Jonathan Swift: Anglo-Irish satirist and essayist (1667–1745)
Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for Whigs then for the Tories), poet and cleric.
He became Dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin.
Jonathan Swift | |
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| Born | 30 November 1667 Dublin, Ireland1 |
| Died | 19 October 1745 (aged 77) Ireland |
| Occupation | satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer, poet, priest |
He is remembered for books and poems he wrote like: Gulliver's Travels, A Modest Proposal, A Journal to Stella, Drapier's Letters, The Battle of the Books, An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity, and A Tale of a Tub. Swift is probably the most well known prose satirist in the English language. He is less well known for his poetry.
Swift originally published all of his work under pseudonyms — such as Lemuel Gulliver, Isaac Bickerstaff, M.B. Drapier — or anonymously. He is known for being a master of two styles of satire; the Horatian and Juvenalian styles.
Works
Swift was a good writer, famous for his satires. The most recent collection of his prose works (Herbert Davis, ed. Basil Blackwell, 1965-) comprises fourteen volumes. A recent edition of his complete poetry (Pat Rodges, ed. Penguin, 1983) is 953 pages long. One edition of his correspondence (David Woolley, ed. P. Lang, 1999) fills three volumes.
Legacy
John Ruskin named him as one of the three people in history who were the most influential for him.
References
Other websites
- e-texts of Swift's works
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