Jonathan Swift Resources

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) wrote some of the most brilliant prose in the English language and is often regarded as its foremost satirist. While best known for his masterpiece Gulliver’s Travels and, to a lesser extent, his blistering A Modest Proposal, Swift wrote many other poetry and prose pieces including the EIL favorite An Argument to Prove that the Abolishing of Christianity in England May, as Things Now Stand Today, be Attended with Some Inconveniences, and Perhaps not Produce Those Many Good Effects Proposed Thereby, commonly referred to as An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity. His work, while contemporary in focus, has proved to have a legacy beyond the purely topical, so much so that George Orwell wrote in 1946, “If I had to make a list of six books which were to be preserved when all others were destroyed, I would certainly put Gulliver’s Travels among them.”

Jonathan Swift resources available on our site:

Jonathan Swift by Charles Jervas, oil on canvas, circa 1718 (NPG 278)
© National Portrait Gallery, London
Creative Commons License

“A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift Biography by Dr. David Cody

Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift, D.S.P.D. by Jonathan Swift

Fortunate Misfortunes: An Analysis of “Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift,” by Janice Campbell

1939 animated movie based on Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift

The Gulliver Suite by Georg Philipp Telemann

***

When will you read Jonathan Swift’s writing in Excellence in Literature?

Module 1.9 in Introduction to Literature, English 1 of the Excellence in Literature curriculum.

E1.9 Focus text: Gulliver’s Travels