Dr Johnson and Mr Savage

Richard Savage (1697 or 1698 – 1743) was a English poet who claimed to be the illegitimate son of an earl and a titled lady. There’s some support for the claim, although nothing really definitive. He made his name through a series of poems, including one entitled “The Bastard” that was aimed at embarrassing and humiliating his mother (which it did) and gaining him some hush money in the form of a pension (which it also did). In 1727, Savage was arrested with several friends and tried for the murder of a man in a coffeehouse which doubled as a brothel. Savage was found guilty but a few weeks later was pardoned by the king. His notoriety gained him access to all kinds of circles, both literary and aristocratic.He also had a most unlikely friendship with the young Samuel Johnson, he of the great dictionary, subject of one of the world’s most famous biographies, and the man who helped save the plays of William Shakespeare from oblivion.Savage was one of the first people Johnson met when he arrived in London in 1737. They made an odd pair of friends, the older and rather refined-looking Savage and the younger and physically ungainly Johnson. For almost two years, they spent considerable time together, especially walking London’s residential squares late at night. During those walks, Savage would describe his life, his parentage, his poetry, his passions, and his prejudices. When Johnson published “London,” some believed (and some academics still do) that the main character in the narrative poem was a thinly disguised Savage. Johnson later denied it, but the question remains. Certainly Savage was an influence on the poem.Savage eventually fell on hard times, left London (aided by friends like Alexander Pope) for Wales, and died in 1743 in the Bristol jail, where he had been imprisoned for three years for non-payment of debts. Johnson was commissioned to write Savage’s biography.As described by Richard Holmes in “Dr. Johnson and Mr. Savage,” what Johnson created with this work was more than a standard biography. “An Account of the Life of Richard Savage” (1744) changed the nature of biographical writing, almost creating a new genre, something between biography and fiction. Johnson didn’t always get his facts right, but he wrote beautifully and entertainingly. Holmes also makes a good case for Johnson writing much of himself into the story of Savage.Johnson’s biographer, James Boswell, was clearly uncomfortable with Johnson’s relationship with Savage and tended to downplay Savage’s influence. Savage was looked down upon for the rest of the 18th century. But his influence on Johnson was clearly there, whatever qualms Boswell might have had.The biography established Johnson. A year after its publication, he was commissioned to produce the dictionary. His growing reputation attracted a wide circle of admirers, and Johnson soon found himself part of the literary and social establishment.Holmes, retired professor of Biographical Studies at the University of East Anglia in the U.K., is the author of numerous works on the Romantic poets and their era, including “”Shelley: The Pursuit (2003); “The Age of Wonder: The Romantic Generation and the Discovery of the Beauty and Terror of Science” (2010); “Coleridge: Early Visions” and “Coleridge: Darker Reflections” (2011 reissues of the earlier two-volume biography); “The Romantic Poets and Their Circle” (2014), a companion guide to an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London; and two literary research memoirs, “Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer” (1996) and “Sidetracks” (2011 reissue).“Dr. Johnson and Mr. Savage” is a fine account and informed reconstruction of the relationship between two men, one of whom slipped into obscurity but powerfully influenced the other and indirectly helped to establish his fame.

Samuel Johnson is a name that crops up often when reading anything about eighteenth-century literature, or English cultural/social history. So it is good to be able to read this book about the friendship of Johnson with Richard Savage. Johnson wrote a seminal biography The Life of Richard Savage which was originally published anonymously in 1744, after Savage's death in 1743. Johnson himself was an odd character, with many strange behaviours, and lives on in the biography of him written by his other well-known friend James Boswell.The author has written several books on literary characters, including Shelley and Coleridge, and seems well suited to delving behind literary conventions and eighteenth century expectations to give us a `true' picture of the life and times of these men. This book, first published in 1993, won the James Tait Black Prize.I confess to not knowing much about Richard Savage, but this book has definitely piqued my interest both in him, and in Johnson. This book, and his association with Johnson, offers us a glimpse into a few years of Savage's life; a life that must have been horrendous; deprivation, squalor, poverty, derision, humiliation, frustration. I felt quite despairing at the horribly sad and bitter life that Savage seems to have led, and the awful end to which it came. That's not to excuse Savage's behaviour, much of which is simply inexcusable; but perhaps some of it can be attributed to his own fevered mind during periods of his life. Certainly those who knew Savage, often seemed prepared to put up with his behaviour, and continued to try and help him to the best of their ability, given his inability to remain civil for long. He must have had what later generations would perhaps describe as `charisma' in bucketsful. There is a pathos and a tragedy in Savage that's impossible to deny; it could be said that it was a shame that he made of his life what he did, but surely that's the root of the tragedy, and the tragedy is the root of his life.Johnson, it seems from this book, seems to have taken Savage to heart in the way that Savage portrayed himself to Johnson, and in the spirit of an `author and poet', rather than as a man who was often difficult, frequently rude, and who lived, when not writing, in a most hedonistic and self-destructive manner. Much thanks must go to Johnson for capturing Savage in his own biographical work, and much thanks must also go to Mr Holmes for his wonderful book on the relationship of Johnson and Savage, which enlightens the reader on both mens' count, fully to the reader's advantage. I found this book compelling; the story riveting, the more so for its truth and honesty, and Johnson's evidently unequivocal admiration and love for Savage. Highly recommended; I am now on the hunt for further reading on Boswell, Johnson and Savage.

Richard Savage (1697?-1743) は英国の詩人で代表作はWanderer (1729) である。ジョンソンはこの作品を高く評価していたらしい。本書の著者のHolmesは「精神が苦難や残酷に打ち勝つ可能性をWandererは示しているとジョンソンは信じていた」と指摘している。ジョンソンの辞書におけるSavage からの引用は7例（s.v. elevate, expanse, fondly, lone, squander, sterilise, suicide）である。辞書全体の引用例数116，000に比べると僅かだが、ジョンソンの辞書の本質に迫るには、このSavageとの交遊録は一読の必要があるだろう。

I'm always a bit sceptical when I see a biography of a figure we have so little contemporary information about, usually we get a third of the book generally discussing their times, a chapter or two on what we know of the subject's life and the discussion on their influence, but it was refreshing that the author actually made an effort in the title of the book to be clear that this isn't a padded out biography.The book focuses predominantly on Savage, but the beginning is fleshed out with some information about Johnson. After a while Johnson sort of disappears from the narrative, and is only mentioned when one of his quotes about Savage is discussed as the author of that quote, which is sometimes expanded a bit into what Johnson must have thought of Savage at this stage, or why he may have omitted some well known information in that part of his biography.The book moves on to the famous murder and forensically tries to explain what happened on that night.Much of the book is quite repetitive and goes over Savage's feeling of betrayal and frustration towards his aristocratic mother, who refused to acknowledge him.Richard Holmes is one of my absolute favourite biographers and his books on Shelley and Coleridge I class amongst the greatest historical biographies ever written. Although this wasn't in the same style - it is not a biography, so I possibly shouldn't compare too much - I was left feeling a bit disappointed.The book is only around 200 pages having said all that, so not a great slog. Worth reading if you want to expand your knowledge on Richard Savage.

Richard Holmes is, simply, our finest literary biographer. I have been an admirer since coming across his superb "Footsteps, Adventures of a Romantic Biographer" in 1986. As Peter Ackroyd puts it, "His purpose is to locate the personal life that is hidden in the printed page, and then to understand that life by an act of identification". This he has done many times, in his two-volume biography of Coleridge, for example. In this book, he gives us a Dr Johnson unrecognisable from the avuncular, eccentric, self-confident figure Boswell portrays. He gives us the younger Johnson, physically awkward, shy, subject to grotesque fits and mannerisms. He also tells us the life story of Richard Savage - bizarre, impetuous, poet, liar and murderer. This whole book is a revelation, as the friendship between Johnson and Savage was not even known of before Holmes's investigations. The book also gives us a fascinating insight into the lives of such poets and writers in the early 18th century.