More specifically concerning: samuel johnson
Citation (20)
25 March 2004, around 15.25.
a love-song, a love-song.
Rasselas
26 March 2004, around 19.06.
a philosophical expedition to Abissinia
Citation (40)
4 January 2011, around 16.26.
on studying hard…
on biography (1)
15 November 2011, around 6.12.
Alexander Theroux. The Strange Case of Edward Gorey. Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2011. After much consideration of this point, I came to the resolution of writing truly, if I wrote at all; of withholding nothing, though some things, from their very nature, could not be spoken of so fully as others. —Elizabeth Gaskell (Life of Charlotte Brontë, […]
the doubtful guest
17 November 2011, around 8.50.
Mrs. Boswell reacts to a visitation by Samuel Johnson.
Crambe repetita (20)
19 November 2011, around 8.09.
Boswell, Life of Johnson.
self-help
14 March 2012, around 4.47.
Let all such fancies, illusive and destructive, be banished henceforward from your thoughts for ever. Resolve, and keep your resolution; choose, and pursue your choice. If you spend this day in study, you will find yourself still more able to study to-morrow; not that you are to expect that you shall at once obtain a […]
in a style to endure
1 June 2014, around 11.42.
In the world of literature and art, Goldsmith and Johnson had gone; Cowper was not yet much known; the most prominent poets were Hayley and Darwin; the most distinguished prose-writer, Gibbon. […] Miss Burney, afterwards Madame D’Arblay, surprised the reading world with her entertaining, but somewhat vulgar novels; and Mrs. Inchbald, Mrs. Charlotte Smith, and […]
with reverence be it spoken
12 November 2024, around 14.47.
Young was a poet; poets, with reverence be it spoken, do not make the best parents. Fancy and imagination seldom deign to stoop from their heights; always stoop unwillingly to the low level of common duties. Aloof from vulgar life, they pursue their rapid flight beyond the ken of mortals, and descend not to earth […]
midafternoon thoughts
2 January 2025, around 15.32.
No code of cataloguing could be adopted in all points by every one, because the libraries for study and the libraries for reading have different objects, and those which combine the two do so in different proportions. —Charles Ammi Cutter (Rules for a Dictionary Catalogue) Cutter was my favorite part of the library. It was […]