James Boswell was a man of deep contradictions who combined a gregarious, engaging personality with profound melancholy and a constant desire for self-improvement.

“So he is, as his journal makes clear, a compound of contradictions and incompatibilities and he traces these incompatibilities right the way through his journal. So he's a very open, gregarious, friendly man, but at the same time he's very prone to deep melancholy.”

James Boswell is an extraordinary writer and innovator.

“The way in which it became clear to people that actually Boswell was, you know, was an extraordinary writer and innovator is something that we'll talk about over the the course of this series.”