Leslie Stephen — Swift

London, Macmillan and Co, 1908. Leather. A bright clean biography of Swift by Leslie Stephen. Beautifully bound in leather with gilt lettering and decoration. With an armorial binding from Heddon Court. From the 'English Men of Letters' series. Jonathan Swift, 1667 – 1745, was a satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer, poet and cleric, who later became Dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin. Swift is probably the foremost prose satirist in the English language and originally published all of his works under pseudonyms or anonymously. As the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography states, Swift as "one of the very best letter-writers in English, and his correspondence speaks of a vivid and intensely sociable engagement with the public and private worlds about him. His poetry—raucous, acerbic, challenging, amusing, and occasionally moving—includes the most vivid representation of the human voice in any contemporary poetry. Together the letters and poems constitute an autobiography of the man. His work has provoked strong responses from each generation of readers, and he is one of those writers whose effect on our minds and imagination will not go away." Sir Leslie Stephen, KCB, 1832 – 1904, was an English author, critic and mountaineer, and the father of Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell. He was also the first editor of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. In a full calf binding. There is slight wear to the extremities, including slight bumping and discolouration. There is a prize nameplate on the front pastedown. The binding is tight and firm. Internally the pages are clean and bright. Very Good . Ill.: None. Very Good .