Satire

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Satire

• What are examples of satire that come to your
  mind?

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SATIRE
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Satire

• It is a genre of COMEDY that is directed at
  ridiculing human foibles and vices, such as
  vanity, hypocrisy, stupidity, and greed.
• It differs from pure comedy in that the aim is
  not simply to evoke laughter, but to expose and
  censure such faults, often with the aim of
  correcting them.
• The target of the satire may vary.

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Another definition

• A writing designed to make readers criticize
  themselves, society, human foolishness and
  weakness, human vices and crimes, or anything the
  writer is dissatisfied about in general in an
  attempt to bring about some sort of change.

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Satires can target an individual

• In some works, it is a particular individual, as
  in a Simpsons episode - it is directed at a
  contemporary president, George Bush, whom Matt
  Goering depicts as too strict and up-tight.

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Satires can target a group or set of people.

• An example of this is the satire against the
  members of the American military establishment in
  Joseph Hellers Catch-22 (1961).
• A satire against an institution, such as
  totalitarianism in George Orwells Animal Farm
  (1946).

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Satires can even aim at the whole of humanity

• For example, Book IV of Jonathan Swifts
  Gullivers Travels (1726). That section of the
  novel is set on an imaginary island, which is
  inhabited by two radically opposed species the
  brutish Yahoos, who have the outward form of
  human beings, and their masters, the Houyhnhnms,
  talking horses who embody the humane intelligence
  that the Yahoos entirely lack.

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Direct Satire also called formal satire

• In direct satire, the FIREST-PERSON NARRATOR
  addresses a specific audience. either the reader
  or an invented listener, whom he or she expects
  will sympathize with the views expressed.
• Direct satire is the oldest and, historically,
  most common form of satiric writing.

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Comedians like direct satire

• Because explicit satire is more efficient, it is
  the kind most likely to be presented by
  comedians.

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Indirect satire

• Indirect satire or informal satire, the usual
  mode of ridicule in stories, poems, plays or
  novels, is not cast in the form of a direct
  address to the audience.
• Rather, the indictment of the characters vices
  and lies is implied by simply representing their
  thoughts and actions.
• Sometimes that presentation is helped by the
  commentary of an INTRUSIVE THIRD-PERSON NARRATOR.

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Turn to your partner and analyze the satire in
this poem.

• By the time you swear youre his,
• Shivering and sighing,
• And he vows his passion is
• Infinite, undying
• Lady, make a note of this
• One of you is lying.
• -Dorothy Parker, Unfortunate Coincidence

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Two types of Satire

• Although satire began with the plays of
  Aristophanes, the main founders of the form were
  two Roman poets, Horace (65-68 B.C.E.) and
  Juvenal (c. 65 c. 135 C.E.). Each wrote a
  distinctive type of satire that has given its
  name to and inspired the two major categories of
  subsequent satiric works.

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Horatian Satire is gentle

• Gentle and humorous satire is called Horatian
  Satire after the writing style of the Roman
  poet Horace.
• Horatian satire is tolerant and urbane,
  indulgently mocking faults with the aim of
  evoking wry amusement rather than repulsion or
  indignation in the audience
• Characterized by playful mockery, a
  conversational and often gently instructive tone,
  and easily accessible language

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Horatian Satire

• Horatian satire places more emphasis on the
  comedic aspects, but this does not mean that it
  can not incorporate biting social commentary
  quite the opposite, in fact. The Horatian
  technique employs subtlety instead of resorting
  to a direct attack, prompting some to accuse the
  Horatian tone of an excess of tolerance.

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Mark Twain used Horatian Satire throughout
Huckleberry Finn

• " Humor must not professedly teach, and it must
  not professedly preach, but it must do both if it
  would live forever.
• Humor is mankinds greatest blessing.

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Example of Mrs. Watson

• And she took snuff, too of course that was all
  right because she done it herself.
• Turn to your partner, who or what is Twain
  satirizing?

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Another example

• The idea of Emmeline keeping a scrapbook filled
  with obituaries and accidents and cases of
  patient suffering  is not what a normal girl her
  age would do. 
• Here Twain pokes fun at the preoccupation with
  death in the mawkish drawings and bathetic verse
  of an adolescent would-be poet.

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More examples

• Lois Lowrys prize-winning childrens book The
  Giver is of Horatian Satire, as is George
  Orwells Animal Farm.
• These books both have anti-totalitarian messages.
• But because Animal Farm comes closer to being
  Horatian satire with its nostalgic barnyard and
  its lovable set of farm animals, when it was
  first submitted to American publishers they
  missed the point and turned it down saying the
  prospective market for animal stories was too
  small.

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Juvenalian satire is harsh

• It is censorious, bitterly condemning vices and
  foibles and inciting the audience to feelings of
  indignation and even disgust.
• An example is Mark Twains Puddnhead Wilson, an
  acerbic denunciation of the injustices of
  slavery.

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Juvenalian satire

• Characterized by biting sarcasm, bitter irony,
  moral indignation, pessimism, and an antagonistic
  tone.
• The object of Juvenalian satire is most often a
  specific person or social institution (as opposed
  to satirizing human folly in general), sometimes
  thinly cloaked in the guise of fiction or
  allegory.
• The Juvenalian satirist treads a fine line
  between satire and tirade.
• When successful, Juvenalian satire is a witty,
  clever condemnation of humanity's flaws. When
  unsuccessful, it resembles an extended whine that
  may prompt the reader to wonder what crawled up
  the author's rear and died.

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Jonathan Swifts A Modest Proposal if the most
famous Juvevalian satire.

• In this satire, Swift denounces the exploitation
  of Catholic peasants in his native Ireland by
  absentee British landlords, who were indifferent
  to the suffering they were causing and who were
  abetted by the apathy of the British Parliament
  and monarchy.

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You will never forget it

• Few people who read Swifts Modest Proposal
  ever forget it. Because it touches such deep
  psychic nerves, it illustrates the satirists
  major tool, which is playing with the emotions of
  readers or listeners.

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• The satirist often assumes the persona of the
  unblemished, morally superior critic who is
  beyond reproach, and as such, is uniquely
  qualified to deliver a crushing blow to whatever
  target happens to draw his or her ire.

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Range of Satire Continuum HORATIAN
................... JUVENALIAN (gentle)
(bitter) ATTACK DIRECT
................... INDIRECT (little or no
ironic diction) (much ironic diction) TARGET -
TOPICAL ................... UNIVERSAL (short-live
d, current) (long-lived)
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RANGE OF SATIRE

• Satire has a long history and occurs across
  genres ranging from Aesops fables and Shel
  Silversteins poetry to Art Buchwalds newspaper
  columns and Paul Krassners newsletter The
  Realist.
• It also includes political and social cartoons,
  such television programs as late-night talk shows
  and The Colbert Report, such movies as Wag the
  Dog and The Truman Show, and such novels as C.S.
  Lewiss Screwtape Letters and Aldous Huxleys
  Brave New World.

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Questions to ask when considering a satire

• Who or what is the target?
• What weapon (comedy technique) is being used?
• Who might not understand this satire and why?
• Who might be offended by this satire?

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