James Boswell
The Life of Samuel Johnson.
The Modern Library, 1931. Modern Library Giants, G2. First Modern Library edition. xv/1200 pages.
Volume, measuring approximately 6" x 8.5", is bound in light brown cloth, with stamped black lettering and decorative designs to spine and front cover. Book is in excellent condition, with top edge of text block tinted black, firm binding, clean and bright pages. Illustrated orange and purple dust jacket, with price of $1.00 referenced on rear panel, displays wear, with sunning to spine panel, tears at top and bottom of front spine edge, and small tear at fore edge. Faint moisture marking appears at lower outside corner of front panel. 
"When Boswell first met Samuel Johnson in 1763, the great man of his dreams was 54 years old; their friendship formed the memorable part of Boswell's life, and is described inimitably in his famous biography. Johnson's favorite indulgence was to talk; Boswell's great idea of success to elicit memorable conversation. Boswell is almost equally admirable as a reporter and as an interviewer, as a collector and as a researcher.
"The Life of Johnson" was written on a scale unknown to biographers before Boswell. Wherever English is spoken, it has become a veritable sacred book; the sober Encyclopedia Brittanica says that it has pervaded English life, and thought "in the same way that the Bible, Shakespeare, and Bunyan have done.""