British Satire and the Politics of Style, 1789-1832

Description

This book surveys and interprets the hundreds of satirical poems and prose narratives published in Britain during the Romantic period. Although satire was a major genre with a wide readership, such works have been largely neglected by literary scholars, satisfied that satire disappeared in the late eighteenth century. Paying as much attention to now-forgotten figures like John Wolcot ('Peter Pindar') and Jane Taylor as to Byron, Gary Dyer argues that contemporary political and social conflicts gave new meanings to conventions of satire inherited from classical Rome and eighteenth-century England. Situating these satires in their cultural and material context sheds light on issues such as the tactics satirists used to deflect prosecution for sedition, and the ramification for women writers of satire's 'masculine' connotations. The book includes a bibliography of more than 700 volumes containing satirical verses.

"...Gary Dyer's British Satire and the Politics of Style, 1789-1832 makes a much needed contribution to our sense of the period." Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 "Dyer's book is an important beginning to a needed reappraisal of Romantic satire. His mapping of the field establishes benchmarks from which future studies will profit." David A. Kent, Romantic Circles Reviews "...a convincing case for the ongoing importance of Johnson's example as an access to central issues in eighteenth-century studies." Helen Deutsch, Modern Philology "Every student of the period will fond something to discover in this list, and anyone who has worked along the fringes of the Romantic Canon will appreciate the hard work and scrupulous scholarship it represents." Wordsworth Circle "British Satire and the Politics of Style is a worthwhile book, a useful introduction to a neglected body of writing...Dyer's is a valuable study...a very welcome contribution." Studies in Romanticism