Write your abstract
here.
A book whose plotline evolved as it was written, in
fact a
book which
owes its existence to the protracted
character
of the dispute it engages, DRAPIER'S
LETTERS is
simultaneously a masterpiece of fact and fiction. The
Drapier, Swift's persona through most of the letters,
is a
masterpiece of characterization, as are all Swift's
voices.
(How good was Swift at assuming voices not his own? A
professor I know once demonstrated to a class, by every
available method of textual analysis and scansion, that
five passages from Swift with different narrators were
written by five different people. Computer analysis I'm
certain would tell you the same.) The facts exposed in
the
letters, on the other hand, are as rigorously and
meticulously factual as is humanly possible---certainly
Swift observes a far higher standard than is common in
comparably polemical works. (To recognize what a
creation
is the downright, honest (not always grammatically or
syntactically pinpoint) voice of the Drapier, simply
contrast it with Swift writing in his own voice in A
Letter
to the Lord Chancellor Middleton.)
the first point at issue in the Drapier's Letters was a
request made in Ireland to the Crown in England to coin
a
new issue of farthings and
halfpence. England's Crown
(and
Parliament) were pleased to award the commission to an
Englishman, William Wood, whom the Irish Parliament
promptly complained of since nobody in Ireland knew or
trusted him, and there were Irish candidates eager to
serve
at a less rate of profit. Besides it soon appeared that
Wood's coins were seriously underweight and easy to
counterfeit. Swift made no doubt Wood, who was
guaranteed a
gouging profit simply on the short weights, would not
fall
behind others in counterfeiting his own coins. Such a
flood
of these undervalued coins and their raps would soon
strip
Ireland of every gold and silver coin that could be
offered
in exchange, plus its wool and other goods. Ireland,
whose
economy was already depressed, would be ruined in
perpetuity.
The second point became more crucial to Swift as the
campaign went on and he saw what lengths the English
were
prepared to go to force Wood's halfpence on a nation
united
in its determination not to have them. It was Ireland's
status, in English eyes, as a 'depending kingdom'---in
all
but name, a nation of slaves. England saw a real risk
of
its supremacy over Ireland slipping to a mere equality
if
resistance on a point such as this could be sustained
against it---therefore it was declared treasonous to
oppose
Wood's halfpence and farthings further. This was the
moment
to pull back if you feared the hangman's noose. It was
the
moment to stand forth more boldly than ever if you
wanted
to help Ireland (should it wish) reclaim its
independence.
This was the moment when Swift spoke out most boldly;
stepped out from behind the Drapier's mask, to speak in
his
own voice unmistakably. (This is a work Canada's own
Northrop Frye repeatedly declared a dated and
negligible
piece of propaganda.)