the history of rasselas · samuel johnson

Samuel Johnson's philosophical tale of 1759, written in the evenings of a single week to pay for his mother's funeral, sends an Abyssinian prince out of the Happy Valley to search the world for a life worth choosing. Every calling is tried and found wanting, and the book's quiet conclusion, that no earthly choice of life satisfies, is offered as its own kind of wisdom.

Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia, edited by Paul Goring (Penguin Classics, 2007). Read in full, Sophomore Spring at Torrey Honors.