Books

Talboys & Wheeler, and W. Pickering, Oxford,, 1825. 11 vols., 8vo., with engraved armorial vignette on titles; attractively and strongly bound in contemporary full tan calf, sides with gilt frame border, backs with five raised bands, second and third compartments with red and black leather labels lettered in gilt, all other compartments richly ruled and tooled in gilt, doublures tooled in blind, all edges marbled, one volume neatly rebacked with old backstrip laid down, six labels (three red and three black) missing (but residual lettering wholly legible in blind), backstrips rather scuffed and age-worn (particularly on sixth volume), joints mildly rubbed (but all bindings entirely sound), else a handsome, internally crisp and spotless extended set in elaborate period binding. This set includes all half-titles, but was bound without the engraved portrait of Johnson often present in first or third volumes. Published in the series 'Oxford English Classics', this edition was…

James Boswell's 'The Life of Samuel Johnson' is regarded as one of the greatest biographies written in the English language. It provides an in-depth and vivid recounting of the life of Samuel Johnson, a writer and critic who was a towering figure in 18th-century British literature.