The Invisible Satirist

Uden, James

doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199387274.001.0001

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…To refute Tutchin's argument Defoe wrote The True-Born Englishmen (1701), a counter-attack also inspired by Juvenal's eighth satire that exposes 'the foolishness of [the ilk of Tutchin's] false pride in their own lineage.' 27 Given the prevalence of this vice, Gildon is right and proper to recapitulate Juvenal's argument that virtuous behaviour, not a noble pedigree, makes one truly noble. Perhaps to him, the English pride in pedigree has equally affected the moral reform of the SRMs, and thus only members of the lower classes are penalised for their moral offences.…”

Section: Gildon and The Reformation Of Manners Movementmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Nobilitas sola est atq; unica Virtus’: Spying and the Politics of Virtue in The Golden Spy; or, A Political Journal of the British Nights Entertainments (1709)

Wu¹

2016

J Eighteenth Century Stud

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This article reassesses the current scholarly tendency to interpret Charles Gildon's The Golden Spy (1709) as the first fully fledged English object narrative by examining this fiction as a social critique of the reformation of manners movement in the late Stuart period. Special attention is paid to its contemporaneous reception, literary precursors and contributions to the debates concerning moral reform. The article argues that Gildon's fictional experimentation, not least the deployment of narrating spy gold coins, seeks not just to delight by its novelty but also to dynamise contemporary readers' reflection on the godly reformation and its politics of virtue.

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Section: Gildon and The Reformation Of Manners Movementmentioning

confidence: 99%