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/lit/ - Literature

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8370861 No.8370861 [Reply] [Original]

How can one man be so based?

>> No.8370865

>>8370861
He had Tourette's and autism

>> No.8370876

>>8370861
He's the absolute spirit of reddit as far as humanities goes.

>> No.8370882

>>8370865
>autism
don't we all
>>8370876
>le reddit

>> No.8371019

My favorite Johnson story:

>After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it -- "I refute it thus."

>> No.8371038
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8371038

>>8371019

>2016
>Trusting sensory experience

>> No.8371043

>In a conversation concerning the literary merits of the two countries, in which Buchanan was introduced, a Scotchman, imagining that on this ground he should have an undoubted triumph over him, exclaimed, ‘Ah, Dr. Johnson, what would you have said of Buchanan, had he been an Englishman?’ ‘Why, Sir, (said Johnson, after a little pause,) I should not have said of Buchanan, had he been an Englishman, what I will now say of him as a Scotchman, – that he was the only man of genius his country ever produced.'

>> No.8371044

>>8371019

>>8370876

>> No.8371051

>>8370876
>Carlyle called him "the last real Tory"
>reddit

pick one

>> No.8371243

>>8370876
'Spirit of Reddit'
Literally the big daddy of linguistic prescriptivism

wew

>> No.8371247

what is so influential about this guy anyways?

>> No.8371254

>>8371043
Scotland on suicide watch.

>> No.8371315

>>8371247
He was the bloom of 18th century England.

>> No.8371325

>>8371051

Carlyle was just an atheist in denial, and very angry about it too.

>> No.8371351

>>8371051
You haven't been on Reddit in a while, have you?

>> No.8371425

>>8371247
He was one of the greatest conversationalists, essayists, and literary critics of all time. He was also famous for his poetry in his time. His dictionary was the best available for almost 200 years. On top of that, he is the subject of the greatest biography ever written.

>> No.8371732

>>8370876
Do explain, my man.

>> No.8371781

>>8371425
>the greatest biography ever written.
I don't understand how people can rate a such a subjective medium in numerical order. I understand it's a very human thing to do so, but it seems to make more sense to "rank" books in tiers rather than by number. For example, I don't believe one can fairly say the Samuel Johnson's bio is better than, say, Plutarch's Lives, but it's easy to say they're both top tier works.