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Prose

Notes Nations of the World, in Four Parts, by Lemuel Gulliver, first a surgeon, and then a captain of
several ships, better known as Gulliver’s Travels. Much of the material reflects his political
experiences of the preceding decade. For instance, the episode in which the giant Gulliver puts out
the Lilliputian palace fire by urinating on it can be seen as a metaphor for the Tories’ illegal peace
treaty; having done a good thing in an unfortunate manner. In 1726 he paid a long-deferred visit
to London, taking with him the manuscript of Gulliver’s Travels. During his visit he stayed with
his old friends Alexander Pope, John Arbuthnot and John Gay, who helped him arrange for the
anonymous publication of his book. First published in November 1726, it was an immediate hit,
with a total of three printings that year and another in early 1727. French, German, and Dutch
translations appeared in 1727, and pirated copies were printed in Ireland.
Swift returned to England one more time in 1727 and stayed with Alexander Pope once again. The
visit was cut short when Swift received word that Esther Johnson was dying and rushed back
home to be with her. On 28 January 1728, Esther Johnson died; Swift had prayed at her bedside,
even composing prayers for her comfort. Swift could not bear to be present at the end, but on the
night of her death he began to write his The Death of Mrs. Johnson. He was too ill to attend the
funeral at St. Patrick’s. Many years later, a lock of hair, assumed to be Esther Johnson’s, was found
in his desk, wrapped in a paper bearing the words, “Only a woman’s hair.”
Death became a frequent feature in Swift’s life from this point. In 1731 he wrote Verses on the
Death of Dr. Swift, his own obituary published in 1739. In 1732, his good friend and collaborator
John Gay died. In 1735, John Arbuthnot, another friend from his days in London, died. In 1738
Swift began to show signs of illness, and in 1742 he appears to have suffered a stroke, losing the
ability to speak and realizing his worst fears of becoming mentally disabled. (“I shall be like that
tree,” he once said, “I shall die at the top.”) To protect him from unscrupulous hangers on, who
had begun to prey on the great man, his closest companions had him declared of “unsound mind
and memory.” However, it was long believed by many that Swift was really insane at this point.
In his book Literature and Western Man, author J.B. Priestley even cites the final chapters of
Gulliver’s Travels as proof of Swift’s approaching “insanity”.
In part VIII of his series, The Story of Civilization, Will Durant describes the final years of Swift’s
life as such: ”Definite symptoms of madness appeared in 1738. In 1741 guardians were appointed
to take care of his affairs and watch lest in his outbursts of violence he should do himself harm. In
1742 he suffered great pain from the inflammation of his left eye, which swelled to the size of an
egg; five attendants had to restrain him from tearing out his eye. He went a whole year without
uttering a word.”
In 1744, Alexander Pope died. On October 19 1745, Swift also died. After being laid out in public
view for the people of Dublin to pay their last respects, he was buried in his own cathedral by
Esther Johnson’s side, in accordance with his wishes. The bulk of his fortune (twelve thousand
pounds) was left to found a hospital for the mentally ill, originally known as St. Patrick’s Hospital
for Imbeciles, which opened in 1757, and which still exists as a psychiatric hospital.
Major Prose Works
Swift’s first major prose work, A Tale of a Tub, demonstrates many of the themes and stylistic
techniques he would employ in his later work. It is at once wildly playful and funny while being
pointed and harshly critical of its targets. In its main thread, the Tale recounts the exploits of three
sons, representing the main threads of Christianity, who receive a bequest from their father of a
coat each, with the added instructions to make no alterations whatsoever. However, the sons soon
find that their coats have fallen out of current fashion, and begin to look for loopholes in their
father’s will that will let them make the needed alterations. As each finds his own means of getting
around their father’s admonition, they struggle with each other for power and dominance. Inserted
into this story, in alternating chapters, the narrator includes a series of whimsical “digressions” on
various subjects.

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