Swift’s Parody

Jonathan Swift’s prose has been discussed extensively as satire, but its major structural element, parody, has not received the attention it deserves. Focusing mainly on works before 1714, and especially on A Tale of a Tub, this study explores Swift’s writing primarily as parody. Robert Phiddian follows the constructions and deconstructions of textual authority through the texts on cultural-historical, biographical, and literary-theoretical levels. The historical interest lies in the occasions of the parodies: in their relations with the texts and discourses which they quote and distort, and in the way this process reflects on the generation of cultural authority in late Stuart England. The biographical interest lies in a new way of viewing Swift’s early career as a potentially Whiggish intellectual. The theoretical and interpretative interest lies in tracing the play of language and irony through parody.

• The first full-length study of parody in the works of Swift • New light on Swift’s early career and the nature of his development as a writer • Analysis of theory and practice of parody, informed by modern theory, leading to new interpretations of eighteenth-century British culture

Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1. Theoretical orientations; 2. Restoration enterprises and their rhetorics; 3. Parody and play of stigma in pamphlet warfare; 4. The problem of anarchic parody: An Argument against Abolishing Christianity; 5. Authority and author: the disappearing centre in Swiftian parody; 6. Entrance to A Tale of a Tub; 7. A Tale of a Tub as an orphaned text; 8. A Tale of a Tub as Swift’s own illegitimate issue; Conclusion: Parodic disguise and the negotiability of A Tale of a Tub; Select bibliography; Index.

‘Robert Phiddian’s ferociously intelligent book … is based on a strenuous, witty, and good-tempered engagement with a very wide range not only of primary but also of secondary writings.’ The Review of English Studies