Selected by
New York Times Book Review as a Best Book Since 2000
"Damrosch tells this story . . . with great energy and elegantly worn erudition. He restores to Swift the dignity he deserves, reminding us that the really shocking things about him lie not in his life but in his work."–Fintan O'Toole,
New York Review of Books "Superb. . . . Damrosch's outstanding book has raised Swift's provocative genius to life. . . . Damrosch has brought [Swift's] vision into sharp focus and exposed its disquieting relevance."–Jeffrey Collins,
Wall Street Journal "An excellent book. Leo Damrosch . . . writes entertainingly and is comfortable with political and philosophical ideas as well as with literary matters."–Michael Dirda,
Washington Post "Damrosch writes with wit and constructs a compelling portrait of the Irish clergyman, whose satires delighted and scandalized eighteenth-century Britain."–
New Yorker, "Briefly Noted"
"Convincing and vivid. . .. Damrosch has . . . let us glimpse the human roots of Swift's sometimes inhuman irony."–John Mullan,
The Guardian "Convincing and vivid. . . . Damrosch has . . . let us glimpse the human roots of Swift's sometimes inhuman irony."–John Mullan,
The Guardian "A lively and pleasurable experience: vigorous, compassionate, occasionally pugnacious, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny. . . . Damrosch's book, and the centuries-old voices in it, are alive and talking to us."–Laura Collins-Hughes,
Boston Globe "Damrosch's approach is forensic. . . . For me the Swift who emerges from these patient investigations is a more rounded personality."–George Walden,
Times (UK)
"Damrosch is incisive about Swift's personality . . . and writes with fine Swiftian clarity, but does not simplify. He acknowledges that, investigating Swift, you run into a revolving door of contradictions. . . . But Damrosch sees him, rightly, not just as a tragic figure but as a fearless thinker whose works are an antidote to optimism's happy lies."–John Carey,
London Sunday Times "Masterly in its control, . . . contriving to blend informality with solid argumentation. . . . What Damrosch has given us is superior to anything that has gone before, in . . . a work where everyone will find a fascinating store of information and enjoyment."–Pat Rogers,
New Criterion "Do read Leo Damrosch's compelling biography. . . . Here is a book to delight and instruct both the general reader and the specialist. Damrosch masterfully fleshes out the fascinating and complex life of this Anglican clergyman, champion of the oppressed Irish, and brilliant satirist who lived in an age equally fascinating and complex."–Karen Swallow Prior,
Books & Culture "Leo Damrosch's. . . wonderful and absorbing biography of Swift . . [is] by far the most balanced, nuanced and persuasive biography of Swift so far. Damrosch is a fine scholar who knows Swift's works and his age very well indeed. . .It should remind the reader what a wonderful writer Swift is and send us enthusiastically back to the texts - something few biographies ever succeed in doing."–Andrew Carpenter, Irish Times
"The book, far from being a dry academic analysis based on sketchy records, is a romp through the years when Britain became established as a world power. . . . Damrosch writes with wry humour and clarity of detail, often cuttingly disputing the theories of previous Swift biographers. To read this hefty book is to get a highly enjoyable education."–Claire Looby,
Irish Times "If Damrosch follows Ehrenpreis in anything, it's in the ambition, indicated by his 'life and world' subtitle, to ground biography in social context. He does that job with efficiency and a sure touch."–Thomas Keymer,
London Review of Books "[Damrosch] writes elegantly, has exactly the right mix of empathy and detachment, and is admirably open-minded in his approach to complex evidence–some of it the product of very new scholarship. . . . This will be the definitive life of Swift for years to come."–Jonathan Bate,
New Statesman "A well written biography in a lively voice with an engaging and plausible portrait of Swift, integrating his strengths and weakness well, bringing him to life."–James E. May,
Eighteenth-Century Intelligencer A
New York Times Notable Book of 2013
"A fine biography. . . . Damrosch is an ingenious, learned hypothesizer on matters lost to history and an adept guide to Swift's works. . . . Even Swift's contemporaries were, often enough, not sure what to make of them. One such called Swift 'my hieroglyphic friend.' And that's fine with me. Let the mystery continue, the interpretations and speculations flourish, and the greatest ironist in the English language continue to be read and puzzled over."–Katherine A. Powers,
Barnes & Noble Review "An impressive feat of scholarship filled with insightful readings of Swift's work, as well as extensive illustrations that help to vivify the world of this satiric master."–
Publishers Weekly "A feisty, first-class life of the sage and scourge of English literature. . . . Damrosch is bent on both correcting the record and adding to it, creating a fresh and vivid life even as he wrestles with previous biographers. . . . This is the kind of biography where you come to feel you know the subject personally. A rich and rewarding portrait of an irreplaceable genius."–
Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"We live in an age when we sorely need a Swift; instead we have Jon Stewart. Modest recompense is to be found in Leo Damrosch's new life of Swift."–Lucas Wittmann,
Daily Beast "Damrosch's tolerance for mystery is one of the outstanding features of his spellbinding biography. . . . Such questions are a sign of scrupulous intellectual integrity. They also deepen Damrosch's narrative, giving us a visceral sense of biography's essential tasks, which are not only to solve a life's puzzles but to remark them. . . . Swift's passions still burn through Gulliver's uncanny adventures, and in Damrosch's exceptional book."–Marcela Valdes,
Critical Mass: The Blog of the National Book Critics Circle "Damrosch invites other scholars into the pages of his book . . . and he also animates his readers by enlisting them in the discussion."–Frances Ferguson,
Studies in English Literature A Best Book of 2013,
The Daily Beast, literary editor Lucas Wittmann
Received an Honorable Mention for the 2013 American Publishers Awards for Professional and Scholarly Excellence (PROSE), in the Biography & Autobiography category.
Winner of the 2013 National Book Critics Circle Award in the category of Biography
Columbia University 2014 Pulitzer Prize Finalist in the Biography/Autobiography category
Finalist for the Biographers International Organization 2014 Plutarch Award for Best Biography of the Year, Selected by other biographers
"Leo Damrosch conjures up Jonathan Swift with hallucinatory vividness, allowing the contradictions of this baffling, elusive genius full rein. He recovers in rich detail the world in which
Gulliver's Travels and other enduring masterpieces were created. This is a brilliant and humane biography."–Stephen Greenblatt, author of
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern "Thoroughly researched, vividly written and convincingly argued, Leo Damrosch's new biography of Jonathan Swift more than holds its own among such great predecessors as Walter Scott and Irvin Ehrenpreis, and presents a standard that contemporary scholarly prose is rarely capable of matching."–Robert Mahony, The Catholic University of America
"Immensely enjoyable and fast-paced."–Louis Menand, author of
The Metaphysical Club
