Evidence: | 'So easy is his style in these "Lives", that I do not recollect more than three uncommon or learned words; one, when giving an account of the approach of Waller's mortal disease, he says, "he found his legs grow tumid"; by using the expression his legs swelled, he would have avoided this; and there would have been no impropriety in its being followed by the interesting question to his physician, 'What that swelling meant?' Another, when he mentions that Pope had emitted proposals; when published or issued would have been more readily understood; and a third, when he calls Orrery and Dr. Delany, writers both undoubtedly veracious, when true, honest, or faithful, might have been used. Yet, it must be owned, that none of these are hard or too big words; that custom would make them seem as easy as any others; and that a language is richer and capable of more beauty of expression, by having a greater variety of synonimes.
His dissertation upon the unfitness of poetry for the aweful subjects of our holy religion, though I do not entirely agree with with him, has all the merit of originality, with uncommon force and reasoning.'
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Century: | 1700-1799 | ||||||||||
Date: | Until: 31 Dec 1781 | ||||||||||
Country: | Scotland | ||||||||||
Time: | n/a | ||||||||||
Place: | n/a | ||||||||||
Type of Experience (Reader): |
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Type of Experience (Listener): |
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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: | Scotland |
Listeners present if any: (e.g. family, servants,
friends, workmates) |
n/a |
Additional comments: | n/a |
Author: | Samuel Johnson |
Title: | Lives of the Poets |
Genre: | Essays / Criticism, Biography |
Form of Text: | Print: Book |
Publication details: | n/a |
Provenance: | owned |
Record ID: | 22169 | |
Source - | ||
Author: | James Boswell | |
Editor: | R.W. Chapman | |
Title: | Life of Johnson | |
Place of Publication: | Oxford | |
Date of Publication: | 1980 | |
Vol: | n/a | |
Page: | 1093-4 | |
Additional comments: | n/a |
Citation: | James Boswell, R.W. Chapman (ed.), Life of Johnson (Oxford, 1980), p. 1093-4, http://can-red-lec.library.dal.ca/Arts/reading/recorddetails2.php?id=22169, accessed: 06 June 2023 |
Originally published 1791. Boswell had read the 'Lives' in MS too. |
Reading Experience Database version 2.0. Page updated: 27th Apr 2016 3:15pm (GMT)