Editing Jonathan Swift (section)

===Major prose works===
{{more citations needed|section|date=October 2017}}<!--only one reference in section-->
[[File:Jonathan Swift - Project Gutenberg eText 18250.jpg|thumb|upright|left|Jonathan Swift at the [[Deanery]] of St Patrick's, illus. from 1905 Temple Scott edition of ''Works'']]

Swift's first major prose/satire work, ''[[A Tale of a Tub]]'' (1704, 1710),<ref>{{cite book |last=De Breffny |first=Brian |author-link= |date=1983 |title=Ireland: A Cultural Encyclopedia |url= |location=London |publisher=Thames and Hudson |page=232|isbn=}}</ref> demonstrates many of the themes and stylistic techniques he would employ in his later work. It is at once wildly playful and funny while being pointed and harshly critical of its targets. In its main thread, the ''Tale'' recounts the exploits of three sons, representing the main threads of Christianity, who receive a bequest from their father of a coat each, with the added instructions to make no alterations whatsoever. However, the sons soon find that their coats have fallen out of current fashion, and begin to look for loopholes in their father's will that will let them make the needed alterations. As each finds his own means of getting around their father's admonition, they struggle with each other for power and dominance. Inserted into this story, in alternating chapters, the narrator includes a series of whimsical "digressions" on various subjects.

In 1690, Sir [[Sir William Temple, 1st Baronet|William Temple]], Swift's patron, published ''An Essay upon Ancient and Modern Learning'' a defence of classical writing (see [[Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns]]), holding up the ''[[Epistles of Phalaris]]'' as an example. [[William Wotton]] responded to Temple with ''Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning'' (1694), showing that the ''Epistles'' were a later forgery. A response by the supporters of the Ancients was then made by [[Charles Boyle, 4th Earl of Orrery|Charles Boyle]] (later the 4th Earl of Orrery and father of Swift's first biographer). A further retort on the Modern side came from [[Richard Bentley]], one of the pre-eminent scholars of the day, in his essay ''Dissertation upon the Epistles of Phalaris'' (1699). The final words on the topic belong to Swift in his ''[[Battle of the Books]]'' (1697, published 1704) in which he makes a humorous defence on behalf of Temple and the cause of the Ancients.

[[File:Swift works.png|thumb|The title page to Swift's 1735 ''Works'', depicting the author in the Dean's chair, receiving the thanks of Ireland. The [[Horace|Horatian]] motto reads, {{Lang|la|Exegi Monumentum Ære perennius}}, "I have completed a monument more lasting than brass." The "brass" is a pun, for [[William Wood (ironmaster)|William Wood]]'s [[Halfpenny (British pre-decimal coin)|halfpennies]] (alloyed with brass) lie scattered at his feet. [[Cherub]]im award Swift a poet's laurel.]]
In 1708, a cobbler named [[John Partridge (astrologer)|John Partridge]] published a popular [[almanac]] of [[astrological]] predictions. Because Partridge falsely determined the deaths of several church officials, Swift attacked Partridge in ''Predictions for the Ensuing Year'' by [[Isaac Bickerstaff]], a parody predicting that Partridge would die on 29 March. Swift followed up with a pamphlet issued on 30 March claiming that Partridge had in fact died, which was widely believed despite Partridge's statements to the contrary. According to other sources,<ref>Murry, ''op. cit.'', p. 150, quotes Steele's Preface to the collected edition of the first four volumes of ''The Tatler'': "I have in the dedication of the first volume made my acknowledgements to Dr. Swift, whose pleasant writings in the name of Bickerstaff created an inclination in the town towards anything that could appear in the same disguise."</ref> [[Richard Steele]] used the persona of Isaac Bickerstaff, and was the one who wrote about the "death" of John Partridge and published it in ''[[The Spectator (1711)|The Spectator]]'', not Jonathan Swift.

The ''Drapier's Letters'' (1724) was a series of pamphlets against the monopoly granted by the [[Parliament of Great Britain|English government]] to [[William Wood (ironmaster)|William Wood]] to mint copper coinage for Ireland. It was widely believed that Wood would need to flood Ireland with debased coinage in order to make a profit. In these "letters" Swift posed as a shopkeeper—a draper—to criticise the plan. Swift's writing was so effective in undermining opinion in the project that a reward was offered by the government to anyone disclosing the true identity of the author. Though hardly a secret (on returning to Dublin after one of his trips to England, Swift was greeted with a banner, "Welcome Home, Drapier") no one turned Swift in, although there was an unsuccessful attempt to prosecute the publisher [[John Harding (printer)|John Harding]].<ref>Elrington Ball. ''The Judges in Ireland'', vol. 2 pp. 103–105.</ref> Thanks to the general outcry against the coinage, Wood's patent was rescinded in September 1725 and the coins were kept out of circulation.<ref>{{cite book |first=Sabine |last=Baltes |year=2003 |title=The Pamphlet Controversy about Wood's Halfpence (1722–25) and the Tradition of Irish Constitutional Nationalism |publisher=Peter Lang GmbH |page=273}}</ref> In "Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift" (1739) Swift recalled this as one of his best achievements.

''[[Gulliver's Travels]]'', a large portion of which Swift wrote at Woodbrook House in County Laois, was published in 1726. It is regarded as his masterpiece. As with his other writings, the ''Travels'' was published under a pseudonym, the fictional Lemuel Gulliver, a ship's surgeon and later a sea captain. Some of the correspondence between printer Benj. Motte and Gulliver's also-fictional cousin negotiating the book's publication has survived. Though it has often been mistakenly thought of and published in [[bowdlerised]] form as a children's book, it is a great and sophisticated satire of human nature based on Swift's experience of his times. ''Gulliver's Travels'' is an anatomy of human nature, a sardonic looking-glass, often criticised for its apparent [[misanthropy]]. It asks its readers to refute it, to deny that it has adequately characterised human nature and society. Each of the four books—recounting four voyages to mostly fictional exotic lands—has a different theme, but all are attempts to deflate human pride. Critics hail the work as a satiric reflection on the shortcomings of Enlightenment thought.

In 1729, Swift's ''[[A Modest Proposal|A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland Being a Burden on Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Publick]]'' was published in Dublin by [[Sarah Harding (printer)|Sarah Harding]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/irish-v-english-prizefighters-eye-gouging-kicking-and-sword-fighting-1.4133850|title=Irish v English prizefighters: eye-gouging, kicking and sword fighting|last=Traynor|first=Jessica|newspaper=The Irish Times|language=en|access-date=2020-04-12|archive-date=9 January 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200109223650/https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/irish-v-english-prizefighters-eye-gouging-kicking-and-sword-fighting-1.4133850|url-status=live}}</ref> It is a satire in which the narrator, with intentionally grotesque arguments, recommends that Ireland's poor escape their poverty by selling their children as food to the rich: "I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food&nbsp;..." Following the satirical form, he introduces the reforms he is actually suggesting by deriding them:
<blockquote>Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedients&nbsp;... taxing our absentees&nbsp;... using [nothing] except what is of our own growth and manufacture&nbsp;... rejecting&nbsp;... foreign luxury&nbsp;... introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance&nbsp;... learning to love our country&nbsp;... quitting our animosities and factions&nbsp;... teaching landlords to have at least one degree of mercy towards their tenants.&nbsp;... Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, till he hath at least some glympse of hope, that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them into practice.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Swift |first1=Jonathan |title=A Modest Proposal |date=2015 |publisher=Penguin |location=London |isbn=978-0141398181 |page=29}}</ref>
</blockquote>