The Selected Essays from the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler

An ample and varied section of accessible essays by Samuel Johnson
 
This selection of the cream of the writing from volumes II to V of the Yale Edition of the Works of Samuel Johnson fills the largest remaining gap in easily available eighteenth-century texts for the student and general reader. The edition provides in popular form the amplest selection available of Johnson’s essays, ranging from his great moral pieces to the valuable essays on literary criticisms. The text is that of the authoritative Yale Edition and includes full annotation. An introduction by W. J. Bate provides a concise summary of the publication history of the essays and probes in detail the moral vision that pervades most of them.

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) was a poet, essayist, biographer, and editor. W. J. Bate was Lowell Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University.