Boswell the Biographer - George Mallory

Later, in the course of conversation, Johnson denied any merit to Swift for writing 'The Conduct of the Allies'; then

recollecting that Mr. Davies, by acting as an informer, had been the occasion of his talking somewhat too harshly to his friend Dr. Percy, for which, probably, when the first ebullition was over, he felt some compunction,[⁶] he took an opportunity to give him a hit; so added, with a preparatory laugh, 'Why, Sir, Tom Davies might have written "The Conduct of the Allies."' Poor Tom being thus suddenly dragged into ludicrous notice in presence of the Scottish doctors, to whom he was ambitious of appearing to advantage, was grievously mortified.

The compunction, however, on this occasion seems to have had a short duration, for Boswell goes on to say:

When I called upon Dr. Johnson next morning, I found him highly satisfied with his colloquial prowess the preceding evening: 'Well (said he), we had good talk.' Boswell: 'Yes, Sir, you tossed and gored several persons.'

THE JOHNSONIAN FLAVOURBoswell seems to have had the power of picking out all that was characteristic and important, of ruthlessly discarding unnecessary details and presenting only the salient points, of seeing a scene as a whole, with its more vivid colours flashing out as it were from a dull background, so that the whole impression is complete and clear. The smallest conversations, as we saw, were dealt with in this way. And as he 'Johnsonised' the talk which he had himself taken down, and 'Johnsonised' the stories given to him by Mr. Langton, he 'Johnsonised' in the same way these larger scenes. While retaining most of the words used by Johnson himself, Boswell seems to have added here and there a characteristic expression to make the whole more pointed, and to have compressed it all till it preserved nothing but the true Johnsonian flavour.

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In all this, the artistic part of his work, Boswell was expressing his own conception of Johnson. But it has been doubted by some whether this is a true view of him, or whether the whole is not overdrawn. Dr. Birkbeck Hill says that Johnson was drawn by Boswell as 'too awful.'[⁷]

It is indeed, as has been said before, the awfulness of Johnson which Boswell had in mind when he wrote his 'comedy scenes,' and even in relating less pungent moments. The humour of it all depended so much upon that!

It must be remarked, at the outset, that several individuals may have quite different impressions of one man. Not only do the observers emphasise different qualities, so that the same person might be described by one as kind and affectionate, and by another as sentimental and stupid, without either account being untrue, except in so far as it is incomplete, but a man's behaviour often varies with the company. The truth of Boswell, since he expressed quite truthfully his own impressions, would be in nowise confounded if it were discovered that the majority did not share his view of Johnson; still less if he had seen what they saw, while they had not seen what he revealed.