ABSTRACT
Samuel Johnson's use of endurance to cover evaluation both by the passive "test of time" and by active personal judgment is a characteristic sleight-of-hand when dealing with the subject of repute. The special tendency of writers to identify with literary men, added to the fact that writings and style of life contribute significantly to "literary" reputation, necessitates close attention to the nature of the figure-institutional reader identification. Identifications of readers toward authors vary in force and duration, and often focus upon a single attribute. Publications are the "problem" of reputation converges with the venerable aesthetic problems of taste and value, closely related issues of evaluation prominent in eighteenth- and twentieth-century debates in aesthetics. Awarding the honorific "major" to a few dozen authors may simplify literary studies and reading lists, but it makes for a ridiculous over attention to the canon.
