Book contents
- Jonathan Swift in Context
- Jonathan Swift in Context
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Notes on Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Part I Personal
- Part II Publishing History and Legacy
- Part III Literary Background
- Part IV Genres
- Part V The External World
- Part VI Social and Intellectual Topics
- Chapter 35 Philosophy
- Chapter 36 Science
- Chapter 37 Race
- Chapter 38 Material Culture
- Chapter 39 Gender
- Chapter 40 Colonialism
- Chapter 41 The Body
- Chapter 42 Demography
- Chapter 43 Food
- Chapter 44 Economics
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 41 - The Body
from Part VI - Social and Intellectual Topics
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 May 2024
- Jonathan Swift in Context
- Jonathan Swift in Context
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Notes on Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Part I Personal
- Part II Publishing History and Legacy
- Part III Literary Background
- Part IV Genres
- Part V The External World
- Part VI Social and Intellectual Topics
- Chapter 35 Philosophy
- Chapter 36 Science
- Chapter 37 Race
- Chapter 38 Material Culture
- Chapter 39 Gender
- Chapter 40 Colonialism
- Chapter 41 The Body
- Chapter 42 Demography
- Chapter 43 Food
- Chapter 44 Economics
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Swift excels where abstract philosophy collides with concrete forms. The first two sections of this chapter focus on Gulliver’s Travels, in which airy discourses on principles and abstract intellectual scenarios are inevitably perforated by the coarse realities of the body. His painstaking attention to corporeality unravels the polite discourses that help people distance themselves from the embarrassing ailments, extrusions, flaws, and failures that their bodies always comprise. The final section of the chapter shifts to Swift’s poems on female beauty, which, this chapter argues, revel in bodily disaggregation.
Keywords
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- Information
- Jonathan Swift in Context , pp. 327 - 334Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024