Decided to re-read Sam Johnson's Rasselas having no other fiction to hand that I felt up to. Just reached Imlac's bracing observation: Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured, and little to be enjoyed. Blimey! They didn't mince their words back in the eighteenth century, did they?
I reckon there's a case to be made for Johnson's novel (if that's what his wonderful History of the Abyssinian Prince is) as one of the earliest self help books. Possibly the wisest. And knocked off in a week to pay his mum's medical bills. Blimey! again.
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