The Nature of Satire

THE NATURE OF SATIRE NORTHROP FRYE THE word "satire" ·belongs to that fairly large class of words which . have two meanings, one specific and technical, the other more general. In Roman literature, for instance, the study of satire is essentially the study . of a specific literary form, or rather two literary forms, of that name: the poetic satire developed by Horace and Juvenal and the prose or 'IMenip_ pea·n" satire developed by Petronius and' (in Greek) Lucian.' In English literature, with which we are at present concerned, the satire may also be and has been the name of a form. Juvenal and Horace are the models of Donne and Pope, and Lucian is the model of Swift. But this idea of a satire form is in English literature a Renaissance and neo-Classical idea: it hardly existed in the Middle Ages, and it hardly exists now) though we still have our Hilaire BeHocs and-Roy Campbells trying to blow up its dying fire with antique bellows. The word now means a tone or quality of art which we may find in any form: in a play by Shaw, a novel.. by Sinclair Lewis or a cartoon by Low. Hence in dealing with English satire we must include not only Swift and Pope) who worked with the traditional models, but all the writers who have ignored the models but -have preserved the tone and attitude of satire. A distinction essential to -the treatment of , Roman, and perhaps also' of French, satire is quite unnecessary in English literature, which has never taken kindly to strict forms. But this, like all our cherished freedoms, was won for us by our ancestors. In the year 1597 Joseph Hall, who later became a bishop, published three , books ' o-f what he called "Toothless Satires," following them with three books of "Biting Satires." Hall begins by saying that he is introducing something radically new into English literature: I first adventure, follow me who list, And be the second English satirist. He dges not mean that he has never 'heard of the Canterbury Tales or Piers Plowman: he means that from the point of view of an imitator of Juvenal and Horace they are not satires. From this point of view his claim to be first is more or less correct: that is, he was about fourth. Later in his life -Bishop Hall became involved in a controversy with Milton, who did not care for bishops. Milton carefully goes over Hall's literary output to show, as the custom then was, ' that his adversary had been a fool from birth. When he comes to the "Toothless Satires" he says that this so-called first English satirist might have learned better from Piers Plowman, besides .other works, and adds: ((But that such a Poem should be toothless I still affirm it to be a bull, taking away the essence of that which it calls itself. For if it bite neither the persons nor the vices, how is it a Satyr, and if it bite either, how is it'toothless, so that toothless Satyrs are as much as if 75 76 TH~ ' UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY . he had said toothless teeth." If there can be no toothless satires, it is the tone that makes a work of art asatire: if Langland is a great satirist because of his satiric attitude, Swift and Pope are so for the same reason, not because of their form. On this point post~rity has decided for Milton agains! the bishop. As a tone or attitude, then, two things are essential to satire. One ·is wit or humour, the other an object of attack. Attack without humour, or pure denunciation, thus forms one of the boundaries of satire; humour without attack, the humour of pure gaiety or exuberance, is the other. Now these two qualities, it is obvious, are not simply different, but opposed. For satire one needs both pleasure 1n conflict and determination to win; both the heat of battle and the coolness of calcLilation. To have too much hatred and too little gaiety will upset the. balance of tone. Man is a precocious monkey, and he wins his battles by the...