Satire Colloquium: Gulliver to Colbert in 4 weeks

“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally
discover everybody’s face but their own.” – Jonathan Swift

Over its long history, satire has been the chosen form of the poet, philosopher, dramatist, and wit, the weapon of polemicists arguing for political, social, and often religious change. Dr. Kyle Dickson is a student of satire in general, the poets and dramatists of Britain’s golden age of satire in particular (Swift, Pope, Gay), and one evening at a restaurant in North Oxford was publicly accused of the gratuitous use of irony. Course “readings” will span the proverbial gamut from Aristophanes to The Onion, with an emphasis on the uses (and abuses) of religious satire since the Reformation. In light of Juvenal’s time-honored claim that “It is difficult not to write satire,” we will conclude by composing original satires of our own.