SOURCE: Dussinger, John A. “‘The Solemn Magnificence of a Stupendous Ruin’: Richard Savage, Poet Manqué.” In Fresh Reflections on Samuel Johnson: Essays in Criticism, edited by Prem Nath, pp. 167-82. Troy, N.Y.: The Whitston Publishing Company, 1987.

In the following essay, Dussinger argues that Savage should be remembered for his poetic work rather than his strange life, concluding that even if Savage's poetry was not as great as Samuel Johnson claimed, it shows evidence of true brilliance.

Although no new evidence has turned up since the eighteenth century to establish whether Richard Savage was indeed the bastard son of the Countess of Macclesfield, modern scholars have sometimes precluded that he was an impostor rather than adopt the judgment of Boswell, himself inclined to disbelief, that “the world must vibrate in a state of uncertainty as to what was the truth.”¹ Needless to say, without complete faith in Savage's...