Satirists have always painted themselves as paragons, correcting the foibles of their societies and punishing wrongdoers. By contrast, literary scholars emphasise the mode’s indeterminacy, instability, and aggression, concluding that satire is too unpalatable to persuade, reform, or injure its readers. But what if they’re looking in the wrong places?
This new perspective on satire frames the question of satiric efficacy against three middlebrow writers: P.G. Wodehouse, G.K. Chesterton, and Nancy Mitford. Rather than focusing on aloof modernists or grim dystopian writers, this metacritical study recognises the satirical potency of middlebrow delight in the hands of commercially driven satirists who are motivated to defend their work and avoid the pitfalls of satiric transgression.
This line of enquiry culminates in an assessment of biographical fictions in which each writer embodies the idealised satirist, making the case that their apologias were successful, and that their satire can be considered capable of genuine impact.
This eclectic study will be of interest to students and scholars of satire, the middlebrow, and biofiction.
