The Satiric Eye: Forms of Satire in the Romantic Period

"The Satiric Eye" is a compelling collection of essays on satiric writing, images, and theatrical performances from 1780 1832. The title alludes to Wordsworth's famous "inward eye / Which is the bliss of solitude" and is meant to raise significant critical questions about inwardness, solitude, sincerity, and authenticity. These diverse contributions on everything from advertising to Jane Austen, graphic pamphlets to the pantomime, illuminate with a satiric eye many presuppositions about early nineteenth century literature. Taken together, they challenge the critical conventions about what matters in the Romantic period, nature, the Gothic, revolution, sentiment, beauty, and what critics have defined the essentially literary qualities of Romanticism. In their range, the essays both decentre Romanticism and reorient the canonical works, authors, and the critical constructs that have defined it.