The Works of Samuel Johnson.

JOHNSON, Samuel.

$250.00

Item Number: 141081

London: Henry G. Bohn, 1850.

Finely bound edition of the works of Samuel Johnson, with an essay on his life and genius by Arthur Murphy. Octavo, two volumes bound in three quarters morocco over marbled boards, gilt titles and tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised bands, marbled endpapers, all edges marbled, engraved frontispiece portrait of Johnson to volume one. In very good condition. Armorial bookplate to each volume.

English writer Samuel Johnson made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography calls him "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history." In his later life Johnson became a celebrity, and following his death he was increasingly seen to have had a lasting effect on literary criticism, even being claimed to be the one truly great critic of English literature.