James Boswell

James Boswell (October 29, 1740 - May 19, 1795) was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland. He was the eldest son of a judge, Alexander Boswell of Auchinleck, Lord Auchinleck. He is best known as the biographer of Samuel Johnson. His name has passed into the English language as a term (Boswell, Boswellian, Boswellism) for a constant companion and observer.

Mature life

Boswell returned to London in February 1766, accompanied by Rousseau's mistress. After spending a few weeks in the capital he returned to Scotland to take his final law exam. He passed the exam and became an advocate. He practiced for over a decade (during which time he spent no more than a month every year with Johnson).

Related Topics:
1766 - Advocate

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Boswell married his cousin, Margaret Montgomerie, in November 1769. She remained faithful to Boswell, despite his infidelities, until her death of tuberculosis in 1789. Despite his relative literary success, with his accounts of his European travels, Boswell was an unsuccessful advocate and by the late 1770s he descended further and further into alcoholism and gambling addiction. James and Margaret had 4 sons and 3 daughters. Two sons died in infancy; the other two were Alexander (1775-1822) and James (1778-1822). Their daughters were Veronica (1773-1795), Euphemia (1774-ca. 1834) and Elizabeth (1780-1814). James also had at least two illegitimate children, Charles (1762-1764) and Sally (1767-1768?).

Related Topics:
1769 - Tuberculosis - 1789

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After Johnson's death in 1784, Boswell moved to London to try his luck at the English bar, which proved even more unsuccessful than his career in Scotland. He also offered to stand for Parliament, but failed to get the necessary support. He spent the final years of his life writing his Life of Johnson, which at once commanded an admiration which has suffered no diminution since, whilst his health began to fail due to his years of drinking and venereal disease.

Related Topics:
1784 - Bar - Venereal disease

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The question has often been raised how a man with the characteristics of Boswell could have produced so unique a work, and has been discussed at length by Macaulay and by Carlyle, the former paradoxically arguing that his supreme folly and meanness themselves formed his greatest qualifications; the latter, with far deeper insight, that beneath these there lay the possession of an eye to discern excellence and a heart to appreciate it, intense powers of accurate observation and a considerable dramatic faculty.

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