Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift was born in Dublin in 1667, after his father's death, and studied at Trinity College, Dublin, at an uncle's expense. As a young man he was secretary to the statesman Sir William Temple and read widely in his master's library. Ordained in the Church of Ireland, he spent some years in London writing for the Tory government and was the most formidable political writer of the day; he hoped for a bishopric in England but was in the end 'exiled' back to Dublin as Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, a post he held for thirty-two years. He wrote many pamphlets on behalf of the oppressed Irish, among them A Modest Proposal, which calmly suggests that the babies of the poor be sold as food to the rich, a summit of satire. In old age he lost his reason, and he left his estate to found a hospital for the mentally ill.