Book: Samuel Johnson

Overview
Joseph Wood Krutch paints a vivid, humane portrait of Samuel Johnson, tracing the arcs of a life that combined towering intellect with private vulnerability. The narrative moves from Johnson's provincial origins through the bustle of London literary life, treating his literary labors, friendships, contradictions, and spiritual struggles with equal attention. The book privileges character and moral seriousness over hagiography, offering a compact but richly observed account of an eighteenth-century figure who shaped English letters.

Portrait of Johnson
Krutch emphasizes the complexity of Johnson's personality: a man of robust moral earnestness whose quick wit and often brusque manner masked deep compassion and recurring melancholy. Physical ailments and chronic depression are not reduced to mere biography; they are shown as forces that shaped Johnson's temperament and relationships. The portrayal balances public flamboyance and private introspection, making Johnson appear as an intensely social creature who also sought steady consolation in faith, books, and friendship.

Major Episodes and Works
Attention centers on the achievements that made Johnson a pillar of his age. The lexicographical labor that produced the Dictionary emerges as an act of scholarship suffused with moral purpose, while "The Rambler," "The Idler," and the "Lives of the Poets" are discussed as vehicles for Johnson's practical criticism and ethical reflection. Krutch sketches episodes such as Johnson's encounters in coffeehouses, his mentorship of younger writers, and key friendships that anchored his life, especially the famous association with James Boswell, which both illuminated and complicated his posthumous reputation.

Style and Interpretation
Krutch writes with a readable elegance that mirrors his subject's love of language, avoiding dry chronology in favor of interpretive snapshots. The prose is brisk and sympathetic, blending anecdote with critical judgement. Psychological insight is applied cautiously; Krutch resists reductive readings while still acknowledging how bodily suffering, religious conviction, and social commitments informed Johnson's judgments and creative energy. The biography engages with primary sources and Boswell's monumental account without surrendering to either uncritical admiration or facile condemnation.

Historical Context and Social Scene
Eighteenth-century London appears as more than backdrop: it is the arena in which Johnson's intellect, moral voice, and social habits are forged. Coffeehouses, periodical culture, and the commercial pressures of the literary marketplace are shown shaping both opportunities and compromises. Krutch situates Johnson amid the period's political conservatism, Anglican orthodoxy, and emergent public sphere, making clear how these forces influenced his responses to the moral and cultural questions of his time.

Legacy and Assessment
Krutch frames Johnson as a lasting moral and critical presence whose work reaches beyond dictionaries and biographies into the heart of literary judgment. The portrait stresses endurance rather than novelty: Johnson's seriousness of purpose and mastery of language secure him a central place in English letters. Krutch's study functions as both introduction and interpretation, inviting readers to appreciate Johnson's contradictions and to see how intellectual rigor and humane feeling combined to make him a figure of lasting interest.