[lbo-talk] Hipsters vs. Mormons

[Carrol Cox]

I don't know where the idea would come from that satire was fiction.
Most of the great satirists -- Hoace, Juvenal, Jonson, Dryden,
Rochester, Pope, Swift, Johnson presented their satires as statements of
what  was actually happening in the world, not as "fictions." The middle
name of George II of England was "Augustus"; he had always wanted to be
a military hero; he didn't know English very well, and spent a lot of
his time visiting his mistress in Germany. Horace had written and
Epistle to Augustus, for the most part _not_ tongue in cheek, in which
heargued for the importance of poetry.

Pope wrote an Epistle to Augustus, an imitation of Horace, translation
changed in various ways to fit the present, addressed to George II.
Horace in listing the merits of Augustus had spoken of his military
feats abroad.  Pope "translates": Thy country, first, in arms abroad
defend." He couldn't quite be charged with lese majeste (sp?) without
the accuser actually committing the crime, but everyone new the arms
abroad were those  of Madame Walmoden.

That's how most satire has always worked, even when embodied in a
fiction (e.g., Gulliver'*Travels) -- but that was not typical of Swift's
satire.

Carrol