Life of Johnson, Volume 6

The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL. D. (1791) is a biography of Dr. Samuel Johnson written by James Boswell. In a sense, the Life's portrayal of Johnson as a moral hero begins in myth. As the biographical story unfolds, of course, this image dissolves and there emerges the figure of an infinitely more complex and heroic Johnson whose moral wisdom is won through a constant struggle with despair, whose moral sanity is balanced by personal eccentricities too visible to be ignored, and whose moral penetration derives from his own sense of tragic self-deception.