Designing the Life of Johnson
Subtitle: The Lyell Lectures in Bibliography, 2001-2 (Lyell Lectures in Bibliography)
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: August 6, 2005
Language: eng
Number of pages: 200
ISBN-13: 9780199284832
First sentence: James Boswell's publisher, Edward Dilly, was hot off the mark: the day after news of Johnson's death reached Boswell in December 1784, he received 'a letter from Mr. Dilly mentioning it, and in the true spirit of the trade wanting to know if I could have an octavo volume of 400 pages of [Johnson's] conversations ready' within two months.'