WorkSamuel Johnson

“Preface to Shakespeare”

Preface to Shakespeare (1765) Inferred

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) · 1765

InferredFuller names 'Dr Johnson' as Dana's critical adversary in the context of a Shakespeare lecture — the natural referent is Samuel Johnson's Preface to Shakespeare (1765), the canonical neoclassical critique that post-Romantic critics reacted against. Fuller's remark that Dana 'fights with Dr Johnson' implies she knows Johnson's criticism well enough to recognize when others are engaged with it.

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Selected engagements, in chronological order.

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Reprints, Memoirs passages, and repeat notes within a single manuscript are shown but never counted twice. Evidence for this work is selective, not exhaustive. Methodology →

When Fuller engaged with this work

No datable encounters with Johnson, Samuel have been catalogued yet.

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n.d.—

On R.H. Dana's Lecture

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“he repeats things current since the Schlegels and fights with Dr Johnson.”

Fuller, Margaret. "On R.H. Dana's Lecture." Boston Public Library Archives & Special Collections; MS Am. 1450; Box: 2, Folder: 85.

Inferred Fuller names 'Dr Johnson' as Dana's critical adversary in the context of a Shakespeare lecture — the natural referent is Samuel Johnson's “Preface to Shakespeare” (1765), the canonical neoclassical critique that post-Romantic critics reacted against. Fuller's remark that Dana 'fights with Dr Johnson' implies she knows Johnson's criticism well enough to recognize when others are engaged with it.