Jonathan Swift in the Company of Women by Louise Barnett (review)

37 Walker’s 1984 edition, with its collation of variants, and Harold Love’s ‘‘magisterial’’ 1999 edition. I disagree with Mr. Hammond on two points: first, in a chapter on ‘‘The King’s Two Bodies,’’ he declares repeatedly that the monarchy was demythologized in the Interregnum and had to be completely reinvented after 1660. This is unlikely, since not even a generation had elapsed. The English would have remembered kingship, and, besides, monarchies were flourishing everywhere then, while ‘‘republics’’ existed chiefly in the Whig imagination. Second, Mr. Hammond misreads ‘‘To Oldham ’’ when he says that Dryden compares Oldham to ‘‘the unfortunate Nisus (who slips and loses the race) and himself with the successful Euryalus (Nisus’s friend who goes on to win).’’ Dryden would not boast of his success at the expense of a deceased friend, and he was the older of the two, like Nisus. Rather, ‘‘To Oldham’’ alludes to St. Paul’s image of life as a ‘‘race’’ (1 Cor. 9:24) and suggests that Oldham, who was immature like Euryalus, had reached the goal of immortality first. Neither of these, however, is central to The Making of Restoration Poetry’s vast erudition and subtle analysis. Mr. Hammond invites us to watch as Restoration verse emerges from under a heap of jarring atoms to attain, at the end, the harmonious form of a canon. Anne Barbeau Gardiner John Jay College, CUNY LOUISE BARNETT. Jonathan Swift in the Company of Women. Oxford: Oxford, 2007. Pp. xviii ⫹ 225. $65. Ms. Barnett has written the most sensible account to date on a topic fascinating since Swift’s contemporaries speculated about his relationships with women. Why are Swift’s relationships with women and his opinions of women still important subjects ? The truth about his involvements with ‘‘Stella’’ and ‘‘Vanessa’’ will likely never be ascertained, and many nuances of his references to women are obscure. But because they absorbed a great deal of Swift’s personal and literary attention, and figure so often as his image of fallen humanity, Swift’s views of women open a window into his opinions of religion, interpersonal relationships, politics, economics, culture, and his personal psychology. Before examining his literary references, Ms. Barnett first probes Swift’s relationships with individual women. She disputes Ehrenpreis’s Freudian conclusion that Swift was emotionally maimed by childhood separation from his mother. The decisions of Swift’s mother to place him in the care, first of a nurse, and afterward, of a wealthier uncle, were reasonable at the time and suggested not neglect, but her attempt to provide for his future. While never close to his mother, Swift displayed none of the animosity one might expect from a victim of abandonment. In the letters to Jane Waring, whom he courted in his late twenties, Ms. Barnett finds the clue to his succeeding relationships. Swift evidently broke off their engagement because he could brook neither Waring’s contrary opinions nor her failure to recognize the singular honor of his courtship. After this, Swift seems determined never to cede control to a woman, let alone permit himself to be humiliated as he had been by his fiancée. 38 Esther Johnson and Esther Vanhomrigh are instances of that resolution. In Stella, he found a protégée willing to forswear intimacy in return for public recognition. Chaperoned by Rebecca Dingley, Stella enjoyed membership in Swift’s social circle and was his closest friend. She, nevertheless, was barred from all but public companionship . Vanessa experienced the reverse. Swift delighted in their private tête-àte ̂tes but refused any public hint of their involvement. His reluctance was of course understandable due to his need to prevent Stella from learning about Vanessa. (Ms. Barnett’s logical conclusion that their relationship remained unconsummated invites debate because of the couple’s euphemistic references to ‘‘coffee.’’) She sees a similarity behind both relationships. Both women were willing to cede control to Swift— Stella sacrificing intimacy and Vanessa, acknowledgment—in order to enjoy his companionship within careful boundaries. In Vanessa’s case, Swift also avoided the sexual entanglement he feared after his failed courtship of Waring. Ms. Barnett fits together these puzzling relationships, elegantly resolving their disparities. She observes...