James Boswell (1740 - 1795)

Picked up (downloaded) Boswell's account of B & J's trip to the Hebrides (thought it might be fun to read before I go to Scotland in the summer -- nothing certain yet, and I certainly don't know if I'll have the chance to travel so far afield). Enjoying the read thus far.

***

James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck (/ˈbɒzˌwɛl, -wəl/; 29 October 1740 – 19 May 1795), was a Scottish biographer and diarist, born in Edinburgh. He is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson, which the modern Johnsonian critic Harold Bloom has claimed is the greatest biography written in the English language.

Boswell's surname has passed into the English language as a term (Boswell, Boswellian, Boswellism) for a constant companion and observer, especially one who records those observations in print. In A Scandal in Bohemia, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes affectionately says of Dr. Watson, who narrates the tales, "I am lost without my Boswell."

[From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Boswell]

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