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Title: Samuel Johnson: The Major Works (Oxford World's Classics) by Donald Greene, Samuel Johnson ISBN: 0-19-284042-8 Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: July, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (2 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Johnson in His Own Write
Comment: This is undeniably the best anthology of Johnson currently available -- or for that matter that has ever been available under one cover. It outshines Penguin's much too abbreviated version and contains all the major items: a fine selection of the essays, several biographical pieces including the essential Soame Jenyns and Life of Savage, the prefaces to the Dictionary and to Shakespeare, a selection of prayers, some wonderful letters, etc.
Penguin had promised a selection of the Lives of the Poets (or Prefaces Biographical and Critical to be more accurate), but has yet to formally announce publication. There is but a small sampling of these wonderful and important essays in the Oxford edition here.
For the journey to Scotland (only excerpted here), I much prefer Penguin's complete edition of the Journey, which includes Boswell's Journal (but has the most eccentric annotation one might imagine -- more the product of a dyspeptic travel writer than a Johnsonian scholar). Reading Boswell and Johnson together is an utter delight -- moving from the formality, grace and power of Johnson to the smaller, more intimate pleasures of Boswell gives one the feeling of having captured, in the adventurous peregrinations of these two inimitable characters, the very breadth and depth of eighteenth century English writing.
To love and admire Johnson, but not appreciate the brilliant, even if much different, stylistic inventions of Boswell seems to me somewhat perverse. Certainly Boswell had his shortcomings, but half the joy of reading and 'knowing' Johnson and his circle comes from appreciating the little peccadilloes and foibles that each displayed in his turn--not the least the Great Cham, Johnson, himself. I cannot think of either of these two men that I don't see Thomas Rowlandson's wonderful caricature of the two walking arm in arm--the older man a head taller, wagging his finger and pontificating casually and brilliantly on some weighty matter, and the other rolling along beside him smiling with sweet admiration and pride of association. To read Johnson and bypass Boswell, is to find one great treasure and forsake another.
As Frank Lynch points out in the review below this edition is identical to the blue cover edition offered elsewhere on this site. (Although the lovely new Hogarth cover is a delightful addition, I bought a second copy thinking this was a new book with new content... I suppose I should also add that as the book is not new, neither is this review which you may find in its earlier incarnation under the listing for the blue cover edition.)
Rating: 5
Summary: Get THIS anthology, not the Penguin.
Comment: .
It's a bit of a misnomer to call this anthology "The Major Works," because the principle guiding the original selection (under a different title) was to provide a diverse sampling of what he'd written -- and included items which would never be considered "major works" (such as a Latin school exercise and letters). They are worth reading, but not "major works." That having been said, as an *anthology* of Johnson's writings, this is the one to get.
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Oxford's anthology of Samuel Johnson's writings is superior to Penguin's because it is more comprehensive, and displays more of his variety, as well as more of what he is known for. In comparison to the Penguin anthology, this collection includes all of Johnson's short fiction "Rasselas" (an excellent book -- read my review of it in the Penguin edition of Rasselas): Penguin will ask you to buy a separate copy of Rasselas on top of their anthology. In addition, Oxford's anthology offers extracts of "Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland" (Penguin has a separate volume of that, although there it is complete and coupled with Boswell's companion piece).
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The Oxford anthology offers 40 periodic essays (Ramblers, Adventurers, & Idlers), a form for which he is well known; plus his prefaces to Shakespeare and the Dictionary; the major poems (chief among them "London" and "The Vanity of Human Wishes"); a sermon; an extract of a Parliamentarian debate; his Life of Boerhaave; his review of Soame Jenyn's "A Free Inquiry into the Nature and Origin of Evil," his political pamphlet "The Patriot," an extract from a law lecture, extracts from "The Lives of The Poets", some letters... At over 800 pages, this is very comprehensive.
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The late Donald Greene provided an excellent introduction and set of notes.
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Note, however, that this is essentially the same anthology Oxford has had in print for years (my first copy is 15 years old, and this is the third cover under which it's been published). The copyright indicates there have been some revisions to this 2000 edition, but they are not apparent. Very great wine in a brand new bottle.
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I still wish, however, that the content were re-thought with the new title. Including letters and odd bits was fine under old titles, but it seems to me that there are "major works" which are missing, at the expense of stray items. Too few of the biographies from "The Lives of the Poets" are complete, and "Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland" deserves more space than its extract receives under a title "The Major Works." Perhaps an additional sermon or two is called for. These are quibbles: the content is fine, it's the title that's off.
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Title: Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell ISBN: 0679417176 Publisher: Everyman's Library Pub. Date: 11 January, 1993 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
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Title: Samuel Johnson by Walter Jackson Bate ISBN: 1887178767 Publisher: Counterpoint Press Pub. Date: June, 1998 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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Title: Samuel Johnson's Dictionary: Selections from the 1755 Work That Defined the English Language by Samuel Johnson, Jack Lynch ISBN: 0802714218 Publisher: Walker & Co Pub. Date: September, 2003 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: Selected Writings (Oxford World's Classics) by William Hazlitt, John Cook ISBN: 0192838008 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: January, 1999 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: Boswell's London Journal: 1762-1763 by Frederick A. Pottle, James Boswell ISBN: 0300057350 Publisher: Yale Univ Pr Pub. Date: September, 1992 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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