I approached the late David Nokes’s scholarly book with some trepidation, having heard that it had been criticised for its apparent dismissal of James Boswell.
I approached the late David Nokes’s scholarly book with some trepidation, having heard that it had been criticised for its apparent dismissal of James Boswell. As I had gained all my previous knowledge of the great Sam from Boswell’s magnificent biography I did not expect to enjoy this new exploration. But I did, very much indeed. Nowhere does he accuse Boswell of falsely creating the character of Johnson; indeed he acknowledges that he portrayed an irritable but very human subject.
Nokes’s book, densely academic, provides a sensitive insight into Johnson’s character, and a valuable analysis of his sometimes difficult prose and verse; difficult, that is, because he was steeped in and influenced by the outpourings of such giants as Horace, Ovid, Milton, Euripides, Dryden and Pope.
Johnson was born in 1709 in Lichfield, three years after Michael, his book- seller father, married the somewhat snobbish Sarah Ford of King’s Norton.
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