“Observation is an old man's memory.”

Anglo-Irish writer, essayist, satirist, and Anglican cleric

Jonathan Swift was an Anglo-Irish writer, essayist, satirist, and Anglican cleric. He is best known for Gulliver's Travels, published in 1726, and for the invention of Lilliput, the fictional island at the heart of that book. He wrote with sharp irony and political bite, and his work helped define satire in the Georgian era. He is widely regarded as a major prose author in English literature, with a reputation built on wit, severity, and a clear eye for human folly.