A Life of James Boswell

by Peter Martin

Book Overview

James Boswell (1740-1795), author of The Life of Samuel Johnson, remains one of the more celebrated biographers in modern literary history. In his monumental A Life of James Boswell, Peter Martin... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0300084897
• ISBN13: 9780300084894
• Release Date: September 2000
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Length: 613 Pages
• Weight: 2.34 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.8" x 6.5" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Good stuff

Martin writes well on Boswell and Johnson. Both biographies make for excellent reading. My only beef was the appalling editing this book enjoyed. It was awash with ridiculous literals.

Still Searching

This is an ample and competent biography of the man who gave us what is termed our first "modern" biography. But, in the end, I think Boswell's biography of Johnson and his other writings (The famous Boswell papers etc) actually reveal more about the man than any biography of Boswell himself I've run across. Martin's accounts of Boswell's seemingly pathological obsession with sex and death make interesting reading, as accounts of sex and death generally do; but couldn't we have more reflection from the biographer here on these matters, a bit more involvement with the subject than the encomia noted by another reviewer? Boswell's ghost is still searching for a biographer as good as he.

Fabulous and lively history

Dr. Martin writes with unabashed affection about his subject, making for lively, energetic reading. This book pours life into a literary figure who, in less caring hands, could have been made out to be dead dull.

A Great Writer Writing About a Great Writer

James Boswell's "Life of Johnson" is commonly regarded as the finest biography in the English language. For 155 years after his death, Boswell was known primarily for this great work. But then in 1949 through 1951, in a series of three separate discoveries, Boswell's journal was found. Boswell is now also regarded as one of history's best diarists. Boswell was a libertine and at times a heavy drinker who, no matter how inebriated he became at the London Literary Club, where he listened to Garrick, Goldsmith, Burke, Reynolds and other brilliant men discuss the topics of the day, would race home to enter their conversation in his journal. So he preserved much of Samuel Johnson's wit ("Fishing: a stick and a string, a fish on one end and a fool on the other.") and philosophy. Peter Martin concludes that Boswell's journal is the best reading that exists regarding London in the late 1700s. Martin's book is an exhaustively researched and beautifully written account of an eccentric, gifted man.

A great biography of the great biographer

Anyone who has read and been fascinated with Boswell's Life of Johnson will do well to read this book.Peter Martin has done a bang-up job of bringing Boswell to life, extensively quoting from his journals and letters, narrating the stories of his Grand Tour,the meetings with Rousseau and Voltaire,and his friendships with the likes of Burke, Reynolds,Goldsmith,Garrick,and of course,Johnson. Boswell's "hypochondria",or chronic depression, is a main topic,and we see how it affected his marriage,his friendships,and his writings.A must read for all Johnsonians and anglophiles.