Dr. Johnson & Mr. Savage

I'm writing these words under the assumption that anyone who has found himself looking at this review knows a pretty good bit about Samuel Johnson, English Literature in general and at least a little about Mr. Savage (if only from his rather appropriate surname.) It's interesting how literary fads come and go; how a prominent poet or author of one era would find himself outcast in another, and, vice-versa; how an unknown of one era would find himself the talk of the town in another....Imagine Jack Kerouac in the days of Matthew Arnold! But I digress. I think I am one of the few people (the only person that I know of, in fact, Mr. Holmes included) who regards Mr. Savage as a great poet, greater than almost any writing during his lifetime: Thomas Grey and Cowper might be exceptions. He is an early, nearly forgotten path-setting pilgrim in the Romantic tradition, the Visionary Company (a phrase coined by Yeats and picked up as a title for his groundbreaking critical study of the Romantics by Harold Bloom). He is a Shelley, a Rimbaud, a Hart Crane before his time. Dr. Johnson is an anonymous, erudite scholar before his time. There just happened to be no satisfactory English dictionary before he came along, so he became famous for writing the (endearingly quirky) first of its kind. And there you have it. This book is to be commended for revealing what we know of Johnson before he became the old curmudgeon we love to ridicule. Like we all were at one time (Well, the better lot of us anyway.): Johnson was impressionable, naive and idealistic when he met the older Savage, and Savage was almost undoubtedly the subject Johnson had in mind when he penned "Slow rises worth, by Poverty oppressed." in The Vanity of Human Wishes. As Holmes makes clear, Johnson idolized Savage for some time, and with good reason. Savage was what we would call "the real thing," even though the book makes clear that he was a notorious liar, particularly about his birth. What I mean is that he was truly a man possessed by his poetic daemon. As Johnson himself put it, "...what was Nature in Savage would in another be Affectation." Besides Johnson's biography, The Wanderer (subtitled "A Vision") is Savage's (just) claim to fame. This review is no place to give the poem its full treatment. But a few lines Holmes quotes from Canto V will suffice to make my point:"Fishers, who yonder Brink by Torches gain,/ With teethful Tridents strike the scaly Train./ Like Snakes in Eagles claws, in vain they strive,/ When heav'd aloft, and quiv'ring yet-alive." As Holmes astutely points out, "There are moments when Savage's whole universe seems to be convulsed in pain like this, as if agony were the condition or proof of existence, 'quiv'ring yet alive.'...Mother Nature seems to be persecuting an orphaned Earth. This is the central vision of The Wanderer." You have to remember that this was the age in which Pope's pompous and didactic Essay on Man was the norm to gain a full appr

Richard Savage's sole claim to fame is that Johnson wrote a book about him. At the time it was written, however, Johnson wasn't very well known himself and was only marginally more respectable than Savage. Holmes does an excellent job of describing their relationship and showing us how Johnson lived before he bacame a tory sage. He provides an excellent counterweight to Boswell, who tended to play down Johnson's awkwardness and barely concealed rage. At the same time, Holmes never forgets that Johnson was a great writer and man.

This is an excellent introduction to Johnson and his literary milieu. Savage was a troubled poet who was orphaned as a child. He claimed to be the illegitimate son of the Earl of Rivers and that he was entitled to aristocratic standing in 18th century England. His best known poems are "The Wanderer" and "The Bastard". Given to riotous living he eventually was involved in a murder from which he was pardoned by Queen Caroline. He ended his days in debtors' prison. What makes the story so interesting is that someone like Johnson would take such a deep interest in Savage. They were separated by some twenty years in age and Johnson, who was just beginning his literary career, looked up to Savage. In doing so he chose not to notice his vices. Other important poets of the time, Pope, Thomson, Mallet also make an appearance. A good way into the world of Samuel Johnson. Holmes is capable of invoking the entire atmosphere of 18th century England

Most of us know Samuel Johnson as the monumental center of Boswell's biography: witty, erudite, and revered by his contemporaries. Richard Holmes gives us a picture of the man before he became a living legend, when Johnson was destitute, wandering the streets all night because he had no money for lodgings--and friends with the notorious Richard Savage. In bringing Savage back to life--a man full of wild poetic genius but too erratic to create works worthy of it--, Holmes reconstructs 18th century London and gives us intriguing glimpses into the influences that made Johnson the literary lion that he became. Holmes' deconstruction of Johnson's "Life of Savage" reveals the substantial emotional ties that Johnson had to his wayward friend. Fascinating reading and tremendous scholarship