes down smoothly, and he absorbs Johnson's epigrammatic observational style. (I laughed when Bate notes about an early mentor to Johnson, "he had a wide acquaintance among men of fashion, some of whom were wits and others merely rakes.") In his critical readings of Johnson's writing, the quotations of Johnson are so powerful and Bate's interpretations so eloquent that they elevate each other. As Bate writes about Johnson's tale Rasselas, "implied throughout the story—only implied, never stated—is the radical mistake we make when we self-centeredly equate 'happiness' with any particular object or condition. For 'happiness' cannot be obtained if we search for it. It proves a mirage as we move toward it. In moments when we awake to a feeling of happiness, we find it has come only as a by-product, only when we are in the active process of lifting our focus of interest to something beyond our own condition and losing ourselves in something else." I'm now on the lookout for editions of the original works.

Having absorbed Johnson and his world through these pages, I feel like I've made a friend for life.

[Brian Willis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Pulitzer Prize winning biography is the definitive narrative of Johnson's life, though some readers may detect that it is from the "old school" of biography.

Though Bate likely did not have the medical terminology to describe it at the time, it is very clear from his descriptions of his psychological symptoms that Johnson suffered from chronic depression and obsessive compulsive disorder. The descriptions of his peculiar behaviors and physical tics are clearly OCD, and his self-accounts of massive "indolence" and an inability to work on his writing projects stem from depression; at times, he did not leave bed for days!

Also superb are the descriptions of Johnson's writing style and strengths, particularly when composing the Dictionary, Rasselas, and the Lives of the Poets. Stripping away the veneer of Boswell's hagiographic Life, Bate gets to the root of Johnson the man. This was clearly the reason why he won his second Pulitzer for this life, because it is an exemplar of the biographical genre. Essential for the Johnson intrigued and the literary historian.

[Gary Mesick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bate was a genius. I was fortunate enough to catch his course on "The Age of Samuel Johnson," where he walked us through most of this book day by day. I can still remember his lecture on Johnson's death--which is captured here. The definitive Johnson bio.

[Adam Stevenson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd say this is the best Johnson biography of them all. Better even than Boswell's, this not only gives us the words and the moments, but a plausible and interesting psychological meaning to them. I've read 5 or six lives of Johnson's now and this is my favourite.

[Jeremy Anderberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Samuel Johnson has fascinated more people than any other writer except Shakespeare."

So begins Bate's memorable, surely unmatched biography of one of history's most interesting (and modernity's most overlooked) writers and humans.

So also begins my surely ongoing education into Johnson's life and work.

I gave you a taste last week, and I wish I could give more. But space just does not allow. So right here at the start, I'll say that you should read this book.

Samuel Johnson — both the book and the character — grabbed my interest from that first sentence. It is immensely readable and absolutely full to the brim of life lessons about overcoming difficulties, finding and working towards your purpose, the beauty and faults and hopefulness of humanity; plus, especially interesting to a fellow who sometimes considers himself a writer, there is a veritable deluge to be learned on that particular craft.

In spite of my supreme book nerdiness, his was not a name I was all that familiar with. I had come across it in passing, but I distinctly remember having looked him up on Wikipedia numerous times simply because I could never remember who the guy was. And yet, as Bate noted, not only was Johnson just "fascinating," he was and is perhaps one of the top few quoted writers in the English language. You probably just don't realize it because his work has so constantly been built upon and riffed on.

From his truly epic dictionary (used by Austen, Dickens, Bronte, and more), to his voluminous essays, to his groundbreaking biographical sketches, he wrote enough to keep me busy for quite a long time.

Not only that, but he's the subject of what Bate calls "the most famous work of biographical art in the history of literature," to which "nothing comparable" exists in the annals of the genre: James Boswell's 1,400-page Life of Samuel Johnson (1791). I'm planning on reading that mountain of a book this year.

That particular combination — of first-person writings and biographical genius from both Boswell and Bate — makes for a man more interesting and more inspiring than just about any I've come across.

And so here I am, a few hundred words into this review of Bate's work, and I've only conveyed tangential information, barely even touching the substance of the book. Like any work (Johnson himself even critiqued Shakespeare), there are flaws: Bate gets a little too Freudian, and doesn't touch enough on The Club or Johnson's lasting legacy. Those flaws should be ignored. The real strength of Bate is in showing Johnson's utter humanity. Here was a man long wracked by self-guilt and who made annual resolutions to accomplish more. Here was a man about whom peers commented was "music" to hear speak in conversation. Here was a man who looked to be pleased rather than looked to be annoyed. What if that was everyone general disposition?

I loved this biography. It took me a full hour just to transcribe all my notes into Google Docs (for which the longer portions I just noted the page numbers to reference later), and my head is spinning with all that both man and biographer had to say.

Samuel Johnson is a book I'll long remember, and Samuel Johnson is a man I plan on spending I plan on spending a great deal of time with in the years to come.

[Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bate, Walter Jackson. Samuel Johnson. 1977. Counterpoint, 1998.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1785) is the preeminent example of what is now a vanishing breed: a man of letters. He singlehandedly wrote the first English Dictionary worthy of the name, an edition of Shakespeare that was the standard text for two centuries, one of the earliest philosophical novels, one of the best philosophical poems of his century, and a body of journalistic writing, sermons, and biography that no one has ever equaled. He was fluent in several languages, most notably, Latin, and late in life taught himself Dutch just to keep his mind off his troubles. He was also the subject of the classic biography written by James Boswell. Much of his journalistic writing and all the sermons were written anonymously or ghostwritten for someone else. While working for a magazine, he was given notes on parliamentary speeches and then wrote what purported to be transcripts of the speeches. He did such a good job that no one from either party ever complained to the magazine. Johnson had written better speeches for them than they had actually made. He lived into his seventies but suffered all his life from depression, convulsions and twitches, poor eyesight and hearing. He was forced to drop out of Oxford in his second year because he could not pay the tuition and remained poor until late in life. Boswell always called him Dr. Johnson, but all his degrees were honorary. His political and philosophical views are difficult to classify. Deeply religious, he seldom went to church. A Tory, he opposed colonialism and slavery. In fact, he made a former slave, whom he employed and helped educate, his main heir. He is certainly a man whose life is worth knowing. The biography by Walter Jackson Bate is still the most detailed and well-researched life of Johnson, despite a couple of major biographies written to celebrate the 300th anniversary of his birth in 2009. It may be a bit more Freudian than is now popular, but most of its judgments seem sound. Bate’s discussion of “The Vanity of Human Wishes” is especially insightful. Five stars.

[Jeremy Kriewaldt · Rating 4 out of 5]

As other reviewers have observed, Prof Bate's work has the singular virtue of comprehensiveness. Whereas Boswell viewed his Life to a significant extent as an opportunity for him to establish his own reputation (while also honouring the memory of his friend and mentor), Bate's approach seems to have been to clear away the thicket of accumulated semi-apocryphal quasi-biographical material and to attempt to present Johnson as he was, rather than others would have him be.

Of particular value is Bate's ability to combine both literary assessment and historical/biographical material to create a well-rounded literary biography, policing the literary work within the context of Johnson's own life, while recognising the central position that his writings played in life.

Prof Bate, like all of us, was a man of his time. Academic life in the mid to late 20th century was profoundly influenced by psychoanalysis and the insights of Freud and his disciples and Bate offers several "explanations" of Johnson's behaviour founded on concepts drawn from psychoanalysis. On the one hand, if correct, these observations have the potential to cast light on matters that might otherwise defy reasonable understanding. On the other hand, they do tend to sometimes have the appearance of inspired guesswork dressed up in pseudo-science. As tentative and unverifiable potential explanations, these observations by Bate are interesting and present Johnson as a more rounded individual. Further, the use of psychoanalytical terms has the advantage of identifying where Bate has engaged in this speculation, even if the statement itself reads as proven fact rather than something less definitive. However, these speculations risk presenting Johnson as a creation of Bate's imagination more than as the human being who actually lived.

For example, Bate didactically asserts that Johnson's disturbing mannerisms and tics are solely the result of his psychology and the conflicts within that psychology without considering the possibility of the presence of Tourette's syndrome. This is not to deny a psychological aspect to this behaviour, but rather to suggest that the picture is probably more nuanced with psychological and medical aspects operating together and on each other. The criticism in these last two paragraphs, however, is not a reason to avoid this work. Rather, it is a suggestion of something that a reader might bear in mind while otherwise enjoying it.

[Sam Rennick · Rating 4 out of 5]

You have to admire the audacity of W. Jackson Bate. Who would attempt a biography of Samuel Johnson, in view of Boswell's, which, like Elizabeth Gaskell's two-volume biography of Charlotte Bronte, is a book about a contemporary? Boswell and Mrs. Gaskell, as she was known, were around their subjects. They literally heard the words they would later put in their book. "Straight from the horse's mouth," you might say. Hearsay not required. But Bate's audacity is rewarded. His biography is first-rate. We get more from Bate than we do from Boswell on Samuel Johnson's psychology. His abundant eccentricities, "scruples," ailments (physical and mental, real and imagined), his marriage. In short, the man. Boswell, of course, is right there with Johnson, writing down every word from this man for whom the word "curmudgeonly" must have been invented. Somewhere in his biography, Bate identifies gratitude as Johnson's greatest virtue, if memory serves. But Boswell's book is more fun. He gives us the sharp-tongued curmudgeon, not the grateful one. Need an example? Johnson and Boswell are on a tour of the Hebrides. Boswell, who will make Johnson immortal, must suffer Johnson's epigram, when he declares the best thing to come out of Scotland is the road to London. Boswell, of course, was from Edinburgh. This tactlessness of Johnson, who didn't care two bits if he hurt someone's feelings, was something Boswell had to put up with countless times. It was worth it. Boswell, by golly, got the last laugh. His book made him immortal, too.

[Joseph Millo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author is brilliantly successful when he sticks to biography – Johnson’s rise from abject poverty to renown, his dreams and failures, his perseverance against years of Grub Street anonymity, his marriage, his character and his literature. The author also excels at integrating literary criticism of Johnson's works into the biographical stream.

But I was sometimes frustrated when the author attempted to psychoanalyze Johnson. The author avoids modern medical terms to describe Johnson’s most common physical and mental afflictions. Johnson suffered from Tourette syndrome, obscessive-compulsive disorder and depression/despair. Yet these medical terms are never used. Instead the author spouts vague Freudian terms like “self-demand” and “superego”. Throughout his life Johnson struggled against what he called “scruples” but the author repeatedly leaves the reader puzzled as to what Johnson meant. Only once, buried in a foot note, does the author identify scruples as acts of obsession and compulsion.

Johnson once referred to writing as the “epidemical conspiracy for the destruction of paper”, probably referring to Grub Street writers. This book does NOT fall into that category. Highly recommended.

[Jeff Keehr · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my second reading of this book. Both times I read the paperback that my first wife gave to me as a birthday gift on my 29th birthday. She inscribed it thus: 'Happy 29th Birthday from one poor scholar to another. Love, Fran' The book fell apart during this reading, the glue having grown hard and brittle. And I am debating whether I should toss it. But the fact that it was a gift and that it's about one of my heroes makes me pause. That such a man continues to live in the imaginations of hundreds, probably thousands, of minds to this day is a testament to the power of the written word and the incredible human being who inspired the words. (The entire world is currently suffering from a pandemic caused by a respiratory virus called the corona, thus named because under the microscope it appears to have a crown. The Black Death, which lasted 4 years, 1347-1351, killed approximately 75 to 200 million people. So although there is a great deal of hand wringing and anxiety over this latest pandemic, it is mild compared to those that have ravaged the human population in the past.)

[Lila · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great biography on a very endearing person. Scholarly, intelligent look at Johnson showing his personality and background without getting enmeshed in Freudian "cant." Johnson's life is the life of a man who tries too hard and fails too hard. He has indeed traveled the road ahead and reported back. While reading this book, you don't feel so much alone, you find that you are not quite as unique as you thought--unusual perhaps, but not unique. Others have gone through the same mental fears, the same attempts at organization, of striving, of forcing yourself so hard that you are paralyzed for fear of error or that someone will think less of you. Bates is right, you fight so hard for control that your mind rebels and will not work.

[Rob Griffin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent biography!

[Evan · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF

I don't know why this has a Pulitzer when half of it is just psychoanalysis... terrible book.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Samuel Johnson" by Walter Jackson Bate is a well-researched biography of this unique and wonderful genius. Cursed by poor health and poverty, Johnson rose not through bald ambition but purely by his will to learn and to be a positive force for enlightenment. Brutally honest with himself and shedding all illusion about his fellow man, he fought through periods of melancholy and near madness to enlist a personal faith that, along with help from generous and appreciative friends, sustained him adequately to become perhaps the most distinguished man of letters in English history.

Among his remarkable achievements is compilation of a comprehensive Dictionary of the English Language which he completed in a few years, while committees of dozens of scholars of other countries were taking decades to assemble dictionaries in their tongues. Helpful were his mastery of Greek and Latin and the classics and his near-perfect memory for what he had very widely read. With its apt citations it is considered a work of literature.

Other valuable works include the poem "The Vanity of Human Wishes", his highly original criticism of Shakespeare, biographies, biographical sketches called "Lives of the Poets", essays, and many speeches and lectures written for others for free and not for attribution to Johnson. For example, without formal training in the law, Johnson wrote legal lectures for delivery by the successor to the great Blackstone.

Another example. For a newspaper he wrote a number of Parliamentary speeches. It was illegal to report the actual speeches, so Johnson sent someone to listen to them and make notes on their context. From the notes and his fine knowledge of the world, Johnson invented speeches and printed them as disquisitions from a fictional land, so that his perceiving public could sense the issues involved. Johnson's speeches were often so far superior to the actual ones that the politicians began claiming them, and they came to be collected and reprinted as genuine.

Johnson is said to be after Shakespeare the most quoted man in the English language; much of it from conversation recorded by associates. He did his own thinking about everything, great or small. He could have been a withering satirist to match Swift but was by will or by nature generous, and from his own struggles and erudition was sympathetic to trials and obstacles threatening everyone and was likely wary of his power to inflict harm.

If you are wanting an easy read about Johnson and have not already done so, then try Boswell's "Life of Johnson". The drawback is that nearly all of that book is about the last third or fourth of Johnson's life; that is, when Boswell knew him. Still, that book is a solid classic.

This biography covers Johnson's entire life, and Bate fills in the years missing from Boswell and corrects errors. There are two quibbles. Bate writes in a style that is amiable, wise and non-academic, but a little too careful to read effortlessly. And he does a bit more of psychologizing than usual, though it is done well, and primarily for Johnson's formative years. That this won the 1978 Pulitzer Prize for biography should not deter anyone.

But it is Johnson himself who carries the day to make this an easy five-star recommendation.

[Smiley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This biography is readable and worth respect regarding Professor Bate's scholarship and excellent style of writing with related references. The best of all Dr Johnson's biographies I have read.

[Scott Macdougall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps a test for biography is the degree to which the author's life has been changed by her encounter with her subject. A sense of the high wonder that Johnson can engender permeates Bate's book.

[Larry · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my all time favorite books. Samuel Johnson was one of the greatest writers in the English language. Bate emphasizes Johnson's keen psychological insight into the "vanity of human wishes."

[Maria · Rating 5 out of 5]

First rate biography.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

A labor of love by one of our best teachers and critics. Sympathetic.Well written, a pleasure to read.

[Sherry · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was soooooo boring!

[Jeff Wills · Rating 5 out of 5]

The finest biography I've read to date. This enthralling and highly intelligent work of art is a real pleasure to read.

[S.N. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great biography

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Freudian psychoanalytic angle gets a little tiresome after a while, but otherwise an impressively researched, interestingly told narrative of a truly fascinating life.

[Sharon · Rating 2 out of 5]

too long-winded

[David G. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A slow read, but rewarding. Deserves all the awards it got!

[Christopher Potter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extraordinary. Highly recommended for those who already appreciate Johnson. Not recommended for others.

[Jackson Cyril · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bate's bio of Johnson, despite a few unsavory pages which were heavy on Freudian criticism, does as much justice to its subject as can be expected of in any such work. Boswell's bio is lamentably weak on Johnson's early period as well as his friendship with the Thrales, and Bate brilliantly illuminates these other aspects of Johnson's life. Heartily recommended.

[Kate]

Mentioned in Shadow in the Garden a biographer’s tale by James Atlas