Pope’s ‘Solid Pudding,’ Swift’s ‘Proposal,’ and the Poor: Poverty in Scriblerian Texts
Pope’s ‘Solid Pudding,’ Swift’s ‘Proposal,’ and the Poor: Poverty in Scriblerian Texts

Author(s): Przemysław Uściński
Subject(s): Cultural history, Studies of Literature, 19th Century, Philology, British Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Alexander Pope; Jonathan Swift; poverty; satire; compassion
Summary/Abstract: This article presents a detailed analysis of approaches to poverty in Scriblerian texts. It discusses their complex attitudes, including the debate on the appropriateness of laughing at the poor in comedy or satire, and traces to the industrial revolution the definitive social and literary locating of the sources of poverty in the ineptitude, laziness and moral turpitude of the poor themselves.

• Details
• Contents