Jonathan Swift: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)

McMinn, Joseph

St.Martin's

An illustrated account of Jonathan Swift's (1667-1745) extensive and lifelong travels in Ireland from Antrim to Kerry and Galway to Wicklow. Quotes from his critical and detailed observations about people, culture, and landscape, are enhanced by a wide range of contemporary illustrations of the places and people he describes. Swift emerges not as the misanthropic recluse of his reputation, but an energetic and sociable writer utterly committed to the improvement and well-being of Ireland and the Irish. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

Jonathan's Travels: Swift and Ireland

Literature & Fiction

History & Criticism

Appletree Press, [

<p>This biography emphasises the extraordinary versatility and resourcefulness of a lifetime spent serving the public interest with the pen. At the same time, it shows Swift's distinctive love of writing for personal entertainment and diversion, with little or no interest in publication. While remaining a fiercely committed writer, he always tried to preserve, especially in his poetry and letters, a literature dedicated to friendship. Swift's literary career comprises much more than the well-known satires.</p>

Biographies & Memoirs

PALGRAVE~MACMILLAN

This biography emphasises the extraordinary versatility and resourcefulness of a lifetime spent serving the public interest with the pen. At the same time, it shows Swift's distinctive love of writing for personal entertainment and diversion, with little or no interest in publication. While remaining a fiercely committed writer, he always tried to preserve, especially in his poetry and letters, a literature dedicated to friendship. Swift's literary career comprises much more than the well-known satires.

This book contains the proceedings of the Seventh Triennial Conference of the I.A.S.A.I.L. held at Coleraine in July of 1988.

Internationalism of Irish Literature and Drama (Irish Literacy Studies Series)

British & Irish

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

In Swift and the Artsùthe first comprehensive study of Swift and the non-literary artsùJoseph McMinn challenges the widespread view shared by Swift's biographer, Irvin Ehrenpreis, that Swift largely ignored most artistic and cultural activities outside literature. The study presents a systematic, historical account of Swift's engagement with a range of artistic activities in both Ireland and England, principally in the areas of music, gardening, theater, architecture, and painting, and shows how the "sister arts" provoked and inspired a wide range of work in his prose and poetry. Swift's perspective on the arts is essentially sceptical rather than indifferent, satirical rather than earnest, and contrasts strongly with that of his close friend, Alexander Pope, one of the leading virtuosi of the eighteenth century.Swift is a shrewd and humorous observer of the changing artistic and cultural scene in both Ireland and England, and his views on these changes in public taste are an important, albeit neglected, part of his biography. His correspondence, especially his Journal to Stella, shows us someone very aware of the various arts and of their lively emergence from the enclosed world of the Puritan era. Many of Swift's friends and acquaintances were serious collectors of paintings, sculpture, coins, medals and Swift himself eventually enjoyed an interesting and revealing collection of artistic artifacts, as this study shows.His satirical response to some of the new fashions and trends in cultural matters, for example with regard to Italian opera and the emergence of "literary gardens," reveals new aspects of his religious and aesthetic values. It also shows that Swift, like many of his contemporaries, regarded some of the arts as "foreign" and therefore unsuitable to the British national character. Such a prejudice with regard to cultural imports sometimes reveals a conservative and puritanical aesthetic in Swift. As Dean of St. Patrick's, Swift was purposeful and dedicated on the question of music as part of the liturgy, and was very aware of the controversies surrounding sacred and secular music. Indeed, Swift's clerical role is shown to be fundamental to his critical discrimination between the comparative virtues of the arts. This book hopes to broaden an understanding of Swift's relationship to Enlightenment thinking about the role of the arts in eighteenth-century society, and to explore how the politics and the theology of his Irish situation determined his unique perspective on the arts. His views on these matters are an important part of Swift's lifelong arguments about the relative virtues of the Ancients and the Moderns.

Jonathan Swift and the Arts

UNKNO

<p>This is the first comprehensive account of Swift's engagement with the arts in Ireland and England. It both documents and reflects upon his attitudes toward music, gardening, theatre, architecture, and painting, and suggests that, despite his often sceptical attitude towards the non-literary arts, he saw them as a rich source of inspiration and entertainment for both his poetry and prose. This study also opens up a previously neglected part of Swift's biography, showing how his growing awareness of the 'sister-arts' was deeply influenced by his social and political circles in both Ireland and England, especially by the rise of the virtuoso, the connoisseur and the art collector, most notably in the person of his close friend, Alexander Pope. In the wider context of the European Enlightenment, this study tries to account for Swift's attitude toward the changing and expanding world of artistic and aesthetic appreciation.</p>

University of Delaware Press

A publication of the Mediterranean Consortium for the 32nd International Geological Congress

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Books by McMinn, Joseph

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by McMinn, Joseph. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Jonathan Swift: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)

Jonathan's Travels: Swift and Ireland

Jonathan Swift: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)

Jonathan Swift: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)

Internationalism of Irish Literature and Drama (Irish Literacy Studies Series)

Jonathan Swift and the Arts

Jonathan Swift and the Arts

Jonathan Swift: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)