Hey Presto!

Ormsby-Lennon's thesis is both provocatively original and as old as Jonathan Swift's Tale of a Tub itself: he argues that Swift's greatest satire is irreligious and that the nature of Swift's irreligion in the Tale is "willful illogicality," particularly "the kaleidoscopic way which Swift rotates the variegated stuff that sustains that illogicality." Ormsby-Lennon (Villanova Univ.) carries this thesis into many dimly lit corners of the archive, centrally and most importantly the late Restoration and more generally the history of satire and learning. This array of contexts historicizes the Tale as never before. Indeed, this book's chief strength is its careful, sustained exhumation of so much relevant material. The author has unearthed enough unfamiliar sources for Swift's satire as to require a lexicon for ready comprehension--terms like terrae filius and circumforaneity make regular appearances, for example. The "mountebank's stage," however, with its connotations of itinerancy, volubility, and fraudulence, becomes the chief metaphor for Swift's method throughout the Tale. Even if any number of Ormsby-Lennon's claims come under revision, qualification, or correction, the book's sheer contextualizing detail makes it an invaluable, sustaining resource for future Swift scholarship. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. * CHOICE *
Hey Presto! Swift and the Quacks is a work of vast erudition and sharp insight, and provides one of the most interesting recent developments in Swift studies. * American Behavioral Scientist *