Samuel JohnsonHarvard University Press, 1998 - 372 pages He was a servant to the public, a writer for hire. He was a hero, an author adding to the glory of his nation. But can a writer be both hack and hero? The career of Samuel Johnson, recounted here by Lawrence Lipking, proves that the two can be one. And it further proves, in its enduring interest for readers, that academic fashions today may be a bit hasty in pronouncing the "death of the author." |
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... seems inevitable . The choice of words is not mere play for Johnson , and certainly not an end in itself . Rather , it shows his fitting of mat- ter to spirit , of action to moral . Meanwhile the hero seems to disappear . One reason ...
... seems a remarkable omission . Johnson's first letter to Edward Cave , in 1734 , had offered " short lit- erary Dissertations " to improve " your Literary Article , for so it might be call'd , " and otherwise to aid his " Literary ...
... seems to be Milton's Satan . We have come a long way from the Falklands . What motivates this furious change of course ? Each party of read- ers will vote for a different answer . A good many scholars think Johnson essentially justified ...
Contents
the Western Islands of Scotland | 234 |
The Lives of the English Poets | 259 |
Johnsons Endings | 295 |
Copyright | |
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