The definition
According to https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/satire, "satire" is:
The use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.
Jonathan Swift's satire
Jonathan Swift uses satire the same way described by the definition. In fact, with his works he attempts to criticize the English society. According to https://schoolworkhelper.net/satire-in-jonathan-swifts-gullivers-travels/ "During the eighteenth century there was an incredible upheaval of commercialization in London. As a result, English society underwent significant, “changes in attitude and thought”, in an attempt to obtain the dignity and splendor of royalty and the upper class (McKendrick,2). As a result, English society held themselves in very high regards, feeling that they were the elite society of mankind. In his novel, Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift satirizes this English society in many ways. In the novel, Swift uses metaphors to reveal his disapproval of English society. Through graphic representations of the body and its functions, Swift reveals to the reader that grandeur is merely an illusion, a facade behind which English society of his time attempted to hide from reality."
Jonathan Swift's works which contain satire
- A Tale of a Tub
- The Battle of the Books
- Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift
- Gulliver's Travels
- A Modest Proposal For preventing the Children of Poor People From being a Burthen to Their Parents or Country, and For making them Beneficial to the Publick
To read more about these works, please click on the "Works" section on this blog.