The most celebrated English biography is a group portrait in which
extraordinary man paints the picture of a dozen more. At the centre of a
brilliant circle which included Burke, Reynolds, Garrick, Fanny Burney and
even George III, Boswell captures the powerful, troubled and witty figure
of Samuel Johnson, who towers above them all. Yet this is also an intimate
picture of domestic life, which mingles the greatest talkers of a talkative
age with the hero's humbler friends in a picture which is, before all
things, humane. This is a new, corrected, rest and reprinted edition. At
14. 99 for the complete edition of the Life in 1344 pages, it compares with
Penguin's abridged edition of just 300 pages of text at 6. 99 and OUP's
World Classics unabridged edition printed on newsprint at 10. 99.