Life of Samuel Johnson
by James Boswell
Category: Biography & Autobiography

Originally published in 1791, this biography of English writer, Samuel Johnson, has been described as the greatest biography ever written. Differing from others in that era, it contained not just a record of Johnson's public life, but instead painted a vivid portrait of him, and included extensive reports of Johnson's conversation. This edition is an abridged version edited by Charles Grosvenor Osgood.Note: there were no chapters in the main body of the text, so I added some arbitrary ones to break the text up a little bit.