In an effort to educate myself, I am reading The Oxford Book of Essays, chosen and edited by John Gross. [copies for sale here] There’s 142 of the blighters, so it will take me all year. To make this “stick” I am going to blog each essay.
This essay is online
No. 188. SATURDAY, JANUARY 4, 1751
Who was the author:
Samuel Johnson (18 September [O.S. 7 September] 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography calls him “arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history”.[1]
What happened the year they were born (and the C02 ppm): 1709
The Big Events they were alive for: xx
What happened in the year they died (and the C02 ppm): 1784
My awareness of/appreciation of this author (if any): I love him – Rasselas, the “What Have ye Done?” essay. Robbie Coltrane’s thing in Black Adder 3.
What’s the essay?
The essay is called “Conversation.” It’s 4 pages long. For me, the key take-aways were…
Best line(s)
“for every one’s experience will inform him, that the pleasure which men are able to give in conversation, holds no stated proportion to their knowledge or their virtue. Many find their way to the tables and the parties of those who never consider them as of the least importance in any other place; we have all, at one time or other, been content to love those whom we could not esteem, and been persuaded to try the dangerous experiment of admitting him for a companion, whom we knew to be too ignorant for a counsellor, and too treacherous for a friend.”
“The wit whose vivacity condemns slower tongues to silence, the scholar whose knowledge allows no man to fancy that he instructs him, the critick who suffers no fallacy to pass undetected, and the reasoner who condemns the idle to thought, and the negligent to attention, are generally praised and feared, reverenced and avoided. He that would please must rarely aim at such excellence as depresses his hearers in their own opinion, or debars them from the hope of contributing reciprocally to the entertainment of the company. Merriment, extorted by sallies of imagination, sprightliness of remark, or quickness of reply, is too often what the Latins call, the Sardinian laughter, a distortion of the face without gladness of heart”
Stuff I had to look up
Sardinian laughter
“Sardinian Laugh”: A proverb used for people who laugh at their own death. According to Demôn it developed from the fact that the Sardinians used to sacrifice the best and the oldest of their captives each year to Cronus as they laughed to display their courage. Timaios, on the other hand, claims that men who had lived a long enough time were in the habit of laughing when they were pushed by their sons into the trenches in which they would bury them. But others claim the saying comes from smiling with devious intent.
A Sardinian Laugh, A Sardonic Smile? A Proverb and State of Mind – SENTENTIAE ANTIQUAE
The Chilling Origins Of The “Sardonic Laugh” | Quintus Curtius
AI SLOP –
Risus sardonicus or rictus grin is a highly characteristic, abnormal, sustained spasm of the facial muscles that appears to produce grinning. It may be caused by tetanus,[1][2] strychnine poisoning, or Wilson’s disease, and has been reported after execution by hanging.[medical citation needed]
The condition’s name derives from the appearance of raised eyebrows and an open “grin”, which can appear sardonic or malevolent to the lay observer, displayed by those experiencing these muscle spasms.
Stuff worth thinking about.
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Stuff to look up
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Connects to (watch this space – if there are later essays that resonate with this one, I’ll come back and add a link to the post for that essay).
marchudson.net 
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