Samuel Johnson Quotes About Tragedy

• When any calamity is suffered, the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped.

  Samuel Johnson

  Suffering, Tragedy, Firsts

  "Johnsoniana: Or, Supplement to Boswell: Being Anecdotes and Sayings of Dr. Johnson".

• The art of the writer, like that of the player, is attained by slow degrees. The power of distinguishing and discriminating comick characters, or of filling tragedy with poetical images, must be the gift of nature, which no instruction nor labour can supply; but the art of dramatick disposition, the contexture of the scenes, the involution of the plot, the expedients of suspension, and the strategems of surprise, are to be learned by practice.

  Samuel Johnson

  Art, Character, Writing

  Samuel Johnson, Arthur Murphy, Francis Pearson Walesby (1825). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D..: The Adventurer and Idler”, p.223

• You may abuse a tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your trade to make tables.

  Samuel Johnson

  Writing, Abuse, Criticism

  On literary criticism, in James Boswell 'The Life of Samuel Johnson' (1791) vol. 1, p. 409 (25 June 1763)

• Nothing is more common than for men to make partial and absurd distinctions between vices of equal enormity, and to observe some of the divine commands with great scrupulousness, while they violate others, equally important, without any concern, or the least apparent conciousness of guilt. Alas, it is only wisdom which perceives this tragedy.

  Samuel Johnson

  Men, Important, Tragedy

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