Johnson on Savage: The Life of Mr Richard Savage by Samuel Johnson. Samuel Johnson

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СКАЧАТЬ extended hagiography, or the lifeless accumulations of 17^th century biographical Dictionaries. He had shown that it was not ‘compiled’, but narrated, argued and brought dramatically alive. He had also raised it above those commercial compilations of scandalous anecdote, that were still so much in vogue, like Theophilus Cibber’s Lives of the Poets (1753, 200 poets packed like sardines into 5 volumes).

      He had separated it from gossip and cheap romance, and redirected it towards ‘the Lovers of Truth and Wit’. By introducing the subject’s own writings - poetry, essays, letters - into the narrative, he had made it more scholarly and authentic. Nor was it any longer dependent on classical models and the lives of the great and eminent - as those by Plutarch, Tacitus, or Suetonius. Instead it had absorbed several popular and indigenous English forms - the Newgate confession, the sentimental ballad, the courtroom drama, even the Restoration comedy of manners.

      Moreover English biography was no longer necessarily about fame and success. It could take obscure, failed and damaged lives, and make them intensely moving and revealing. Biography was an act of imaginative friendship, and depended on moral intelligence and human sympathy. Biography had become a new kind of narrative about the mysteries of the human heart.

      Many years later Johnson is reported to have told Boswell, ‘that he could write the Life of a Broomstick’.

      Johnson made minor corrections to The Life of Richard Savage in the second edition of 1748, and reduced the footnotes in the subsequent editions of 1775 and the definitive edition incorporated into The Lives of the Eminent English Poets of 1781. (See Select Chronology) The text used here is based on the 1781 edition, with some modernizing of capital letters and punctuation.

       SELECT CHRONOLOGY

1697/8	(16 January?) Richard Savage born in Holborn, LondonBrought up by a nurse as Richard Smith
1709	Samuel Johnson born in Lichfield, Staffordshire
1712	Death of the 4th Earl Rivers
1715	Richard Smith discovers ‘convincing Original Letters’ apparently proving his true birthright as Richard Savage
1716	Savage begins to haunt the street outside Lady Macclesfield’s house
1718	Savage is befriended by Sir Richard Steele, and the Drury Lane actors Robert Wilks and Anne Oldfield.
1720	Savage receives a £50 pension from Ann Oldfield until her death
1723	Savage’s play Sir Thomas Overbury fails at Drury Lane
1724	Aaron Hill begins campaign on behalf of Savage in the Plain Dealer, and publishes ‘Lament’
1726	Savage publishes Miscellaneous Poems, with Preface violently attacking Lady Macclesfield
1727	(December) Trial of Savage, and conviction for murder Publication of the anonymous pamphlet The Life of Mr Richard Savage, Who was Convicted of Murder at the Old Bailey
1728	Savage receives Royal PardonSavage publishes The Bastard’ against LadyMacclesfield, which runs to five editionsSavage receives £200 pension from her nephew, Lord TyrconnelSavage’s ‘Golden period beginsJohnson goes to Oxford University
1729	Savage publishes The Wanderer, dedicated to Lord Tyrconnel
1732	Savage appoints himself Volunteer Laureate to Queen Caroline, and receives £50 pension
1733	Savage begins publishing poetry in the Gentleman’s Magazine
1735	Savage quarrels with Lord Tyrconnel, ‘Right Honourable Brute and Booby’ (Savage), and loses £200 pension
1736	Savage publishes Of Public Spirit in Regard to Public Works, dedicated to Frederick, Prince of Wales.
1737	(March) Johnson comes to LondonSavage reprints The Bastard’ in the Gentleman’s Magazine Savage meets Johnson at offices of The Gentleman’s Magazine (November) Death of Queen Caroline and loss of Savage’s £50 pension Savage reduced to penury
1738	Savage and Johnson begin to share night walks round London(April) Johnson publishes Latin epigram in praise of Savage(May) Johnson publishes poem London, partly based on Savage’s experiences as ‘Thales’
1739	Pope launches subscription scheme to support Savage in Wales with £50 pension(July) Savage leaves for Bristol, parting from Johnson ‘with Tears in his Eyes’.
1740	Savage in Wales
1743	(January) Savage arrested for debt in Bristol(1 August) Death of Richard Savage in Newgate Gaol, Bristol
1744	(February) Johnson publishes An Account of the Life of Mr Richard Savage, Son of the Earl Rivers
1748	Johnson publishes a second, corrected edition of the Life
1750	Johnson publishes ‘On Biography’ (Rambler No. 60)
1753	Death of Lady Macclesfield (Mrs Ann Brett)
1759	Johnson publishes ‘On Autobiography’ (Idler No. 84)
1760	Johnson publishes ‘On Literary Biography’ (Idler No. 102)
1763	(May) Johnson meets James Boswell
1775	Publication of The Works of Richard Savage Esq., with A Life by Samuel Johnson, 2 vols.
1781	Life of Mr Richard Savage incorporated into The Lives
1784	Death of Samuel Johnson
1791	Boswell publishes The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D.

AN ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE OF MR. RICHARD SAVAGE, SON OF THE EARL RIVERS

      It has been observed in all ages that the advantages of nature or of fortune have contributed very little to the promotion of happiness; and that those whom the splendour of their rank, or the extent of their capacity have placed upon the summits of human life, have not often given any just occasion to envy, in those who look up to them from a lower station: whether it be that apparent superiority incites great designs, and great designs are naturally liable to fatal miscarriages; or, that the general lot of mankind is misery, and the misfortunes of those whose eminence drew upon them an universal attention, have been more carefully recorded, СКАЧАТЬ