Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet and cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.
He is remembered for works such as 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 foremost prose satirist in the English language, and is less well known for his poetry. Swift originally published all of his works under pseudonyms – such as Lemuel Gulliver, Isaac Bickerstaff, MB Drapier – or anonymously. He is also known for being a master of two styles of satire: the Horatian and Juvenalian styles.
Famous quotes by jonathan swift:
“Desponding Phyllis was endu’d
With ev’ry Talent of a Prude,
She trembled when a Man drew near;
Salute her, and she turn’d her Ear:
If o’er against her you were plac’d
She durst not look above your Waist;”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“We are so fond of one another, because our ailments are the same.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“But you think ... that it is time for me to have done with the world, and so I would if I could get into a better before I was called into the best, and not die here in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“Their school a crowd, his master solitude;
Through Jonathan Swift’s dark grove he passed, and there
Plucked bitter wisdom that enriched his blood.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)