A Tale of a Tub - Johnathan Swift

Hello Learners,

This blog includes presentation, thinking activity, material and quiz on “A Tale of a Tub” by Johnathan Swift.

Jonathan Swift's Tale of the Tub is a brilliant failure. It is a prose satire intended as a defense of the Anglican church, but it was widely interpreted by contemporary readers as an attack on all religion. At the time of writing it, Swift was a junior Anglican clergyman hoping for substantial preferment in the Church. The appearance of the Tale, and its assumed message, was a serious obstacle to his promotion.

One of the things that makes the Tale difficult to interpret for that the work attacks multiple things of things at the same time: it's an allegory about religious differences; it's a satire on pedantry and false scholarship; it's a parody of the contemporary book trade; it has attached to it two further treatises, the 'Battle of the Books', and the 'Mechanical Operation of the Spirit'. This essay will examine notions of authorship, intertextuality, originality, and the relationship between parody and allegory, and try to determine how all these components fit together.

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Here’s a brief presentation on “A Tale of a Tub” discussed in the class. Go through the presentation and reading material to complete the thinking task and quiz.

A Tale of a Tub from Department of English MKBU

CLICK HERE to appear in the quiz.

Thinking Activity:-

H1.) How far do you think Digression is necessary?

I 2.)Identify any one movie/web series/song/poem/novel which talks about the sensitive topic like religion. Write in brief about it and explain what kind questions are raised through that work.

HHappy Learning!!!

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