Samuel Johnson

When James Boswell and Samuel Johnson met in Edinburgh on August 14, 1773, they had been friends for ten years.  Boswell was at thirty-two years of age a moderately successful Scottish lawyer. He combined his intellectual endeavor with a fervent devotion to the sensual pleasures of womanizing and drinking.  At sixty-three years of age, Johnson was a major London celebrity, a famous writer whose houses became a rendezvous for those who wished to benefit from his moral piety and worldly wisdom.