Samuel Johnson
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Samuel Johnson LLD MA
Samuel Johnson c. 1772, painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds
Born	18 September 1709 (O.S. 7 September) Lichfield, England
Died	13 December 1784 (age 75) London, England
Occupation	essayist, lexicographer, biographer, poet
Spouse(s)	Elizabeth Jervis Porter

Samuel Johnson (often referred to as Dr Johnson) (18 September 1709 O.S. 7 September] – 13 December 1784) was an essayist, poet, biographer, lexicographer and critic of English literature. He was born in Lichfield, Staffordshire and spent many of his early years in the surrounding community. Later, he attended Pembroke College, Oxford for a year, before he was forced to leave because of his inability to support himself financially. Lacking a degree, he struggled to find employment in the field of education, and eventually travelled to London, where he began his career as a man of letters, writing essays for The Gentleman's Magazine and completing his A Dictionary of the English Language.

Following the publication of his Dictionary, Johnson enjoyed popularity and success. He continued to write for various London periodicals and embarked on an edition of William Shakespeare's plays. During this time, he met James Boswell along with Henry Thrale and Hester Thrale, the three people that Johnson would spend the majority of his time with after his wife's death. With Boswell, he travelled to Scotland and wrote A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland. Towards the end of his life, he produced his Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets. After a series of illnesses, Johnson died on the evening of 13 December 1784; he is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Although Johnson is well known for A Dictionary of the English Language and Lives of Poets, he is best known from Boswell's biography, the Life of Samuel Johnson. Boswell encouraged interest in Johnson's life, and biographies of Johnson have become their own specialised field within Johnson scholarship.^[1] Many of Johnson's friends, including Boswell, Hester Thrale/Piozzi and Fanny Burney, kept detailed accounts of his life, which provide the basis for the many later critical claims about Johnson's life and works. His friends' descriptions of his behaviour and mannerisms have also informed the posthumous diagnoses of Tourette syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder, conditions unknown to 18th-century physicians.

Biography

There are many biographies and biographers of Samuel Johnson, but James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson is the one best known to the general reader.^[2] Yet opinion among 20th-century Johnson scholars such as Edmund Wilson and Donald Greene is that Boswell's Life "can hardly be termed a biography at all", being merely "a collection of those entries in Boswell's diaries dealing with the occasions during the last twenty-two years of Johnson's life on which they met ... strung together with only a perfunctory effort to fill the gaps".^[2] Furthermore, Greene claims that the work "began with a well-organized press campaign, by Boswell and his friends, of puffing and of denigration of his rivals; and was given a boost by one of Macaulay's most memorable pieces of journalistic claptrap".^[2]

The cause for concern is that Boswell's original Life "corrects" many of Johnson's quotations, censors many of the more vulgar comments, and largely ignores Johnson's early years.^[3] Modern biographers have since corrected Boswell's errors.^[4] However, this is not to say that Boswell's work is wrong or of no use: scholars such as Walter Jackson Bate appreciate the "detail" and the "treasury of conversation" that it contains.^[5] All of Johnson's biographers, according to Bate, have to go through the same "igloo" of material that Boswell had to deal with: limited information from Johnson's first forty years and an extreme amount for those after.^[5] Simply put, "Johnson's life continues to hold attention" and "every scrap of evidence relating to Johnson's life has continued to be examined and many more details have been added" because "it is so close to general human experience in a wide variety of ways".^[6]

Early life and education

Samuel Johnson was born in Lichfield, Staffordshire, at 4:00 pm on Wednesday, 18 September 1709. His parents were Michael Johnson, a bookseller, and his wife, Sarah Ford.^[7] Michael was the first bookseller of "reputation" in the community, having opened a parchment factory which produced book bindings.^[8] In 1706, he had married Sarah Ford, daughter of Cornelius Ford, from a middle-class milling and farming family; he was 49 and she was 37.^[9] Although both families had money, Johnson always claimed that he grew up in poverty. It is uncertain what happened between Michael and Sarah's marriage and the birth of Samuel just three years later to provoke such a change in fortune.^[8]

Johnson's birthplace in Market Square, Lichfield

Johnson was born in the family home above his father's bookshop, near Market Square in Lichfield, across from St. Mary's Church.^[7] His mother, Sarah, was 40 when she gave birth, a matter for sufficient concern that George Hector, a "man-midwife" and a surgeon of "great reputation", was brought in to assist during the birth.^[10] The baby was named Samuel, after Sarah's brother Samuel Ford.^[7] He did not cry and, with doubts surrounding the newborn's health, his aunt claimed "that she would not have picked such a poor creature up in the street".^[11] As it was feared the baby might die, the vicar of St Mary's was summoned to perform a baptism.^[12] Two godfathers were chosen: Dr. Samuel Swynfen, a physician and graduate of Pembroke College, and Richard Wakefield, a lawyer, coroner and Lichfield town clerk.^[13]

Johnson's health improved and he was placed in the nursing care of Joan Marklew.^[14] During this period he contracted what is believed to have been scrofula,^[14] known at that time as the "King's Evil". Sir John Floyer, a former physician to Charles II, recommended that the young Johnson should receive the "royal touch",^[15] which he received from Queen Anne on 30 March 1712, at St James's Palace.^[16] Johnson was given a ribbon in memory of the event, which he claimed to have worn for the rest of his life.^[16] However, the ritual was ineffective and an operation was performed that left him with permanent scarring across his face and body.^[17] Sarah later gave birth to a second boy named Nathaniel, which put financial strain on the family.^[18] Michael was unable to keep on top of the debts he had accumulated over the years, and his family was no longer able to enjoy the lifestyle that it had previously enjoyed.^[18]

Johnson demonstrated signs of intelligence as a child, and his parents, to his later disgust, showed off his "newly acquired accomplishments".^[20] His initial education began at the age of three, and came from his mother who had him memorize and recite passages from the Book of Common Prayer.^[21] When Johnson turned four, he was sent to a nearby "school" on Dam Street; 'Dame' Anne Oliver, the proprietor, gave lessons to young children in the living-room of a cottage.^[21][22] Johnson especially enjoyed his time with Dame Oliver, and later remembered her fondly.^[21] When Johnson reached the age of six, he was sent to a retired shoemaker to continue his education.^[23] A year later, having demonstrated his intelligence, he was sent to Lichfield Grammar School, where he excelled in Latin under Humphrey Hawkins, his teacher in the lower school.^[24][25] He was promoted to the upper school at the age of nine,^[25] to be tutored by Edward Holbrooke.^[26] Johnson's memories of the school differed from his experience with Dame Oliver because the school was directed by Reverend John Hunter, a man known for both his scholarship and, like Holbrooke, his brutality.^[27][28] While attending the school, Johnson befriended Edmund Hector, nephew of his "man-midwife" George Hector, and John Taylor, two men with whom he stayed in contact later in his life.^[29]

At the age of 16 Johnson was given the opportunity to stay with his cousins, the Fords, at Pedmore, Worcestershire.^[30] There he became friendly with Cornelius Ford, the son of his mother's brother.^[30][31] Ford had a successful career in academia and in society, and he knew many people such as Alexander Pope.^[32] It is thought that Ford's knowledge of the classics was employed to tutor Johnson while not attending school.^[32] However, Ford was a notorious alcoholic whose excesses contributed to his death, six years after Johnson's visit, in mid-August 1731.^[32] Johnson, who bonded with his cousin during his stay at Pedmore, was affected deeply by Ford's death, and he remembered Ford in his Lives of the Poets, saying that his abilities, "instead of furnishing convivial merriments to the voluptous and dissolute, might have enabled him to excel among the virtuous and the wise."^[33] After six months with his cousins Johnson returned to Lichfield, but Hunter, "angered by the impertinence of this long absence", refused to allow him to continue at the grammar school.^[34]

Unable to return to Lichfield Grammar School, Johnson was enrolled into Stourbridge Grammar School.^[34] Because the school was located near Pedmore, Johnson was able to spend more time with the Fords.^[34] During his time at the school he wrote many poems and produced many verse translations.^[35] However, he spent only six months at Stourbridge before returning once again to his parent's home in Lichfield.^[36] For companionship, Johnson spent time with Edmund Hector and John Taylor, two of his schoolfriends, and he soon fell in love with Hector's younger sister, Ann.^[36] This first love was not to last, and Johnson later claimed to Boswell, "She was the first woman with whom I was in love. It dropped out of my head imperceptibly, but she and I shall always have a kindness for each other."^[36]

During this time it was uncertain what Johnson's future would be, as although Michael Johnson was doing well, being a senior bailiff in Lichfield, he was still in debt.^[36] In order to earn some money Johnson began stitching books for his father, although he was ill-suited to the work because of his poor eyesight, resulting from his childhood illness.^[37] It is possible that Johnson spent most of his time in his father's bookshop reading various works and building his literary knowledge.^[38] During this time, Johnson met Gilbert Walmesley, the Registrar of the Ecclesiastical Court and a frequent visitor to the bookshop.^[39] Walmesley took a liking to Johnson, and the two discussed various intellectual topics for the two years Johnson spent working in the shop.^[40] Their relationship did not last; one of Sarah Johnson's relatives, Elizabeth Harriotts, died in February 1728, leaving Sarah a bequest of £40, which was used to send Johnson back to school.^[40][41]

College

On 31 October 1728, a few weeks after he turned 19, Johnson entered Pembroke College, Oxford as a fellow-commoner.^[42] The inheritance from Mrs Harriotts did not cover all of his expenses at Pembroke, but Andrew Corbet, a friend and student at Pembroke, offered to make up the deficit.^[43] Corbet left Pembroke soon after Johnson arrived, so this source of aid disappeared.^[43] To meet the expenses, Michael Johnson allowed his son to take a hundred books from his bookshop, at a great cost to himself, and these books were not fully returned to Michael until many years later.^[43]

Entrance of Pembroke College, Oxford

On the day of Johnson's entrance interview for Pembroke, his anxious father introduced him to his future tutor, William Jorden, hoping to make an impression.^[44] During the interview, his father was "very full of the merits of his son, and told the company he was a good scholar, and a poet, and wrote latin verses", which caused Johnson significant embarrassment.^[45] Michael's praise was unnecessary; Johnson's interview went so well that one of the interviewers, a 26-year-old William Adams (Jorden's cousin, later Master of Pembroke), claimed that Johnson was "the best qualified for the University that he had ever known come there".^[46] Throughout the interview, Johnson sat quietly while listening to his father and the interviewers, until he interrupted and quoted Macrobius.^[45] The interviewers were surprised that "a School-boy should know Macrobius", and he was accepted forthwith.^[47]

At Pembroke, Johnson made many friends, but neglected a number of mandatory lectures, and ignored calls for poems.^[48] However, he did complete one poem, the first of his tutorial exercises, on which he spent comparably significant time (that of two rereads), and which provoked surprise and applause.^[49] He was later asked by his tutor to produce a Latin translation of Alexander Pope's Messiah as a Christmas exercise.^[50] Johnson completed half of the translation in one afternoon and the rest the following morning.^[51] Although the poem brought him praise, it did not bring him the material benefit he had hoped for.^[51] The poem was brought to Pope's attention; according to Sir John Hawkins, Pope claimed that he could not tell if it was the original or not.^[51] However, John Taylor, his friend, dismissed this "praise" because Johnson's father had already published the translation before Johnson sent a copy to Pope, and Pope could have been remarking about it being a duplication of the published edition.^[51] Regardless, Pope remarked that the work was very finely done, but that did not prevent Johnson from being violently angry at his father's actions in preempting his sending Pope a copy of the poem.^[52] The poem later appeared in Miscellany of Poems (1731), edited by John Husbands, a Pembroke tutor, and was the earliest surviving publication of any of Johnson's writings.^[52] Johnson spent the rest of his time studying, even over the Christmas vacation.^[53] He drafted a "plan of study" called "Adversaria", which was left unfinished,^[53] and used his time to learn French while working on his knowledge of Greek.^[53]

Although he later praised Jorden, Johnson came to odds with him over what he considered to be Jorden's "meanness" of abilities.^[55] He discouraged his friend Taylor, who came to Pembroke in March, from having Jorden as his tutor, and Taylor was soon encouraged to go to Christ Church to be taught by Edmund Bateman.^[56] Johnson appreciated Bateman's skill as a lecturer, and he would often travel to meet Taylor to discuss the lectures.^[56] However, Johnson lacked the funds to even replace his own shoes, and so he started to make the journey barefoot.^[57] In response, those of Christ Church began to mock Johnson, and he soon kept to his own room for the rest of his time at Pembroke, with Taylor visiting him instead.^[58]

After thirteen months, poverty forced Johnson to leave Oxford without taking a degree, and he returned to Lichfield.^[59] During Johnson's last weeks at Oxford, Jorden left Pembroke, and Johnson was given William Adams as a tutor in his place.^[60] He enjoyed Adams as a tutor, but by December, Johnson was already a quarter behind in his student fees, and he was forced to return home.^[61] He left behind many of the books that his father had previous lent him because he could not afford the expense of transporting all of them and as a symbolic gesture that he hoped to return to the school soon.^[61]

Just before the publication of his Dictionary in 1755, Oxford University awarded Johnson the degree of Master of Arts.^[62] He was awarded an honorary doctorate in 1765 by Trinity College Dublin and in 1775 by Oxford University.^[63] In 1776, he returned to Pembroke with Boswell and toured the school with his previous tutor Adams, who was then the school's Master.^[64] He used that visit to recount his time at the college, his early career, and to express his later fondness for Jorden.^[64]

Early career

Dr Johnson's House, 17 Gough Square, London

There is little record of Johnson's life between 1730 and 1731; he most likely lived with his parents while experiencing bouts of mental anguish.^[65] By 1731 his father was deeply in debt, and had lost much of his standing in Lichfield.^[65] An usher's position became available at Stourbridge Grammar School, but Johnson's lack of a degree saw him passed over, on 6 September 1731.^[65] Instead, he stayed at the home of Gregory Hickman, Cornelius Ford's half brother, writing poetry.^[66] It was there that he heard the devastating news that Cornelius had died in London, on 22 August 1731;^[66] later, in his personal "Annales", he pointed to that moment as one of the most important of his life.^[66]

At about the same time, Johnson's father became ill, and had developed an "inflammatory fever" by the end of the year.^[67] He died in December 1731 and was buried at St. Michael's Church on 7 December 1731.^[67] He left no will, and Johnson received only £20 from Michael's estate of £60.^[67] In an act "almost like religious penance", Johnson honoured his father's memory 50 years later by returning to his father's bookstall in Uttoxeter to make amends for his refusal to work the stall while his father lay dying.^[67][68] Richard Warner kept Johnson's account of the scene:

... a postchaise to Uttoxeter, and going into the market at the time of high business, uncovered my head, and stood with it bare an hour before the stall which my father had formerly used, exposed to the sneers of the standers-by and the inclemency of the weather.^[69]

Johnson eventually found employment as undermaster at a school in Market Bosworth, Leicestershire.^[70] He was paid £20 a year, enough to support himself.^[70] The school was run by Sir Wolstan Dixie, who allowed Johnson to teach even though he did not have a degree.^[70] The unconventional Dixie allowed Johnson to live at his own mansion, Bosworth Hall.^[71] Although the arrangement may seem congenial, Johnson was treated as "a kind of domestick chaplain, so far, at least, as to say grace at table, but was treated with what he represented as intolerable harshness; and, after suffering for a few months such complicated misery, he relinquished a situation which all his life afterwards he recollected with the strongest aversion, and even a degree of horrour."^[72]

Elizabeth "Tetty" Porter, Johnson's wife

Still, Johnson found pleasure in teaching even though he thought it boring.^[73] By June 1732, he had returned home, and, after a fight with Dixie, quit the school and stayed at Lichfield while searching for a new opening at the local schools.^[74]

After being turned down for a position in Ashbourne, Johnson spent time with his friend, Hector.^[75] Hector lived in the home of Thomas Warren, on High Street Birmingham, and Johnson was invited to stay there as a guest in the autumn of 1732.^[76] Warren was at that time starting his Birmingham Journal, and he enlisted Johnson's help, though no copies of the essays he wrote for the paper now survive.^[76] His stay with Hector and Warren was not to last, and Johnson moved into the house of a man named Jarvis on 1 June 1733.^[77] During this time, Johnson started to slip into a "state of 'absence'" and he began to treat his friends with "abuse".^[78]

His connection with Warren continued to grow, and Johnson proposed to translate Jeronimo Lobo's account of the Abyssinians.^[79] Johnson read Abbe Joachim Le Grand's French translations, and he thought that a shorter version might be "useful and profitable".^[80] He began work on the edition and a finished section was taken to be printed during the winter of 1733–1734.^[80] To finish the rest, Johnson dictated directly to Hector, who then took the copy to the printer and made any corrections.^[80] Johnson was paid £5 for what amounted to a month's work.^[80] A year later in 1735, his A Voyage to Abyssinia was finally published.^[80]

Johnson returned to Lichfield in February 1734, where he began an annotated edition of Poliziano's Latin poems, along with a history of Latin poetry from Petrarch to Poliziano.^[81] Johnson began on 15 June 1743 and printed a Proposal for the work on 5 August 1734.^[82] However, the project did not receive enough funds and it was soon brought to an end.^[82]

Edial Hall School

Johnson was close to a man named Harry Porter, and remained with him during his terminal illness.^[83] Porter died on 3 September 1734, leaving his wife, Elizabeth Jervis Porter (otherwise known as "Tetty"), widowed at the age of 41, with three children.^[84] Months later, Johnson began to court the widow; Reverend William Shaw claims that "the first advances probably proceeded from her, as her attachment to Johnson was in opposition to the advice and desire of all her relations".^[85] Johnson was inexperienced in terms of relationships, but the well-to-do widow encouraged him and provided for him with her substantial savings.^[86] Johnson married Elizabeth on 9 July 1735, at St. Werburgh's Church in Derby.^[87] The Porter family did not approve of the match, partly because Johnson was 25 and Elizabeth was 21 years his elder.^[88] His mother's marriage to Johnson so disgusted her son Jervis that he stopped talking to her.^[88] However, her other son, Joseph, later accepted the marriage, and her daughter, Lucy, accepted Johnson from the start.^[88]

Johnson decided in June 1735 that he could be a successful teacher if he ran his own school.^[89] In the autumn of 1735, Johnson opened a private academy at Edial, near Lichfield.^[90] The building, Edial Hall, was a large house with a pyramid-shaped roof and a unique design; a back room served as the schoolroom while the rest housed Johnson's family.^[90] He had only three pupils, David Garrick, George Garrick and Lawrence Offley; David Garrick—18 at the time—went on to become one of the most famous actors of his day.^[90] In the June and July (1736) editions of the Gentleman's Magazine, Johnson advertised the school:

At Edial, near Litchfield, in Staffordshire, Young Gentlemen are Boarded, and Taught the Latin and Greek Languages, by Samuel Johnson

However, this proved fruitless, and Johnson began writing his first major work, the historical tragedy Irene, in hopes of earning money; the play did not earn Johnson the money he had hoped for until it was produced by Garrick in 1749.^[91][92]

Johnson was rejected for employment by two schools because "It was thought that his involuntary motions would make him an object of ridicule with his students", and concern that his "way of distorting his face (which though he can't help)" would affect the students.^[94] On 2 March 1737, penniless, Johnson left for London with his former pupil David Garrick.^[95] To make things worse, Johnson received word that his brother had died on the day they left.^[95] However, their prospects were not completely hopeless, as Garrick was set to inherit £1,000 when he reached the age of 21, in one year's time.^[95] Garrick also had connections in London, and the two would stay with his distant relative, Richard Norris, who lived on Exeter Street.^[96] Johnson did not stay there long, and set out to Greenwich near the Golden Hart Tavern to finish Irene.^[97] During that time, he wrote to Edward Cave on 12 July 1737 and proposed a translation for Paolo Sarpi's The History of the Council of Trent (1619), which Cave did not accept until months later.^[98] In October 1737, Johnson brought his wife to London; they first lived at Woodstock Street and then moved to 6 Castle Street.^[99] Soon, Johnson found employment with Cave, and wrote for his The Gentleman's Magazine.^[100] His work for the magazine and other publishers during this time "is almost unparalleled in range and variety", and "so numerous, so varied and scattered" that "Johnson himself could not make a complete list".^[101]

In May of 1738, his first major work, a poem called London, was published anonymously.^[102] The work was based on Juvenal's Third Satire and replaces the "Spokesman" for "Thales" who travels to Wales in order to escape from the problems of London.^[103] Although critics such as T. S. Eliot take the work as evidence that Johnson was a major poet, and Sir Walter Scott wrote that the poem "has often extracted tears from those whose eyes wander dry over pages profoundly sentimental", Johnson could not bring himself to regard the poem as granting him any merit as a poet.^[104] Alexander Pope claimed that the author "will soon be déterré" (brought to light, become well known), although it did not immediately happen.^[102]

Soon after, in August, Johnson was denied a position as master of the Appleby Grammar School because a Masters degree from Oxford or Cambridge was required for the position.^[11] To ensure that he would not suffer rejection again, Pope asked John Gower, a man with influence in the Appleby community, to have a degree awarded to Johnson.^[11] Gower attempted to have a degree awarded to Johnson from Oxford, but he was told that it was "too much to be asked."^[105] Gower then wrote to a friend of Jonathan Swift to persuade Swift to use his influence at the University of Dublin to have a masters awarded to Johnson, which could then be used to justify a masters awarded to Johnson from Oxford.^[105] However, Swift refused to act on Johnson's behalf.^[106] Regardless of Swift's motivation in not acting on Johnson's behalf, or how Johnson reacted to Swift's actions, it is known that Johnson then after refused to appreciate Swift as a poet, writer, or a satirist.^[107] There is, however, one exception, and that is for Swift's Tale of a Tub, to which he doubted Swift's authorship.^[108]

Between 1737 and 1739, Johnson became close to Richard Savage.^[109] Feeling guilty for his own poverty, Johnson stopped living with his wife and spent time with Savage.^[110] Together, they would roam the streets at night without enough money to stay in taverns or sleep in "night-cellars".^[111] Savage was both a poet and a playwright, and Johnson was reported to enjoy spending time and discussing various topics with him, along with drinking and other merriment.^[111] However, poverty eventually caught up with Savage, and Pope, along with Savage's other friends, gave him an "annual pension" in return for him agreeing to move to Wales.^[112] Savage ended up in Bristol however, and once again fell into debt by reliving his former London lifestyle.^[112] He was soon in debtor's prison and died in 1743.^[112] A year later, Johnson wrote Life of Mr Richard Savage (1744), a "moving" work that, according to Walter Jackson Bate , "remains one of the innovative works in the history of biography".^[113]

A Dictionary

Main article: A Dictionary of the English Language

Johnson's Dictionary Vol. 1 (1755) title page

In 1746, a group of publishers approached Johnson about creating a dictionary.^[102] On the morning of 18 June 1746, over breakfast at the Golden Anchor tavern in London, Johnson signed a contract with William Strahan and associates to produce an authoritative dictionary of the English language. The contract stated that Johnson was to be paid 1,500 guineas (£1,575),^[114][102] the equivalent of about £135,000 in modern terms,^[115] in instalments based on delivery of manuscript pages; all expenses relating to the project—ink, paper, assistants, etc.—were to be Johnson's responsibility and to be paid for by him.^[114] Johnson claimed that he could finish the project in three years.^[102] In comparison, the Académie Française had forty scholars spending forty years to complete their dictionary, which prompted Johnson to claim, "This is the proportion. Let me see; forty times forty is sixteen hundred. As three to sixteen hundred, so is the proportion of an Englishman to a Frenchman."^[102] Although he did not succeed in completing the work in three years, he did manage to finish it in nine, justifying his boast.^[102]

Although it is commonly thought that Johnson's was the dictionary, his was not the first English dictionary or one that was particularly unique.^[116] Furthermore, other dictionaries, like Nathan Bailey's Dictionarium Britannicum, were much longer.^[116] In the preceding 150 years there had been about twenty "English" dictionaries produced. The first, published in 1538, was a small Latin–English dictionary by Sir Thomas Elyot.^[117] Robert Cawdrey's Table Alphabeticall, published in 1604, was the first monolingual English dictionary.^[114] In the 18th century, dictionaries became expensive, and the various dictionaries, like John Kersey's A New English Dictionary (1702), began to offer shorter definitions.^[118] The dictionaries that stood out against this trend were Nathan Bailey's An Universal Etymological English Dictionary (1721) and Dictionarium Britannicum (1730), which attempted to describe the origins of various English words.^[119]

Although many dictionaries were available, there was open dissatisfaction with them.^[120] In 1741 David Hume claimed: "The Elegance and Propriety of Stile have been very much neglected among us. We have no Dictionary of our Language, and scarce a tolerable Grammar."^[120] What Johnson's dictionary does offer are insights into the 18th century and "a faithful record of the language people used".^[116] Furthermore, Johnson's Dictionary is more than a reference book; it serves as a work of literature unto itself.^[117]

Johnson's Dictionary Vol. 2 (1755) title page

Throughout the decade, he constantly worked on the Dictionary, which caused his and Tetty's living conditions to suffer; Johnson had to employ multiple assistants for copying and mechanical work, which filled the house with constant noise and clutter.^[121] He was constantly busy with his work, and kept hundreds of books around at any given time.^[121] John Hawkins described the scene as: "The books he used for this purpose were what he had in his own collection, a copious but a miserably ragged one, and all such as he could borrow; which latter, if ever they came back to those that lent them, were so defaced as to be scarce worth owning."^[122] However, Johnson was also distracted by Tetty's health, as she started to show signs of a terminal illness.^[121] In order to accommodate both his wife and his work, he moved to Gough Square near his printer, William Strahan.^[123]

To prepare for the work, Johnson wrote a Plan for the Dictionary. This Plan was patronized by Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield but not to Johnson's pleasure.^[124] Chesterfield did not care about praise, but was instead interested by Johnson's abilities.^[125] Seven years after first meeting Johnson to go over the work, Chesterfield wrote two anonymous essays in The World that recommended the Dictionary.^[125] He complained that the English language was lacking structure and argued in support of the dictionary.^[126] Johnson did not appreciate the tone of the essay, and he felt that Chesterfield did not fulfill his obligations as the work's patron.^[126][127] Johnson wrote a letter expressing this view and harshly criticised Chesterfield, but Chesterfield accepted it without any ill will and, impressed by the language, he kept the letter displayed on a table for anyone to read.^[128]

Besides working on the Dictionary, Johnson also wrote various essays, sermons, and poems during these nine years.^[129] He decided to produce a series of essays under the title The Rambler that would run every Tuesday and Saturday for twopence each.^[130] Explaining the title years later, he told his friend Joshua Reynolds: "I was at a loss how to name it. I sat down at night upon my bedside, and resolved that I would not go to sleep till I had fixed its title. The Rambler seemed the best that occurred, and I took it."^[130] These essays, often on moral and religious topics, tended to be more grave than the title of the series would suggest;^[130] his first comments in The Rambler were to ask "that in this undertaking thy Holy Spirit may not be withheld from me, but that I may promote thy glory, and the salvation of myself and others".^[130] The popularity of The Rambler took off once the issues were collected as a volume as they were reprinted nine times during Johnson's life.^[131] Richardson, enjoying the essays greatly, questioned the publisher as to who wrote the works, and he, with a few of Johnson's friends, was given the knowledge as to Johnson's authorship.^[131]

However, not all of his work was confined to The Rambler.^[133] One such work, The Vanity of Human Wishes, was written with such "extraordinary speed" that Boswell claimed Johnson "might have been perpetually a poet."^[133] The poem was critically celebrated but it failed to become popular.^[134] He was paid only 15 guineas for the poem and it sold less than his London.^[92] In 1749, Garrick made good on his promise that he would produce Irene, but its title was altered to Mahomet and Irene, to make it "fit for the stage".^[92] The show ran for nine nights.^[135] Although the production's run had a rough start, Johnson received nearly £300 in total for the manuscript and the performances.^[92]

Johnson's wife died shortly after the final issue appeared. During his work on the dictionary, Johnson made many appeals for financial help in the form of subscriptions: patrons would get a copy of the first edition as soon as it was printed in compensation for their support during its compilation. The appeals ran until 1752.

The Dictionary was finally published in September 1755, with a title page noting the fact that Oxford had awarded Johnson a Master of Arts degree in anticipation of the work.^[136] The published dictionary was a huge book. With pages nearly 1½ feet (46 cm) tall and 20 inches (51 cm) wide, it contained 42,773 entries. It sold for the huge price of £4 10s, the equivalent of about £350 today.^[115] It was years before "Johnson's Dictionary", as it came to be known, turned a profit. Author's royalties were unknown at that time, and Johnson, once his contract to deliver the book was fulfilled, received no further monies from its sale. Years later, many of its quotations would be repeated by various editions of the Webster's Dictionary and the New English Dictionary.^[137]

Later career

On 16 March 1756, Johnson was arrested for an outstanding debt of £5 18s.^[138] Unable to contact anyone else, he wrote to Samuel Richardson to ask for money.^[138] Richardson previously lent money to Johnson and sent him six guineas (more than enough money to pay the debt) to show his good will.^[138] Soon after, Johnson met and befriended Joshua Reynolds, and this new relationship impressed Johnson enough that he declared Reynolds "almost the only man whom I call a friend".^[139] Reynolds' younger sister—Miss Francis Reynolds—observed during their time together "that men, women and children gathered around him [Johnson], laughing" at his gestures and gesticulations. ^[94] Johnson's only other friend who was present at the time, Bennet Langton, just returned home and later set off to school in 1757.^[140]

A literary party at Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1781, depicting Johnson and members of "The Club" – use cursor to identify.

To occupy himself, Johnson began working on The Literary Magazine, or Universal Review, the first issue of which was printed on 19 March 1756.^[141] Philosophical disagreements erupted over the purpose of the publication when the Seven Years' War began and Johnson started writing political essays about his dislike over the fighting.^[141] After the start of the war, the Magazine started to include many reviews, at least thirty-four written by Johnson.^[141] While not working on the Magazine, Johnson wrote a series of prefaces for others writers, such as Guiseppe Baretti, William Payne, and Charlotte Lennox.^[142] However, these only amounted to a small portion of his time as his Edition of Shakespeare took up the rest.^[143]

With the amount of time he dedicated to his Shakespeare, he was able to publish a Proposal for it on 8 June 1756.^[143] However, Johnson slowed on the work as the months passed, and he told Charles Burney in December 1757 that it would take him until the following March to complete it.^[144] Before that could happen, he was arrested again, for a debt of £40, in February 1758.^[144] The debt was soon repaid by Jacob Tonson, who had contracted Johnson to publish Shakespeare, and Johnson was soon motivated to finish his edition in order to repay the favour.^[144] Although it took him another seven years to finish, Johnson completed a few volumes of his Shakespeare in order to prove his commitment to the project.^[144]

In 1758, Johnson began to write a weekly series, The Idler, which ran from from 15 April 1758 to 5 April 1760, as a way to avoid having to finish his Shakespeare.^[145] This series was shorter and lacked many features of The Rambler.^[145] Unlike his independent publication of The Rambler, The Idler was published in a weekly news journal The Universal Chronicle, a publication supported by John Payne, John Newbery, Robert Stevens and William Faden.^[145] The Idler did not take up all of Johnson's time, and he was able to publish his philosophical novella Rasselas on 19 April 1759.^[146] Rasselas was written in one week to pay for his mother's funeral, and to settle her debts; it became so popular that there was a new English edition of the work almost every year.^[146] Its fame was not limited to English-speaking nations, and Rasselas was immediately translated into five different languages (French, Dutch, German, Russian and Italian), and later into another nine.^[146]

James Boswell at 25

By 1762, however, Johnson had gained a notoriety for dilatory writing; contemporary poet Charles Churchill teased Johnson for the delay in producing his long-promised edition of Shakespeare: "He for subscribers baits his hook / and takes your cash, but where's the book?"^[147] The comments soon motivated Johnson to begin finishing his Shakespeare, and, after receiving the first payment on a government pension on 20 July 1762, he was able to dedicate most of his time towards this goal.^[147] Earlier that July, the 24-year-old King George III granted Johnson an annual pension of £300 in appreciation for the Dictionary.^[63] While not making Johnson rich, it allowed him a modest yet comfortable independence for the remaining 22 years of his life.^[148] The award came largely through the efforts of Thomas Sheridan and the Earl of Bute.^[149] When Johnson questioned if the pension would force him to promote a political agenda or support various officials, he was told by Bute that the pension "is not given you for anything you are to do, but for what you have done".^[149]

On 16 May 1763, Johnson met 22-year-old James Boswell, a man who would later become Johnson's first major biographer, for the first time in the book shop of Johnson's friend, Tom Davies.^[150] They quickly became friends, although Boswell would return to his home in Scotland or travel abroad for months at a time.^[150] Around the spring of 1763, Johnson formed "The Club", a social group that included his friends Joshua Reynolds, Edmund Burke, David Garrick, Oliver Goldsmith, Topham Beauclerk, Bennet Langton, Dr. Christopher Nugent, Burke's father-in-law, John Hawkins, and Anthony Chamier (although the membership would vary over the next few decades, expanding to allow individuals such as Adam Smith and Edward Gibbon to join).^[151] They decided to meet every Monday at 7:00 pm at the Turk's Head in Gerrard Street, Soho, and these meetings would continue until long after the deaths of the original members.^[151]

Johnson met Henry Thrale, a wealthy brewer and Member of Parliament, and his wife, Hester, on 9 January 1765.^[153] They quickly became friends; Johnson was treated as a member of the family, and was motivated to work on his Shakespeare again.^[153] The work was finally published on 10 October 1765 as The Plays of William Shakespeare, in Eight Volumes ... To which are added Notes by Sam. Johnson in a printing of 1,000 copies.^[154] The edition sold quickly and a second edition was soon printed.^[154] Afterwards, Johnson stayed with the Thrales for 15 years until Henry's death in 1781, sometimes staying in rooms at Thrale's Anchor Brewery in Southwark.^[154] Hester Thrale's reminiscences of Johnson, together with her diaries and correspondence, are an important source of biographical information on Johnson.^[155]

In the same year his Shakespeare was published, Johnson received an honourary doctorate from Trinity College, Dublin, followed by one from Oxford 10 years later.^[63] These were not the only special events during this time of his life; in February 1767 he was granted a special meeting with King George III.^[156] This happened at the library of the Queen's house, and it was organized by the king's librarian, Frederick Augusta Barnard.^[156] The king himself, after hearing that Johnson would visit the library, commanded Barnard to introduce him to Johnson.^[157] After the visit, Johnson told Boswell the king "is the finest gentleman I have ever seen".^[152]

Final works

Johnson (1775) showing his intense concentration and the weakness of his eyes; he did not want to be depicted as "Blinking Sam"^[158]

On 6 August 1773, eleven years after first meeting Boswell, Johnson set out to visit his friend in Scotland, in order to begin "a journey to the western islands of Scotland", as Johnson's 1775 account of their travels would put it.^[159] The work was intended to discuss the social problems and struggles that affected the Scottish people, but it also praised many of the unique facets of Scottish society, such as a school in Edinburgh for the deaf and dumb.^[160] Johnson attacked the claim that James Macpherson's Ossian poems were translations of ancient Scottish literature on the grounds that "in those times nothing had been written in the Earse language".^[161] This claim brought swift reaction from Macpherson, who threatened Johnson with physical violence.^[162] Boswell's account, The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, was published in 1786, as a preliminary to his Life of Johnson.^[163] Included were various quotes and descriptions of events, including anecdotes such as Johnson swinging around a broadsword while wearing Scottish garb, or dancing a Highland jig.^[164]

In the 1770s, Johnson, who had tended to be an opponent of the government early in life, published a series of pamphlets in favour of various government policies.^[165] In 1770 he produced The False Alarm, a political pamphlet attacking John Wilkes.^[166] In 1771, his Thoughts on the Late Transactions Respecting Falkland's Islands cautioned against war with Spain.^[167][168] In 1774 he printed The Patriot, a critique of what he viewed as false patriotism. On the evening of 7 April 1775, he made the famous statement, "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel."^[169][170] This line was not, as widely believed, about patriotism in general, but the false use of the term "patriotism" by John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (the patriot-minister) and his supporters.^[171] Johnson opposed "self-professed Patriots" in general, but valued what he considered "true" patriotism.^[171]

The last of these pamphlets, Taxation No Tyranny (1775), was a defence of the Coercive Acts and a response to the Declaration of Rights of the First Continental Congress of America, which protested against taxation without representation.^[172][170] Johnson argued that in emigrating to America, colonists had "voluntarily resigned the power of voting", but they still had "virtual representation" in Parliament.^[172] In a parody of the Declaration of Rights, Johnson suggested that the Americans had no more right to govern themselves than the Cornish people.^[172] If the Americans wanted to participate in Parliament, said Johnson, they could move to England and purchase an estate.^[173] Johnson denounced English supporters of America as "traitors to this country", and hoped that the matter would be settled without bloodshed, but that it would end with "English superiority and American obedience".^[172] Years before, Johnson had advocated that the English and the French were just "two robbers" who were stealing land from the natives, and that neither deserved to live there.^[141] After the signing of the 1783 Peace of Paris treaties, marking the colonists' defeat of the English, Johnson was "deeply disturbed" with the "state of this kingdom".^[174]

On 3 May 1777, while Johnson was trying to save Reverend William Dodd from execution, he wrote to Boswell that he was busy preparing a "little Lives" and "little Prefaces, to a little edition of the English Poets".^[176] Johnson was asked by Tom Davies, William Strahan and Thomas Cadell to create this final major work, the Lives of the English Poets.^[177] Johnson asked for 200 guineas, an amount significantly lower than the price he could have demanded.^[177] The Lives, which were critical as well as biographical studies, appeared as prefaces to selections of each poet's work, and they were quite larger than originally expected.^[178] The work was finished in March 1781 and the whole collection was published in six volumes.^[179] Johnson was unable to enjoy this success because Henry Thrale, the dear friend with whom he lived, died on 4 April 1781. His funeral was on 11 April 1781.^[180] Life changed quickly for Johnson, and Mrs. Thrale became interested in the Italian singing teacher Gabriel Mario Piozzi, which forced Johnson to move on from his previous lifestyle.^[181] After returning home and then travelling for a short period, Johnson received word that his dear friend, Robert Levet, had died on 17 January 1782.^[182] Johnson was shocked by Levet's death. Shortly afterwards he caught a cold which turned into bronchitis, lasting for several months.^[183]

Final moments

Hester Thrale and her daughter Queeny

Although he had recovered his health by August, he experienced emotional trauma when he was given word that Mrs Thrale would sell the residence that Johnson shared with the family.^[184] What hurt Johnson the most was the possibility that he would be left without her constant company.^[184] Months later, on 6 October 1782, Johnson attended church for the final time in his life, to say goodbye to his former residence and life.^[185] The walk to the church strained him, but he managed the journey unaccompanied.^[185] While there, he wrote a prayer for the Thrale family:

To thy fatherly protection, O Lord, I comment this family. Bless, guide, and defend them.^[185]

Mrs Thrale did not completely abandon Johnson, asking if he would accompany the family on a trip to Brighton.^[185] He agreed, and was with them from 7 October until 20 November 1782.^[186] On his return, his health began to fail him, and he was left alone following Boswell's visit on 29 May 1783 until he travelled to Scotland.^[187]

On 17 June 1783, Johnson wrote to his neighbour, Edmund Allen, that he had lost the ability to speak.^[188] Two doctors were brought in to aid Johnson; he regained his ability to speak two days later.^[189] Johnson feared that he was dying, and wrote:

The black dog I hope always to resist, and in time to drive, though I am deprived of almost all those that used to help me. The neighbourhood is impoverished. I had once Richardson and Lawrence in my reach. Mrs. Allen is dead. My house has lost Levet, a man who took interest in everything, and therefore ready at conversation. Mrs. Williams is so weak that she can be a companion no longer. When I rise my breakfast is solitary, the black dog waits to share it, from breakfast to dinner he continues barking, except that Dr. Brocklesby for a little keeps him at a distance. Dinner with a sick woman you may venture to suppose not much better than solitary. After dinner, what remains but to count the clock, and hope for that sleep which I can scarce expect. Night comes at last, and some hours of restlessness and confusion bring me again to a day of solitude. What shall exclude the black dog from an habitation like this?^[190]

By this time he was sick and gout-ridden.^[191] Surgery was performed to remove Johnson's gout, and his remaining friends, including Fanny Burney (the daughter of Charles Burney), came to keep him company.^[191] He was confined to his room from 14 December 1783 to 21 April 1784.^[192]

His health had begun to improve by May 1784, and he travelled to Oxford with Boswell on 5 May 1784.^[192] By July, many of Johnson's friends were either dead or gone; Boswell had left for Scotland and Mrs Thrale had become engaged to Piozzi.^[193] With nobody to visit, Johnson expressed a desire to die in London and arrived there on 16 November 1784.^[193] On 25 November 1784, he allowed Burney to visit him and expressed an interest to her that he should leave London.^[193] He soon left for Islington to visit Rev. Strahan.^[194] His final moments were filled with mental anguish and delusions; when Dr. Warren visited and asked him if he were feeling better, Johnson burst out with: "No, Sir; you cannot conceive with what acceleration I advance towards death."^[195]

Many visitors came to see Johnson as he lay sick in bed, but he preferred only Langton's company.^[195] Burney waited for word of Johnson's condition, along with Windham, Strahan, Hoole, Cruikshank, Des Moulins and Frank Barber.^[197] On 13 December 1784, Johnson met with two others: a young woman, Miss Morris, whom Johnson blessed, and Francesco Sastres, an Italian teacher, who was given some of Johnson's final words: "I am Moriturus" ("I who am about to die").^[198] Shortly afterwards he fell into a coma, and died at 7:00 pm.^[197]

Langton waited until 11:00 pm to tell the others, which led to John Hawkins becoming pale and overcome with "an agony of mind", along with Seward and Hoole describing Johnson's death as "the most awful sight".^[199] Boswell remarked, "My feeling was just one large expanse of Stupor ... I could not believe it. My imagination was not convinced."^[198] William Gerard Hamilton joined in and stated, "He has made a chasm, which not only nothing can fill up, but which nothing has a tendency to fill up. -Johnson is dead.- Let us go to the next best: There is nobody; -no man can be said to put you in mind of Johnson."^[197]

He was buried on 20 December 1784 at Westminster Abbey with an inscription that reads:

Samuel Johnson, LL.D.

Obiit XIII die Decembris,

Anno Domini

M.DCC.LXXXIV.

Ætatis suœ LXXV.^[200]

Character sketch

His figure was confusing to some; when William Hogarth first saw Johnson standing near a window in Samuel Richardson's house, "shaking his head and rolling himself about in a strange ridiculous manner", Hogarth thought Johnson an "ideot, whom his relations had put under the care of Mr. Richardson".^[202] Hogarth was quite surprised when "this figure stalked forwards to where he and Mr. Richardson were sitting and all at once took up the argument ... [with] such a power of eloquence, that Hogarth looked at him with astonishment, and actually imagined that this ideot had been at the moment inspired".^[202] Not everyone was misled by Johnson's appearance; Adam Smith claimed that "Johnson knew more books than any man alive"^[203], while Edmund Burke thought that if Johnson were to join Parliament, he "certainly would have been the greatest speaker that ever was there".^[204]

Johnson relied on a unique form of rhetoric, and he is well known for his "refutation" of Bishop Berkeley's idealism.^[205] During a conversation with his biographer, Johnson became infuriated at the suggestion that Berkeley's idealism could not be refuted. In his anger, Johnson powerfully stomped a nearby stone and proclaimed of Berkeley's theory, "I refute it thus!"^[201]

Johnson was a devout, conservative Anglican, a staunch Tory and a compassionate man, supporting a number of poor friends under his own roof.^[63] He was an opponent of slavery, and once proposed a toast to the "next rebellion of the negroes in the West Indies". He had a black manservant, Francis Barber (Frank), whom Johnson made his heir.^[206] He admitted to sympathies for the Jacobite cause but by the reign of George III he had come to accept the Hanoverian Succession. Although Johnson respected John Milton's poetry, he could not tolerate Milton's Puritan and Republican beliefs.^[207]

Beside his beliefs concerning humanity, Johnson is also known for his love of cats.^[208] In particular, he was fond of his own two cats, Hodge and Lily.^[208] Boswell claimed: "I never shall forget the indulgence with which he treated Hodge, his cat."^[209]

Depression

There are many accounts of Johnson suffering from possible bouts of depression or what he himself thought might be "madness". As Walter Jackson Bate puts it, "one of the ironies of literary history is that its most compelling and authoritative symbol of common sense—of the strong, imaginative grasp of concrete reality—should have begun his adult life, at the age of twenty, in a state of such intense anxiety and bewildered despair that, at least from his own point of view, it seemed the onset of actual insanity".^[210] After leaving Pembroke College, Johnson began to experience "feelings of intense anxiety" along with "feelings of utter hopelessness" and lassitude.