Friday 12 October 2007

Worst review in history?

Macaulay's essay on Doctor Johnson falls into three parts, and the Doctor himself takes centre stage only in the third. The second is Macaulay's incredulous knife-job on the character of Boswell (now known to be unjust, though that adds to the fun) while the first is his painstaking, brick-by-brick demolition of Croker's edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson. Poor old Croker - whose book did have its merits, apparently - must have spent the rest of his own life hiding under a bucket.

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