Genius Fan

Today is the 75th anniversary of the publication here in Britain of James Boswell’s London Journal 1762-1763. It hit the bookshops on Monday 4 December 1950 and was an instant bestseller in UK and the USA. Readers loved it, hundreds of thousands of copies were printed and sold across both sides of the Atlantic.

Here’s my list of six extra ways to enjoy Boswell’s London Journal. (I believe this is what’s called a listicle.) I suppose you could pick any of these and read, listen or watch them before even reading the Journal itself. My recommendation is to read the Journal first. If you ‘wanna read it, but can’t be bothered’, go to No.1 on my list and start there.

1. A Glorious Radio Address from a Lost Age at WNYC

Click here: This is absolutely brilliant! Listen to Yale librarian Herman Liebert talk about the James Boswell and his London Journal, just two months after it was published in the US on 6 November 1950. This is an episode of the enormously successful ‘Book and Author Luncheon Show’ on WNYC, New York Public Radio and it was broadcast on 23 January 1951. Liebert was among the first to view and examine the James Boswell archive when it was bought by Yale University in the late 1940s. His proximity to and familiarity with the manuscripts gave him special insight that enriched his radio presentation. This recording will surely transport you to a New York radio theatre. You’ll hear the reverb of Liebert’s voice and the audience, there’s all the authenticity of a crackling recording and the voices without the compression or bass of modern recordings. And then there’s the content. Liebert loves his subject, James Boswell. It’s wonderful to listen to.

2. Actor Anthony Quayle Narrates Boswell’s Best Bits

Click here: British actor Anthony Quayle narrates the biggest scenes from Boswell’s London Journal: the Louisa love scenes and Boswell meeting Johnson. If you know your B&W movies then you’ll know him as the South African character in Ice Cold in Alex (1958). Of course, you know the date Quayle starts reading…Tuesday 14 December: “It is very curious to think that I have now been in London several weeks without ever enjoying the delightful sex…” You should listen to this…but stick with it beyond the first 5 minutes – it takes Quayle that long to get into his stride. After that, it’s really rather good. And there’s some emotion in it, too, that didn’t pop out when I read the original text in the Journal. And where was this narration available? On an LP (a black vinyl disk), of course. This reading, published in 1960 by Caedmon Records (you can buy it on Ebay, if you’re that way inclined), is considerably more than it appears to be. (The link above is for Side 1…click here for Side 2.)

3. Boswell and London Star in an Eye-Opening Novel

There’s no Click – you’ll have to buy this book!: The Brothers Boswell is a novel by Philip Baruth published in 2011. This is a novel which is set ‘inside’ the events of Boswell’s London Journal. In other words, Baruth has taken the journal and inserted a fictional narrative involving Boswell, his brother John and Samuel Johnson. This was my bedtime reading book for a fortnight and my poor wife had to suffer me exclaiming some of the events Baruth created. It’s a good story and as a Boswellian I felt there were other layers for me to enjoy, knowing as I do the Journal, London and Boswell himself. Baruth fleshes out, from alternative perspectives, scenes we know from the Journal. He hands us a three dimensional glimpse of those London days from 1763. It’s clever. Baruth is a US Senator in Vermont and has published four novels, short stories and non-fiction.

4. A Cartoonist’s View of Sex Scenes from the London Journal

There’s no Click – you’ll have to buy this comic!: Back in 1981 US comic artist Robert Crumb saw the comic potential in the sex scenes described by Boswell in his London Journal 1762-1763. Crumb, already famous for creating the iconic characters Mr Natural, Fritz the Cat and the Keep on Truckin’ guy, gave us five pages of Boswell, lifted straight from his own journal, under the banner ‘A Klassic Komic’ in his Weirdo comic (no.3, cost $2.25). Crumb looks at the world in very interesting ways, invariably highlighting sexual relationships and, if they’re anywhere to be seen, women with large bottoms. That’s why teenage boys love this stuff. There are surely some fellas in their 50s and 60s (I’m one such overgrown teenager) who read this and remember Crumb’s Boswell strip featuring Thomas Sheridan, Oliver Goldsmith, James Macpherson, Samuel Johnson? Or maybe it would be the cartoonist’s graphic visions of Boswell cavorting with prostitutes? Don’t overlook Crumb’s intellectual power, though. Read the strip and it’s there.

5. A Jazz Interpretation of Boswell’s London Journal. Nice.

Click here: This is The Chris Hodgkins Quartet performing a jazz interpretation of scenes from James Boswell’s London Journal. I get it. You see I grew up with jazz LPS in my house, brought back from Germany where my Mum and Dad met in the early 1950s (Modern Jazz Quartet, Bob Brookmeyer, Chet Baker, Gerry Mulligan and the rest). Trumpeter Chris and arranger Eddie Harvey composed 15 tunes around key themes in Boswell’s Journal, including Louisa, The Turk’s Head, Vauxhall Gardens and Auchinleck. My favourite is Wilkes. It starts off with a swagger I expect of the Liberty and Freedom guy. It’s groovy, which Wilkes possibly may have been – or at least the Eighteenth century equivalent, he was confident, unorthodox and game for most anything. Takes me right back to being a kid at the gramophone. Now, remember: Listen on YouTube and you get 60% or less of the original sound. Visit the Chris Hodgkins website and buy the CD to get 90-95% of the original sound. So much better.

6. Surprisingly Fun Podcast about Boswell’s London Journal

Click here: Listen to a jolly fun chat about James Boswell’s London Journal from Sophie and Jonty of the Secret Life of Books podcast on Spotify. I listened all the way through and that’s unusual for me. The episode description starts thus: “It’s London, 1763 – we’re paying a visit to the most fashionable, literary, sexy, filthy, glamorous capital in the world.” And they’re using Boswell and his journey as their guide. If you can look beyond the mistakes (eg. Sophie says Boswell’s father was a member of the House of Lords – that is certainly not the case, or that he was born and brought up on his family estate outside Edinburgh – that’s wrong in several ways), and you should try to do so, because this pair of presenters have a rapport that’s really quite entertaining. Their enthusiasm for literature, literary history and personalities is really very enjoyable to listen to. Jonty gives the classic reading of Boswell’s boasts about making love to Louisa five times in a single night. They enjoy the journal and so we should join them to hear what they have to say.