BIZARRE: Jonathan swift | Mind Blowing Facts

Gulliver fans celebrate three centuries of Jonathan Swift’s classic satire

Events in Ireland explore origins of Gulliver’s Travels, the Dublin clergyman’s book that became an instant hit in 1726

The Guardian - UK · 18h ago

Gulliver’s Travels at 300: a satire of the Anglo-Irish and the folly of allegiance to empire

Gulliver’s Travels, first published on October 28 1726, is a masterpiece of satire that continues to have the power to provoke, to amuse, and to shock. Most readers familiar with it will know that its author, Jonathan Swift, was not only Irish-born but was Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral in…

The Conversation · Oct 27

Washington reflecting pool saga is just the latest example of man trying to dominate nature – and losing

US President Donald Trump’s “restoration” of the reflecting pool that stretches between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument has been dogged by questions over cost and now by the president’s claims it has been vandalised.

The Conversation · Jun 26

Gerry Adams tells high court he was stunned by 1996 Docklands bombing

Former Sinn Féin leader, who is being sued for symbolic damages, also denies any prior knowledge of the attack

The Guardian - UK · Mar 18

Plan to turn Irish borderlands into Unesco ‘region of literature’

Arts group proposes literary routes across 11 counties linked to writers from Jonathan Swift to Lisa McGee

The Guardian - UK · Mar 8

Arborescence by Rhett Davis review – why would people turn into trees?

This quietly satirical speculative novel tells a story of metamorphosis, but feels insulated from real ecological crisis

The Guardian - UK · Jan 6

Jane Austen was a satirist – why isn’t she treated like one?

From the pompous vanity of Sir Walter Elliot in Persuasion (1817), to the shallow reading habits of Isabella in Northanger Abbey (1817), few characters in the works of Jane Austen are spared the gentle satire of her famously ironic narrative voice. Similarly, some of her best remembered characters, like Elizabeth…

The Conversation · Aug 4, 2025

Alan Strachan obituary

Director in the West End and regional theatre for five decades who often worked with the playwright Alan Ayckbourn

The Guardian - UK · Jun 18, 2025

Many life-saving drugs fail for lack of funding. But there’s a solution: desperate rich people

Each year, hundreds of potentially world-changing treatments are discarded because scientists run out of cash. But where big pharma or altruists fear to tread, my friend and I have a solution. It’s repugnant, but it will work

The Guardian - UK · Mar 11, 2025

Trolling feels like a new phenomenon. But it existed long before the internet

Trolling on the internet looks and feels like a new phenomenon. Abuse can rain down on a target instantly and from everywhere, in quantities never before seen. But as David Rudrum’s engaging book on the history of trolling shows, the desire to hurt or distract another with words goes back…

The Conversation · Feb 19, 2025