Reading Experience Database
1450-1945

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Record 21714

Reading Experience:

Evidence:
'He [Johnson] was much diverted with an article which I shewed him in the "Critical Review" of this year, giving an account of a curious publication, entitled, "A Spiritual Diary and Soliloquies", by John Rutty, M.D. Dr. Rutty was one of the people called Quakers, a physician of some eminence in Dublin, and authour of several works. This Diary, which was kept from 1753 to 1775, the year in which he died, and was now published in two volumes octavo, exhibited, in the simplicity of his heart, a minute and honest register of the state of his mind; which, though frequently laughable enough, was not more so than the history of many men would be, if recorded with equal fairness.'
Century: 1700-1799
Date: 19 Sep 1777
Country: England
Time: n/a
Place: city: Ashbourne
county: Derbyshire
   
Type of Experience (Reader):
silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown
Type of Experience (Listener):
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Reader/Listener/Reading Group:

Reader:James Boswell
Age Adult (18-100+)
Gender Male
Date of Birth 29 Oct 1740
Socio-economic group: Professional / academic / merchant / farmer
Occupation: writer and lawyer
Religion: n/a
Country of origin: Scotland
Country of experience: England
Listeners present if any:
(e.g. family, servants, friends, workmates)
n/a
Additional comments: n/a

 

Text Being Read:

Author:
Title: Critical Review
Genre: Essays / Criticism
Form of Text: Print: Serial / periodical
Publication details: n/a
Provenance: owned

 

Source Information:

Record ID: 21714  
Source - Print  
  Author: James Boswell
  Editor: R.W. Chapman
  Title: Life of Johnson
  Place of Publication: Oxford
  Date of Publication: 1980
  Vol: n/a
  Page: 852
  Additional comments: n/a

Citation: James Boswell, R.W. Chapman (ed.), Life of Johnson (Oxford, 1980), p. 852, http://can-red-lec.library.dal.ca/Arts/reading/recorddetails2.php?id=21714, accessed: 29 March 2024

Additional comments:

Originally published 1791. Not certain if either Johnson or Boswell read the book being reviewed. Extracts of the review are reproduced.

 

 

Reading Experience Database version 2.0.  Page updated: 27th Apr 2016  3:15pm (GMT)