Why in our time the author of Gulliver would be a scandalous satirist blogger, and the authorities were afraid of Swift's texts

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

For most of the former Soviet children, Swift is the author of a wonderful book about Gulliver's fabulous adventures. For many generations, children have been delighted with this … satirical, acutely political text. Indeed, in fact, Swift is known precisely as the author of the most penetrating satire. In our time, he would be a popular blogger who is dragged into memes. However, he is already being dragged into memes.

Swift was born into an English family living in Dublin, and considered his homeland, above all, Ireland. In those days, Ireland was not just far from independence - in relation to England, it was in approximately the same position as it would be in the nineteenth century with the overseas colonies.

The Irish did not care about anything, from their land they pumped out everything that could be pumped out. The famous ancient Irish culture, which once became the source of the restoration of Christian culture in Europe, was mixed with mud and trampled, the Irish themselves were exposed as savages and treated like cattle. Swift himself received a spiritual education and even nourished the flock in an Irish village for some time, but quickly realized, that the career of a country priest is not for him. Literally everything irritated him too much. It was not possible to keep the calmness befitting a pastor, and there was not enough humility to endure the hardships of life in a poor village after living and studying in Oxford.

He began to seek a position in Dublin - and in the end he did. And it was precisely during the period of waiting and petitions that his first satirical pamphlets fell. Here are some facts about Swift as a satirist and blogger of his day.

He wrote many of his poisonous texts anonymously

The Reverend Swift was a man, of course, somewhat principled, but smart and cheerful and preferred to write his most poisonous texts under pseudonyms. As a result, even the most scandalous of them did not turn into a prison term for him. Moreover, he changed his pseudonyms.

Thus, his famous prank on the astrological guru of his time gave birth to the alter ego of Swift, the astrologer Isaac Bickerstaff. The fact is that in those days when Swift was trying to arrange his fate in England, they went crazy about an astrologer named Partridge. If in his publication Partridge promised Aries a failure in an important conversation, tens or hundreds of Aries locked themselves at home, canceling all cases and, sometimes, missing profitable negotiations or learning important news too late. If Partridge promised Sagittarius financial success, Sagittarius rushed to invest money indiscriminately - which threatened to turn into ruin. Swift, as a priest and a pragmatist rolled into one, was quite irritated by Partridge's cult.

Swift began publishing his own astrological pamphlets under the Bickerstaff name. He parodied Partridge in the most subtle way, so that for most astrology fans his brochures looked very convincing and exciting. Soon, Bickerstaff became incredibly popular, and many were consulted with his predictions.

Then Bickerstaff announced that Partridge would die on March 29, 1708. This date was pretty close. Partridge issued a rebuttal, where he painted on a star chart why this prediction could not be true. Bickerstaff reiterated in the next issue that Partridge would die. So they indirectly corresponded until that very date.

On March 29, Partridge was somewhat tense. On March 30, he exhaled and felt much calmer until he saw Bickerstaff's new publication. It reported on the death of the famous astrologer. Partridge tried to publish a refutation again, but the printing house did not accept the text: they believed that the real Partridge had died, and therefore an impostor had appeared. Moreover, all of London believed that Partridge was dead.

While the unfortunate astrologer was trying to recover, Bickerstaff in due time released a description of how the funeral of the untimely deceased Partridge went. After that, even Partridge's friends did not immediately agree to recognize him in him, so deeply they were convinced of his death. Partridge ended all social life for four years. After this period, he began to publish again, although he was never destined to reach the former heights of popularity.

He blackmailed the British to change their policy in Ireland

Can one person, moreover, not even the one in power, intimidate the government with economic sanctions from people who are equally far from the authorities? The Reverend Swift did it. When he was already serving in Dublin, the British decided that somehow they were not benefiting enough from the Irish. And they began to pay with them not with gold coins for their goods, but exclusively with copper coins, and those that will be in use only in Ireland.

After this ingenious economic decision in Ireland and England, the Letters of the Cloth Maker, printed in the printing house, began to be distributed. Anonymous. In them, in a simple, popular language among artisans, the situation was discussed on behalf of an unknown Irish clothier. These were the letters that everyone was waiting for, because they were not only poisonous and accurate, but also hilariously funny. By modern standards, it is as if someone started a blog on behalf of a not very gifted literary, but with a lively and well-marked colloquial speech of a tire changer or other hard worker, where he would paint what it means to the people what the legislators are doing.

Moreover, these "Letters" contained a call to completely stop buying goods of English production and, moreover, to use the coin; it is better to exchange your item directly. It is not that the Irish have massively turned their backs on what is imported from England, but the Letters were so popular that the British authorities were seriously worried. At first, several distributors of "Letters" were imprisoned for intimidation. But from this - who would have thought - the situation only escalated. Then the British nevertheless legislatively revised their economic policy in Ireland. Not that they stopped sucking it, but some steps have been taken to make life easier for the Irish.

He imprinted the king's greed in stone, and he got nothing for it

The area where Jonathan Swift served naturally included a cemetery. Some of the graves on it were unkempt, with damaged tombstones that should have been renovated long ago. But who could do it?

The Reverend Swift walked around the cemetery and meticulously wrote down the details of all the gravestones in need of replacement. Then, using church books and using additional sources of information, Swift compiled a list of relatives who could take care of the tombstones.

He sent out letters to these relatives, offering to take care of the appearance of the graves. True, the monk promised that if no one would take care of the last refuge of the dead, he would do it himself, at his own expense … did not want to pay for the repair of the tombstones.

After a while, all the tombstones were replaced with new ones. Some were indeed engraved with inscriptions about the greed of certain gentlemen. And among these gentlemen was the English king. One of the deceased, a distant relative of the king, could not be found to have other relatives, and the king ignored Swift's letter (although, most likely, he saw him - Swift was already a regular columnist, author of a satirical page, in one of the British publications, and in his name alive reacted).

He made the British seriously discuss the propaganda of cannibalism

One of Swift's most famous texts is the satirical pamphlet A Modest Proposal. Although it is known by this name, the complete one is "A Modest Proposal, designed to prevent the children of poor people in Ireland from being a burden to their parents or their homeland, and, on the contrary, to make them useful to society." This text was openly signed with the name of the author. Swift, it seems, was by that time very bitter.

The pamphlet imitated public initiatives that were then freely published. But if most of the real initiatives were ignored by society and the authorities, then it was impossible to pass by.

The author of the pamphlet, in the most sympathetic and innocent tone, imitating the authors of manuals on the farm, explained why it would be better for everyone if Irish parents sold their children to English masters, who would cook various dishes from the little Irishmen (list attached) and eat. So, they say, the problem of Irish poverty and English appetite will be solved.

The pamphlet was written during a major famine in Ireland. The only hearty food available to the Irish at that time - potatoes - was infected with a parasite and unsuitable for food, and the British were still forbidden to grow bread. Entire villages of the Irish were dying out. Some peasants dared to maim their children in order to throw them later on to the English gentlemen - they pitied the cripples or kept them with them as jesters.

In Britain, the text caused a serious scandal. Some took him seriously and loudly resented the propaganda of cannibalism. Others immediately noticed the bile dripping from the pages and correctly understood that Swift calls the English cannibals, and they were also extremely outraged. The text was discussed this way and that, and while passions were seething, only a handful of Englishmen tried to organize help for the starving Irishmen, either ashamed, or being humane by nature.

Needless to say, Swift was respected and adored in Ireland. In cities, many exhibited his portrait in the windows of houses. His popularity was so great that, even when Swift's ears were sticking out of anonymous texts, the authorities still hesitated to arrest him without direct evidence - they were afraid that instead of a murmur they would finally face a riot. But no. They saw the Irish revolt only more than two hundred years later.

By the way, Swift's book on Gulliver's travels was started as a parody of Defoe's book about Robinson Crusoe: Important details of the novel "Robinson Crusoe" that many readers overlook.