Book review: Samuel Johnson, A Biography

Samuel Johnson was a man of virtue, of words, of endeavour.

However, Johnson, despite his legacy of work that is virtually unparalleled in size and quality, is fixed in time by his caricature.

He has endured a reputation for being haughty, rude and brooding. Imagine Gordon Brown with a quill and the bearing of Robbie Coltrane and that is how he has been cast.

That version has its foundations in truth, to be certain, but it is merely a savage line drawing. Biographer Peter Martin admirably grapples with history to draw out a portrait of a far more complex and formidable figure.

Johnson was a man of contradictions. He was a pitiable physical wreck - hard of hearing, virtually blind, sick to the stomach, with appalling Tourettes and dogged by depression.

Yet he was a robust giant too with great appetites. He was quick to smite an opponent, yet he was generous to a fault.

He overcame a poor education to be the most erudite and sought after guest. He was a man of virtue who struggled with guilt at his own failings.

Martin finds a Johnson who is troubled, three-dimensional, warm and, above all, forgivable.

He gives a glimpse of what it is to walk this world as a conflicted genius, all too brilliant, all to flawed. This work is an uplifting and scholarly insight.

– From June 2010