Shelley’s Swellfoot the Tyrant : Poetic Satire on Politics

Shelley’s Swellfoot the Tyrant : Poetic Satire on Politics

The main object of this essay is to study Shelley’s poetic satire on the current politics in Swellfoot the Tyrant. In the work, Shelley dramatises his contemporary contemporary political affair, the Queen Caroline scandal. Appropriating the materials of the current politics, Shelley ridicules both the leadership of contemporary authority and the political culture of England. The lack of mentality or imagination in contemporary leadership is directly related with the lack of poetic quality in language and the mind. They are the major cause of social and political corruption and misrule. Derision and mockery are Shelley’s major purpose in composing the work. Similar features are provided by the famous political cartoonists of the day, James Gillray and George Cruikshank. At the same time, however, inducing a response of laughter from his audience, he also attempts to conceptualise the idea of revolution and contemplates the intricate relationship between tyranny, oppression and language. Revolution and the dethroning of the symbolic order are a major topic in Swellfoot the Tyrant. However, with his treatment of treason in a farcical and comic manner, Shelley removes its seriousness from the social and political context.