A Tale of a Tub

This article is about the satire by Jonathan Swift. For the 1633 play by Ben Jonson, see A Tale of a Tub (play).

Nature of the satire

Upon its publication, the public realized both that there was an allegory in the story of the brothers and that there were particular political references in the Digressions. A number of "Keys" appeared soon thereafter. For a contemporary analogy, think of services like Cliffs Notes or, on the web, Spark Notes. "Keys" offered the reader a commentary on the Tale and explanations of its references. Edmund Curll rushed out a Key to the work, and William Wotton offered up an "Answer" to the author of the work.

Related Topics:
Cliffs Notes - Edmund Curll

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Swift's targets in the Tale included indexers, note-makers, and, above all, people who saw "dark matter" in books. He attacks criticism generally, and he appeared to be delighted by the fact that one of his enemies, William Wotton, had offered to explain the Tale in an "answer" to the book and that one of the men he had explicitly attacked, Curll, had offered to explain the book to the public. In the fifth edition of the book in 1705, Swift provided an apparatus to the work that incorporated Wotton's explanations and Swift's narrator's own notes as well. The notes appear to occasionally provide genuine information and just as often to mislead, and William Wotton's name, a defender of the Moderns, was appended to a number of notes. This allows Swift to make the commentary part of the satire itself, as well as to elevate his narrator to the level of self-critic.

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It is hard to say what the Tale's satire is about, since it is about any number of things. It is most consistent in attacking misreading of all sorts. Both in the narrative sections and the digressions, the single human flaw that underlies all the follies Swift attacks is over-figurative and over-literal reading, both of the Bible and of poetry and political prose. The narrator is seeking hidden knowledge, mechanical operations of things spiritual, spiritual qualities to things physical, and alternate readings of everything.

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Within the "tale" sections of the book, Peter, Martin, and Jack fall into bad company (becoming the official religion of the Roman empire) and begin altering their coats (faith) by adding ornaments. They then begin relying on Peter to be the arbitrator of the will, and he begins to rule by authority (he remembered the handyman saying that he once heard the father say that it was alright to put on more ornaments), until such a time that Jack rebels against the rule of Peter. Jack begins to read the will (the Bible) overly literally. He rips the coat to shreds to try to restore the original state of the garment (equivalent of the "primitive Christianity" sought by dissenters). He begins to rely only upon "inner illumination" for guidance and thus walks around with his eyes closed, after swallowing candle snuffs. Eventually, Peter and Jack begin to resemble one another, and only Martin is left with a coat that is at all like the original.

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An important factor in the reception of Swift's work is that the narrator of the work is an extremist in every direction. Consequently, he can no more construct a sound allegory than he can finish his digressions without losing control (eventually confessing that he is insane). For a Church of England reader, the allegory of the brothers provides small comfort. Martin has a corrupted faith, one full of holes and still with ornaments on it. His only virtue is that he avoids the excesses of his brothers, but the original faith is lost to him. Readers of the Tale have picked up on this unsatisfactory resolution to both "parts" of the book, and A Tale of a Tub has often been offered up as evidence of Swift's misanthropy.

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As has recently been argued by Michael McKeon, Swift might best be described as a severe skeptic, rather than a Whig, Tory, empiricist, or religious writer. He supported the Classics in the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns, and he supported the established church and the aristocracy, because he felt the alternatives were worse. He argued elsewhere that there is nothing inherently virtuous about a noble birth, but its advantages of wealth and education made the aristocrat a better ruler than the equally virtuous but unprivileged commoner. A Tale of a Tub is a perfect example of Swift's devastating intellect at work. By its end, little seems worth believing in.

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Formally, the satire in the Tale is historically novel for several reasons. First, Swift more or less invented prose parody. In the "Apology for the &c." (which was added in 1705), Swift explains that his work is, in several places, a "parody," which is where he imitates the style of persons he wishes to expose. What is interesting is that the word "parody" had not been used for prose before, and the definition he offers is arguably a parody of John Dryden defining "parody" in the "Preface to the Satires." Prior to Swift, parodies were imitations designed to bring mirth, but not primarily in the form of mockery. (For example, Dryden himself imitated the Aeneid in "MacFlecknoe" to describe the apotheosis of a dull poet, but the imitation made fun of the poet, and not of Virgil.)

Related Topics:
John Dryden - Aeneid

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Additionally, Swift's satire is relatively unique in that he offers no resolutions. While he ridicules any number of foolish habits, he never offers the reader a positive set of values to embrace. While this type of satire became more common as people imitated Swift, later, Swift is quite unusual in offering the readers no way out. He does not persuade to any position, but he does persuade readers from an assortment of positions. This is one of the qualities that has made the Tale Swift's least-read major work.

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