Book contents
- British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century
- British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I Traditions and Breaks
- Part II Publicity and Print Culture
- Chapter 6 Women’s Satires of the Literary Marketplace in Eighteenth-Century England
- Chapter 7 Charlotte Lennox, Satirical Poetry, and the Rise of Participatory Democracy
- Chapter 8 Jane Collier’s Satirical Fable
- Chapter 9 Hiding in Plain Sight
- Part III Moral Debates and Satiric Dialogue
- Appendix Selected List of Eighteenth-Century Women Writers and Their Satiric Works
- Selected Bibliography and Guide to Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 8 - Jane Collier’s Satirical Fable
Teeth, Claws, and Moral Authority in An Essay on the Art of Ingeniously Tormenting
from Part II - Publicity and Print Culture
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 31 March 2022
- British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century
- British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I Traditions and Breaks
- Part II Publicity and Print Culture
- Chapter 6 Women’s Satires of the Literary Marketplace in Eighteenth-Century England
- Chapter 7 Charlotte Lennox, Satirical Poetry, and the Rise of Participatory Democracy
- Chapter 8 Jane Collier’s Satirical Fable
- Chapter 9 Hiding in Plain Sight
- Part III Moral Debates and Satiric Dialogue
- Appendix Selected List of Eighteenth-Century Women Writers and Their Satiric Works
- Selected Bibliography and Guide to Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Jane Collier’s An Essay on the Art of Ingeniously Tormenting (1753) combines the reforming strategies of satire, conduct writing, and fable. The collision of these forms creates a fabular hybrid, a text in which fabular elements are folded into the generic markers of the conduct book, resulting in an intensification of the satire of conduct writing and infusing it with a moral claim. In the preface to her excoriating exposure of the abuses of power in domestic life, Collier applauds Jonathan Swift’s Directions to Servants for its “ingenuity,” the descriptor she applies to her own manual, and the text bears comparison to the Scriblerian project with its satire of both medium and message. The three sections into which Ingeniously Tormenting is divided emphasize the satire of the conduct book. The concluding fable of the Lion, the Leopard, the Lynx, and the Lamb, however, forces a rereading of Ingeniously Tormenting and points to John Gay’s fables. When references to animals, teeth, and claws to describe human behavior are echoed in the real teeth and claws of the animals in the fable, the essay’s tone darkens. The fable’s placement at the end of the book reflects the ironic inversion characteristic of satire.
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- British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century , pp. 152 - 171Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022