Satire

A literary device holding up human vices and follies to ridicule and scorn

An Example…

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Types of Satire

• Horatian – gentle, urbane, smiling. It aims to correct with broadly sympathetic laughter.

• Juvenalian – biting, bitter, angry. It points out the corruption of human beings and institutions with contempt

Analysis

• Look for the following rhetorical devices:• Caricature• Hyperbole• Understatement• Irony• Wit• Sarcasm• Allusion• Juxtaposition

The Cynic’s Dictionary

• Abstainer – a person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure. – Ambrose Bierce

• Adult – one who has ceased to grow vertically but not horizontally – Kevin Goldstein-Jackson

• Advertising – Legalised lying – H.G. Wells• Fishing – an excuse to drink in the daytime –

Jimmy Cannon

Cynic’s Dictionary

• Money – the only likeable thing about rich people – Lady Astor

• Monogamy – monotony –Zsa Zsa Gabor• Science – the art of systematic over-

simplification – Karl Popper• Statistics – like a bikini: what they reveal is

suggestive, but what they conceal is vital—Aaron Levenstein

Democracy and its definition

• A system in which you say what you like and do what you’re told.—Gerard Barry

• A system of choosing your dictators, after they’ve told you what you think it is you want to hear.—Alan Coven

• Government by discussion – but it’s only effective if you can stop people talking.—Clement Attlee

• An institution in which the whole is equal to the scum of its parts.—Keith Preston

Democracy and its definition

• A political system that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few. – George Bernard Shaw

• The aristocracy of blackguards. – Lord Byron• The worst form of government – except for all

the others. –Winston Churchill• The art of running the circus from the monkey

cage.—H.L. Mencken

The Bill of Rights

• Too cumbersome at 10

Satire ExamplesThe Onion and The Hummus

• Brookings Institute goals:• Strengthen American democracy; • Foster the economic and social welfare,

security and opportunity of all Americans and • Secure a more open, safe, prosperous and

cooperative international system.

Questions to Answer

• What is the overall message we are to believe? What is the article satirizing?

• What literary devices are used to advance/demonstrate this message?

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